Author Archives: Arab America

American Muslims for Palestine has started an advertising campaign ahead of Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to Congress next week and issued the following press release:

The American Muslims for Palestine, a national education and advocacy organization, on Wednesday, Feb. 25, 2015 will unveil its latest ad campaign that uses Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s breach of protocol to focus on the detrimental impact our ‘friendship’ with Israel has on the United States.

Netanyahu caused controversy when he circumvented the White House and accepted House Speaker John Boehner’s invitation to address Congress. Critics accuse Netanyahu of meddling in US affairs.

This may be the case. Speaking in 2001 about how he could manipulate the United States, Netanyahu was videotaped saying, “I know what America is. America is a thing you can move very easily, move it in the right direction.” The video and comments were widely reported on in 2010 in Israeli and American media.

“At a time when the United States is close to a deal with Iran, Mr. Netanyahu is coming to persuade Congress to trade in a peaceful, diplomatic solution for war,” said Dr. Osama Abu Irshaid, AMP national political coordinator.

Source: mondoweiss.net

Things continue to hot up on the Netanyahu speech, which is only five days away now. Pressure is building on the political establishment to prevent a train wreck for the Israel lobby.

First, the Obama administration announces news that national security adviser Susan Rice and UN ambassador Samantha Power will represent the White House at AIPAC next week– the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s policy conference.

And how does Bill Kristol of the Emergency Committee for Israel respond?

Source: mondoweiss.net

‘If we wash our hands of the conflict … we don’t remain neutral.’

Source: www.dailydot.com

On Wednesday, Students for Justice in Palestine along with a diverse array of organizations at the University of California at Berkeley constructed a mock Israeli wall and dramatized encounters at a mock checkpoint. The creative actions took place under the iconic Sather Gate for a few hours on campus during the middle of the day.

The actions were intended to spark discussions between students as part of Israeli Apartheid Week, an annual, global campaign to educate and mobilize the public against Israeli violations of Palestinian rights.

Source: electronicintifada.net

The Justice Department has reportedly concluded it will not bring civil rights charges against police officer Darren Wilson for shooting unarmed African-American teenager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. On Wednesday, The New York Times reported Attorney General Eric Holder will have the final say, but will almost certainly side with investigators who are recommending no charges. A wider Justice Department probe into Ferguson police over reports of racial profiling in traffic stops and use of excessive force remains underway. Meanwhile, a judge has rejected an NAACP Legal Defense Fund request for a new grand jury to consider criminal charges against Wilson. The group raised concerns over the actions of prosecutor Bob McCulloch, including his decision to let a witness provide false testimony. All this comes as President Obama made just one mention of Ferguson in his State of the Union address Tuesday, prompting activists to release their own video on the State of the Black Union. We are joined by Vincent Warren, executive director of the Center for Constitutional Rights.

TRANSCRIPT

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: We turn now to news that the Justice Department does not plan to bring civil rights charges against police officer Darren Wilson for shooting unarmed African-American teenager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. On Wednesday, The New York Times reported Attorney General Eric Holder will have the final say, but will almost certainly side with investigators who are recommending no charges. A wider Justice Department probe into Ferguson police over reports of racial profiling in traffic stops and use of excessive force remains underway. Meanwhile, a judge has rejected an NAACP Legal Defense Fund request for a new grand jury to consider criminal charges against Wilson. The group raised concerns over the actions of prosecutor Bob McCulloch, including his decision to let a witness provide false testimony.

AMY GOODMAN: All this comes as President Obama made a single mention of Ferguson in his State of the Union address Tuesday, prompting activists to release their own video on the State of the Black Union. This is a clip.

STATE OF THE BLACK UNION: We recognize that not even a black president will pronounce our truths. We must continue the task of making America uncomfortable with institutionalized racism, in the hopes that together we can re-imagine what is possible and build a system that is designed for blackness to thrive.
AMY GOODMAN: For more on the news that the federal government does not plan to file civil rights charges against police officer Darren Wilson for shooting Michael Brown in Ferguson, we’re joined by Vincent Warren, executive director of the Center for Constitutional Rights.

Vince, welcome back to Democracy Now! Were you surprised?

VINCENT WARREN: Not terribly surprised. It’s very disappointing, because I think a range of people want to have some measure of accountability. But when you actually look at the federal civil rights laws, it’s a much harder and higher burden for them to prove these types of charges. They were going to have to essentially show that Darren Wilson intended to violate Mike Brown’s civil rights. And there are ways that they can do that, by looking at the totality of the evidence, looking at what he said. But I think their view is the evidence just is probably not enough to support that higher burden of proving an intent to do something based on race or to violate his civil rights in that way. It’s a challenge.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And what about the ongoing investigation of Ferguson by the Justice Department?

VINCENT WARREN: Well, the Department of Justice has two options. One is the criminal route, which it looks like it’s not going to happen specifically with respect to Darren Wilson. But they also have other options, which are civil lawsuits against the Ferguson Police Department for pattern and practice of activities that violate civil rights—excessive force and things like that. So that’s clearly something that they’re intending to move forward. Beyond that, the Brown family also has the ability to file a civil lawsuit, which is not outstanding for the justice that people want, but it certainly is a remedy that could send a very strong financial message.

AMY GOODMAN: On this issue of intent, I mean, even if he didn’t that morning, when he got up, say, “I want to violate his rights,” or even five minutes before, once he did that, why is that not sufficient?

VINCENT WARREN: Well, there are a range of things in life that happen that it’s difficult to prove after the fact. And with this situation, you know, it’s not—the proof doesn’t require him to say the N-word right as he pulls the trigger. And you can look at the facts and the circumstances. So, whether Mike Brown’s hands were up or not would matter. Whether Mike Brown was running away or running towards would matter. So those are the totality of the circumstances that they can begin to look at. However, I think their take is, based on that information that they have, it’s going to be very hard for them to issue an indictment in a federal court that would sustain this type of charge, unfortunately.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And what’s been the impact nationwide, following Ferguson, in terms of attempts by local communities to reform the police abuse situation in their own communities? We just recently—for instance, this week, Governor Cuomo announced new measures. During his State of the State address Wednesday, he announced his reforms that could lead to the appointment of special prosecutors in cases where police kill unarmed suspects and a grand jury fails to indict the officer. This is Governor Cuomo.

GOV. ANDREW CUOMO: I will appoint an independent monitor who will review police cases where a civilian dies and no true bill is issued, and the independent monitor can recommend a special prosecutor be appointed. The independent monitor should have access to the grand jury information, which will be protected, but this way, the independent monitor can actually make an intelligent recommendation, because they’ll have all the evidence and they’ll have all the facts.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: That was Governor Cuomo at his State of the State. Your analysis of his proposals and what’s going on in other parts of the country, as well?

VINCENT WARREN: Well, yeah, the Ferguson situation has everything to do with what’s going on in different parts of the country. With respect to that particular proposal, I actually was part of a meeting with Attorney General Schneiderman of New York, who proposed a similar measure in which his office would be appointed to be able to look at these things more independently than local prosecutors who work with police officers would. This, I think, is a step in the right direction. And it really points to the larger issue that the protesters are talking about, is that we’re talking systemic failure. What’s happening in grand juries around the country, and even in terms of the federal prosecution, the system is not keeping up with the current nature and tenor of the civil rights violations that are happening with police departments. We need protesters out there to push that political agenda to make sure that black lives matter, and then we need to have smart reforms, like this one, that shift the dynamic so that the system is not trying to reform itself.

AMY GOODMAN: Vince Warren, I want to thank you for being with us. Vince Warren is executive director of the Center for Constitutional Rights.

Source: www.democracynow.org

THE recent reunion show for the 40th anniversary of “Saturday Night Live” re-aired a portion of Eddie Murphy’s 1984 classic “White Like Me” skit, in which he disguised himself to appear Caucasian and quickly learned that “when white people are alone, they give things to each other for free.”

The joke still has relevance. A field experiment about who gets free bus rides in Brisbane, a city on the eastern coast of Australia, shows that even today, whites get special privileges, particularly when other people aren’t around to notice.

As they describe in two working papers, Redzo Mujcic and Paul Frijters, economists at the University of Queensland, trained and assigned 29 young adult testers (from both genders and different ethnic groups) to board public buses in Brisbane and insert an empty fare card into the bus scanner. After the scanner made a loud sound informing the driver that the card did not have enough value, the testers said, “I do not have any money, but I need to get to” a station about 1.2 miles away. (The station varied according to where the testers boarded.)

With more than 1,500 observations, the study uncovered substantial, statistically significant race discrimination. Bus drivers were twice as willing to let white testers ride free as black testers (72 percent versus 36 percent of the time). Bus drivers showed some relative favoritism toward testers who shared their own race, but even black drivers still favored white testers over black testers (allowing free rides 83 percent versus 68 percent of the time).

The study also found that racial disparities persisted when the testers wore business attire or dressed in army uniforms. For example, testers wearing army uniforms were allowed to ride free 97 percent of the time if they were white, but only 77 percent of the time if they were black.

This elegant experiment follows in a tradition of audit testing, in which social scientists have sent testers of different races to, for example, bargain over the price of new cars or old baseball cards. But the Australian study is the first, to my knowledge, to focus on discretionary accommodations. It’s less likely these days to find people in positions of authority, even at lower levels of decision making, consciously denying minorities rights. But it is easier to imagine decision makers, like the bus drivers, granting extra privileges and accommodations to nonminorities. Discriminatory gifts are more likely than discriminatory denials.

Source: mobile.nytimes.com

The residents of the West Bank village Bil’in are in close contact with the Israeli state. For the past ten years, they have been waging a popular struggle against the separation barrier that has cut them off from most of their land, while withstanding heavy oppression from the army, including arrests, tear gas, raids on the village, and more. As non-Jewish subjects of military rule in the occupied territories, the residents of Bil’in have no right to vote in the elections, and thus cannot decide who will make the up the next government that will decide their fate. However, some of them know very well who they would like to see in the Knesset.

“We hope that the Joint List succeeds, and that it will be the third largest party in the Knesset. It is simply wonderful that the Arab factions are running together,” Abdullah Abu Rahmah, a central organizer of Bil’in’s nonviolent protests, told +972. “I also hope that Meretz succeeds, despite the fact that they are losing their strength. I hope that the Palestinians on the ‘inside’ [Palestinian citizens of Israel, H.M.] go out and vote, because anyone who does not vote only strengthens the right.”

Abu Rahmah, who was recognized by the European Union as a Human Rights Defender, was recently levied a fine and a suspended sentence after being convicted last October of interfering with the work of a soldier for an incident in May 2012, when he stood in front of a bulldozer that was clearing land to build the separation barrier near Ramallah.

Source: 972mag.com

Today, a coalition of civil society and human rights organizations delivered the names of thousands of constituents who sent letters and signed petitions to their members of Congress calling on them to #SkipTheSpeech of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on March 3.

Constituent letters and petitions were delivered to 75 members of Congress who have either pledged to skip Netanyahu’s speech or have expressed hesitation about attending. In total, more than 37,000 people have sent more than 110,000 letters to members of Congress. An additional 20,000 people have signed a petition calling on members not to attend. (Photos of the petition deliveries can be viewed here.)

More than 30 members of Congress have already publicly or privately committed to #SkipTheSpeech, with additional Representatives and Senators expected to do so this week. Those who have already pledged not to attend include members of the Congressional Black Caucus, including its leader, Representative G.K. Butterfield, and Representative John Lewis, one of the heroes of the US Civil Rights Movement. The #SkipTheSpeech campaign is being organized by Roots Action, US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation, Jewish Voice for Peace, Code Pink and American Muslims for Palestine.

Josh Ruebner, of the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation, stated: “Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to Congress has opened a huge political rift between the Obama administration and Democratic members of Congress on the one hand, and Republicans in Congress on the other. Our campaign is designed to provide grassroots political backing for the more than 30 members of Congress already pledging not to attend and to embolden others to follow their lead. As the head of a government engaged in serious human rights abuses and war crimes, including last summer’s attack on Gaza, Netanyahu should never have been honored with an invitation to address Congress in the first place.”

“A growing constituency of American Jews oppose Israeli policies led by Netanyahu that entrench the occupation and oppress Palestinians,” said Rebecca Vilkomerson, the Executive Director of Jewish Voice for Peace. “The 2013 Pew study of Jewish Americans and a poll during the war on Gaza in 2014 demonstrate growing criticism for Israeli policy among young people and Democrats. It’s time for our elected officials to follow their lead.”

“With the politicization of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s speech and the growing divide between Democrats and Republicans over Boehner’s invitation to the foreign leader, there is no more appropriate time to confront Congress on US foreign policy, the influence of the Israel lobby group AIPAC, and again highlight the brutal military occupation of Palestine,” said CODEPINK organizer Anna Kaminski.

Source: mondoweiss.net

Last week the State Department announced that after a long internal review, the U.S. would now allow for the sale of armed drones to allied countries. While the U.S. has sold unarmed drones—utilized mostly for intelligence purposes—to allies such as Italy and France, this is the first time that armed drones would be sold to a country other than the UK. Along with the announcement of this new policy, the State Department also provided some troubling guidelines about how the U.S. would vet its potential buyers, a process it described as being “months, not years-long”. Combined with their ambiguous nature, these new guidelines call into question whether or not the U.S. has the ethical credibility that would allow it to regulate the sale and monitor the use of armed drones to other countries.

The administration insisted that the review process would ensure that potential buyers would have to meet a rigorous standard, requiring that they have a consistent record of respecting international human rights and humanitarian law and would agree to use them in accordance with international law. However, these standards requiring adherence to international human rights law in regards to their use have raised some eyebrows. While the White House has insisted that its own drone strikes are carried out when there is “near certainty” of the identity of the target, the U.S. has faced criticism of the high civilian death toll from U.S. drone strikes, particularly in Yemen.

Source: www.aaiusa.org

Suspected Israeli nationalists set fire to a Christian seminary in Jerusalem and vandalized an elementary school in Nablus on Thursday, officials said. The attacks, which came a day after a similar group burned a mosque near Bethlehem, have been characterized as hate crimes by Israeli officials and “terrorism” by Palestinians.

According to local media reports, the assailants poured flammable liquid into a bathroom window of the Greek Orthodox seminary and ignited it. Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said “anti-Christian” slogans were scribbled in Hebrew on the seminary’s walls — including “Jesus is a son of a whore” and “the redemption of Zion.”

The fire damaged the compound’s bathroom facilities, but was quickly subdued by city fire officials. No one was injured in the blaze.

Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat said in a statement that the fire at the seminary was set deliberately and “there is no room for such deplorable activity” in the city, which is deemed holy to Jews, Muslims and Christians. The majority of Palestinian Christians are members of the Greek Orthodox Church.

Source: america.aljazeera.com

At a time when most Americans were uninformed, misinformed, or simply afraid of Islam, Thomas Jefferson imagined Muslims as future citizens of his new nation. His engagement with the faith began with the purchase of a Qur’an eleven years before he wrote the Declaration of Independence. Jefferson’s Qur’an survives still in the Library of Congress, serving as a symbol of his and early America’s complex relationship with Islam and its adherents. That relationship remains of signal importance to this day.

That he owned a Qur’an reveals Jefferson’s interest in the Islamic religion, but it does not explain his support for the rights of Muslims. Jefferson first read about Muslim “civil rights” in the work of one of his intellectual heroes: the seventeenth-century English philosopher John Locke. Locke had advocated the toleration of Muslims—and Jews—following in the footsteps of a few others in Europe who had considered the matter for more than a century before him. Jefferson’s ideas about Muslim rights must be understood within this older context, a complex set of transatlantic ideas that would continue to evolve most markedly from the sixteenth through the nineteenth centuries.

Amid the interdenominational Christian violence in Europe, some Christians, beginning in the sixteenth century, chose Muslims as the test case for the demarcation of the theoretical boundaries of their toleration for all believers. Because of these European precedents, Muslims also became a part of American debates about religion and the limits of citizenship. As they set about creating a new government in the United States, the American Founders, Protestants all, frequently referred to the adherents of Islam as they contemplated the proper scope of religious freedom and individual rights among the nation’s present and potential inhabitants. The founding generation debated whether the United States should be exclusively Protestant or a religiously plural polity. And if the latter, whether political equality—the full rights of citizenship, including access to the highest office—should extend to non-Protestants. The mention, then, of Muslims as potential citizens of the United States forced the Protestant majority to imagine the parameters of their new society beyond toleration. It obliged them to interrogate the nature of religious freedom: the issue of a “religious test” in the Constitution, like the ones that would exist at the state level into the nineteenth century; the question of “an establishment of religion,” potentially of Protestant Christianity; and the meaning and extent of a separation of religion from government.

Source: www.salon.com

They sang the famous ‘Tala Al Badru ‘Alayna’ song which is thought to have been sung by the Prophet’s companions on his arrival to Madinah from from Makkah.

Source: ilmfeed.com