Reports Roundup (November 10)

Reports Roundup (November 10)

Reports Roundup (November 10)

By : Jadaliyya Reports

[The following list is a compilation of the reports, statements, and other materials featured on the Jadaliyya Reports Page this past week.]

Trial of Israeli Attack on Freedom Flotilla Begins on November 6 IHH Humanitarian Relief foundation reports on the opening of the trial on Israel`s attack on the Gaza-bound Freedom Flotilla in Çağlayan Courthouse in Turkey. The suspects, which include several high-ranking individuals within the Israeli Defense Forces, will be tried as "fugitive suspects." 

Urgent Call for Kurdish Hunger Strikers in Turkey This letter seeks to draw attention to the 683 Kurdish detainees on hunger strike in Turkish prisoners, many of whom have been on strike for over 50 days. Despite the dangerous duration of the strikes, the Turkish prime minister refused to acknowledge the strikers` existence at a recent press conference. 

Turkish Academics` Statement of Solidarity with Kurdish Detainees on Hunger Strike In this letter, a number of Turkish academics formally state their intent to include the demands of the Kurdish hunger strikers and advocacy for the Kurdish people into their academic activities, both courses they teach and written work. 

Two Iranian Activists Granted EU`s Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought Nasrin Sotoudeh, a lawyer, and Jafar Panahi, a film maker, were awarded the European Parliament`s prestigious Sakharov Prize, which recognizes activists or political dissidents who make significant contributions in the field of human rights and democracy. 

Who Will Win the Presidential Election? Lecture by Michael McDonald George Mason University`s Professor McDonald lectures on voter turnout and other factors that might influence the result of the US presidential election. 

Month-by-Month Summary of Developments in Syria (Updated) International Crisis Group issues a monthly "Crisis Watch" report on Syria; these briefs are compiled here, showing the progression of the Syrian conflict. 

Gatekeepers and Evictions: Somalia`s Displaced Population at Risk Refugees International reports on the dangers and difficulties faced by internally displaced persons in Somalia, including abuse and aid diversion by camp "gatekeepers." 

National Students for Justice in Palestine Conference Opposes "Normalizing" Israeli Human Rights Abuses At the Second Annual National Students for Justice in Palestine Conference, students worked to form coalitions across campuses and create new protocols for fundraising and media promotion. 

Amnesty International Calls for End to Bahraini Ban on Protesting Amnesty International condemns the Bahrain government`s ban on protesting, which was instituted on October 30 and will continue indefinitely, or "until security is maintained." 

Bidayat: New Beginnings for All Seasons of Change This article, translated from Arabic, is the introduction to the inaugural issue of Bidayat, a journal dealing with various aspects of the popular Arab revolutions. 

Palestinian Youth Statement from Lebanon Issued by supporters at a rally in Beirut on November 9, this statement deals with Mahmoud Abbas`s recent comments compromising his stance on the Palestinian right of return. 

Draft Resolution Requesting Palestine Upgrade from Observer Mission Status to Observer State Status The Permanent Observer Mission of Palestine to the United Nations submitted a draft resolution requesting an upgrade in its status. This request will not affect the Palestinian bid for statehood. 

International Call Out: British CEO`s Actions Threaten Union Rights in Lebanon Friends of Spinneys Workers draws attention to the harassment, both physical and psychological, of workers at the Lebanese branches of Spinney`s supermarket. These attacks, a product of Spinney`s CEO Michael Wright and Lebanese elites, are intended to curtail the activities of the workers` independent union. 

Facebook Attempts to Shut Down the Voice of "The Uprising of Women in the Arab World" The Facebook group "The Uprising of Women in the Arab World" responds to attempts by Facebook to block, suspend, or permanently delete the accounts of its key activists. The controversy surrounds a post asking the group`s members to support activist Dana Bakdounes, who submitted a photograph of herself without her hijab to the campaign. 

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Past is Present: Settler Colonialism Matters!

On 5-6 March 2011, the Palestine Society at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London will hold its seventh annual conference, "Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine." This year`s conference aims to understand Zionism as a settler colonial project which has, for more than a century, subjected Palestine and Palestinians to a structural and violent form of destruction, dispossession, land appropriation and erasure in the pursuit of a new Jewish Israeli society. By organizing this conference, we hope to reclaim and revive the settler colonial paradigm and to outline its potential to inform and guide political strategy and mobilization.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is often described as unique and exceptional with little resemblance to other historical or ongoing colonial conflicts. Yet, for Zionism, like other settler colonial projects such as the British colonization of Ireland or European settlement of North America, South Africa or Australia, the imperative is to control the land and its resources -- and to displace the original inhabitants. Indeed, as conference keynote speaker Patrick Wolfe, one of the foremost scholars on settler colonialism and professor at La Trobe University in Victoria, Australia, argues, "the logic of this project, a sustained institutional tendency to eliminate the Indigenous population, informs a range of historical practices that might otherwise appear distinct--invasion is a structure not an event."[i]

Therefore, the classification of the Zionist movement as a settler colonial project, and the Israeli state as its manifestation, is not merely intended as a statement on the historical origins of Israel, nor as a rhetorical or polemical device. Rather, the aim is to highlight Zionism`s structural continuities and the ideology which informs Israeli policies and practices in Palestine and toward Palestinians everywhere. Thus, the Nakba -- whether viewed as a spontaneous, violent episode in war, or the implementation of a preconceived master plan -- should be understood as both the precondition for the creation of Israel and the logical outcome of Zionist settlement in Palestine.

Moreover, it is this same logic that sustains the continuation of the Nakba today. As remarked by Benny Morris, “had he [David Ben Gurion] carried out full expulsion--rather than partial--he would have stabilised the State of Israel for generations.”[ii] Yet, plagued by an “instability”--defined by the very existence of the Palestinian nation--Israel continues its daily state practices in its quest to fulfill Zionism’s logic to maximize the amount of land under its control with the minimum number of Palestinians on it. These practices take a painful array of manifestations: aerial and maritime bombardment, massacre and invasion, house demolitions, land theft, identity card confiscation, racist laws and loyalty tests, the wall, the siege on Gaza, cultural appropriation, and the dependence on willing (or unwilling) native collaboration and security arrangements, all with the continued support and backing of imperial power. 

Despite these enduring practices however, the settler colonial paradigm has largely fallen into disuse. As a paradigm, it once served as a primary ideological and political framework for all Palestinian political factions and trends, and informed the intellectual work of committed academics and revolutionary scholars, both Palestinians and Jews.

The conference thus asks where and why the settler colonial paradigm was lost, both in scholarship on Palestine and in politics; how do current analyses and theoretical trends that have arisen in its place address present and historical realities? While acknowledging the creativity of these new interpretations, we must nonetheless ask: when exactly did Palestinian natives find themselves in a "post-colonial" condition? When did the ongoing struggle over land become a "post-conflict" situation? When did Israel become a "post-Zionist" society? And when did the fortification of Palestinian ghettos and reservations become "state-building"?

In outlining settler colonialism as a central paradigm from which to understand Palestine, this conference re-invigorates it as a tool by which to analyze the present situation. In doing so, it contests solutions which accommodate Zionism, and more significantly, builds settler colonialism as a political analysis that can embolden and inform a strategy of active, mutual, and principled Palestinian alignment with the Arab struggle for self-determination, and indigenous struggles in the US, Latin America, Oceania, and elsewhere.

Such an alignment would expand the tools available to Palestinians and their solidarity movement, and reconnect the struggle to its own history of anti-colonial internationalism. At its core, this internationalism asserts that the Palestinian struggle against Zionist settler colonialism can only be won when it is embedded within, and empowered by, the broader Arab movement for emancipation and the indigenous, anti-racist and anti-colonial movement--from Arizona to Auckland.

SOAS Palestine Society invites everyone to join us at what promises to be a significant intervention in Palestine activism and scholarship.

For over 30 years, SOAS Palestine Society has heightened awareness and understanding of the Palestinian people, their rights, culture, and struggle for self-determination, amongst students, faculty, staff, and the broader public. SOAS Palestine society aims to continuously push the frontiers of discourse in an effort to make provocative arguments and to stimulate debate and organizing for justice in Palestine through relevant conferences, and events ranging from the intellectual and political impact of Edward Said`s life and work (2004), international law and the Palestine question (2005), the economy of Palestine and its occupation (2006), the one state (2007), 60 Years of Nakba, 60 Years of Resistance (2009), and most recently, the Left in Palestine (2010).

For more information on the SOAS Palestine Society 7th annual conference, Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine: www.soaspalsoc.org

SOAS Palestine Society Organizing Collective is a group of committed students that has undertaken to organize annual academic conferences on Palestine since 2003.

 


[i] Patrick Wolfe, Settler Colonialism and the Transformation of Anthropology: The Politics and Poetics of an Ethnographic Event, Cassell, London, p. 163

[ii] Interview with Benny Morris, Survival of the Fittest, Haaretz, 9. January 2004, http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/php/art.php?aid=5412