Tells the Facts, Names the Names

Tariq Ali rappelle l’importance du rapport Henry Campbell-Bannerman de 1907 : Blinded by Israel, Visionless in Gaza. Si tu ne le connais pas, c’est un document incontournable :
▻http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/07/22/blinded-by-israel-visionless-in-gaza

Few British citizens are aware of the role their own country played in creating this mess. It was a long time ago when Britain was an Empire and not a vassal, but the echoes of history never fade away. It was not by accident, but by design that the British decided to create a new state and it wasn’t Balfour alone. The Alternate Information Center in Beit Sahour, a joint Palestinian-Israeli organization promoting justice, equality and peace for Palestinians and Israelis recently put up a post. It was a quote from The Bannerman Report written in 1907 by the Prime Minister of Great Britain, Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, and, as it was strategically important it was suppressed and was never released to the public until many years later:

“There are people (the Arabs, Editor’s Note) who control spacious territories teeming with manifest and hidden resources. They dominate the intersections of world routes. Their lands were the cradles of human civilizations and religions. These people have one faith, one language, one history and the same aspirations. No natural barriers can isolate these people from one another … if, per chance, this nation were to be unified into one state, it would then take the fate of the world into its hands and would separate Europe from the rest of the world. Taking these considerations seriously, a foreign body should be planted in the heart of this nation to prevent the convergence of its wings in such a way that it could exhaust its powers in never-ending wars. It could also serve as a springboard for the West to gain its coveted objects.”

What is Clintonism?
▻http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/07/25/what-is-clintonism

Reaganism took hold almost immediately upon the turn in capitalism’s trajectory. Thus Jimmy Carter was America’s first Reaganite president. But Carter only got on the track half-heartedly, and not before the final years of his presidency.

Reagan was not even the most important Reaganite leader in the early days. That dubious honor falls to Margaret Thatcher. It was within the government she led in Great Britain that Reaganite theory and practice fully took shape.

This is why, in the Anglophone world outside the United States, Reaganism is called “Thatcherism.”

Americans are too provincial to follow suit, but this isn’t the only reason for naming the phenomenon after the Gipper. Since the end of the Second World War, Britain has been America’s junior partner — unable, on its own, to lead a change in the course of world events. Even the Iron Lady could not have done all the harm she did had we Yankees not helped her out.

And so, Reaganism it is.

(...)

“Bushism” is (...) a non-starter, no matter which Bush one has in mind. “Clintonism,” however, is something else.

The term has been in circulation for some time. People know how to use it because, as Justice Potter Stewart said of obscenity, you know it when you see it.

Israeli #Crimes and World Hypocrisy
▻http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/07/22/israeli-crimes-and-world-hypocrisy

Now let’s see what some of the world’s leaders have said about all this.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper: “The indiscriminate rocket attacks from Gaza on Israel are terrorist acts, for which there is no justification.”

U.S. President Barack Obama reaffirmed Israel’s right to defend itself from rocket attacks by Hamas militants.

U.S. secretary of State John Kerry said no country can accept such rocket attacks, adding that de-escalating the crisis is ultimately in everyone’s interests.

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said, “The missile attack on Israel from the Gaza Strip has created a situation which threatens a spiraling process of violence and violent counter measures. Israel of course has the right to protect its citizens from rocket attacks.”

Stephane Dujarric, a spokesman for United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, said that Ban Ki-moon “condemns the recent multiple rocket attacks on Israel from Gaza” and that “these indiscriminate attacks on civilian areas must stop.”

French Ambassador to Israel Patrick Maisonnave said on Tuesday, “When one is here [Ashdod, Israel], 30 kilometers [19 miles] from Gaza, you can feel up close the constant anxiety and fear which the families in the south live with, who find themselves yet again hostage to the violence. I would like to say to these families that we are not forgetting them and that France stands alongside them.”

* The UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon told an emergency meeting of the Security Council that Israel and Hamas “must exercise maximum restraint” to end the fighting.

It might be helpful to look at each of these statements in some detail, to understand how blatantly and unfairly each one favors Israel.

(...)

The Invisible Deaths of Lebanon’s Migrant Domestic Workers
▻http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/07/09/the-invisible-deaths-of-lebanons-migrant-domestic-workers

Last 12th June, Nahar newspaper reported that an Ethiopian maid was found dead at her employer’s house, in Koura, Lebanon, strangled with a hair tie. The news was reported in only one sentence.

Earlier in May, hundreds of migrant domestic workers in Lebanon raised their voices against the daily abuse of their rights at an annual workers’ day event, calling for better legal protection for the more than 200,000 domestic workers in Lebanon.

Migrant domestic workers generally get very little protection from the Lebanese government and remain under-reported in the media, while the deaths of these workers are rarely discussed in the news. Despite the high incidence, domestic workers’ deaths are not investigated or documented by the Lebanese authorities.

“A range of abuses are experienced by migrant domestic workers in Lebanon. These may include verbal, physical and sexual abuse, as well as poor working conditions and violations of labour rights,” Zeina Mezher, project manager at the International Labour Organisation (ILO), said.