The original construction of the Orthodox Church was built in the 6thCentury, in what is now Gaza

Phoebe Greenwood, writing from Gaza City in The Guardian on 23 December, reported:

"There hasn't been a Christmas tree in Gaza City's main square since Hamas pushed the Palestinian Authority out of Gaza in 2007 and Christmas is no longer a public holiday."

The headline said Hamas had "cancelled Christmas". Could this possibly be true?

When I visited Gaza in late 2007 Fr Manuel Mussallam, the feisty old priest in charge of the Catholic community, took me and others to meet Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh and some of his colleagues. Relations between Christian and Muslim – or at least between the Catholic community and the Hamasgovernment – seemed strong enough and friendly enough for Christmas celebrations to be left undisturbed.

The very idea of a ban actually makes me smile because Scotland, a Christian country of course, saw Christmas as a papist festival and for centuries discouraged it. When I lived there it wasn't even a public holiday.

But back to the Strip... Is Hamas being beastly to Gaza's Christians? Has Phoebe Greenwood got her story straight? I wrote to her at The Guardian, pointing out that revelations of this kind in the popular British press undo the hard work activists put in to help the Palestinian cause. Could she please throw more light onto it? I've had no reply.

I'm in England and unable to contact Hamas. Phoebe Greenwood is on the spot. Shouldn't someone from Mr Haniyeh's office be given a chance to comment?

As for Fr Manuel, he has finally retired and left Gaza. The school he ran there, part-funded by the Vatican, had 1200 pupils. About 1000 were Muslim and some of these the children of Hamas leaders.

The relationship between Muslim and Christian in the Holy Land, and the potential for friction, is frequently poked and prodded simply to make mischief.

Those with a rightful cause versus those who took it away

Archbishop Theodosius Hanna (Greek Orthodox Church), on a visit to Ireland a year ago, told politicians:

"The problem in Palestine has nothing to do with religion – it is not a religious issue. It is not a conflict of Christians, Muslims and Jewish people. It is a conflict between those who are the holders of a rightful cause and those who took away that right by military might.

"Palestinian people as a whole, including Christians and Muslims, have said repeatedly that what they want is peace. We want two states that live together in peace. However, the reality on the ground is that we are extremely far away from that goal because Israel does not want peace."

Fr Manuel, who accompanied the Archbishop, told his listeners what happened when the Christian school in Gaza was targeted.

"Five Hamas ministers visited the school after it was attacked and promised they would repair the damage... A Hamas minister, a Muslim, picked up the Holy Bible thrown on the ground, kissed it and put it back on the altar. He said Muslims were forbidden to do such things to the Bible. Hamas paid more than $122,000 to repair all the damage caused.

"Afterwards I met the Hamas prime minister, Ismail Haniyeh. When he embraced me he said this, and we believed it. He said: "Go to your family, but be assured that Hamas will employ weapons against Muslims to protect Christians in Gaza." This is the reality. Christians in Palestine are not suffering persecution, because we are not considered to be a religious community, but rather the people of Palestine. We have the same rights and the same obligations."

From left: Archbishop Theodosius Hanna and Father Manuel Mussallam

It is hardly surprising that Israeli oppression aided and endorsed by western Christendom, and the grinding poverty this evil alliance creates in the occupied territories, drives some Muslims into the arms of Islamic extremism. Hamas insists that extremist acts are incidents not policy.

Fr Manuel went on to tell the Irish what things were really like under military occupation.

"We have spoken to Israel for more than 18 years and the result has been zero. We have signed agreements here and there at various times and then when there is a change in the government of Israel we have to start again from the beginning. We ask for our life and to be given back our Jerusalem, to be given our state and for enough water to drink. We want to be given more opportunity to reach Jerusalem. I have not seen Jerusalem since 1990."

He described the nightmarish system of entry and exit permits, which Israel invariably refused.

"We want to see an end to this occupation, and please do not ask us to protect those who are occupying our territory."

A week ago, on Christmas Day, the Voice of Palestine website ran this news item:

DAMASCUS – Hamas Movement have offered its best wishes to all Palestinian Christians in occupied Palestine, and other countries on the occasion of Prophet Jesus' birth and wished them a happy holiday.

"On the occasion of rejoicing the birth of Prophet Jesus peace of God be upon him, the Islamic Movement of Hamas extends its sincere wishes to all our fellow Christians in their homeland Palestine, the cradle of prophecies and the land of divine messages, as well as to the Palestinian Christians in the Arab and Islamic countries and the whole world," Hamas said in a press release on Saturday.

Hamas wished this occasion to be an opportunity for uniting the Palestinian people and pooling the efforts of the world's free people to support the Palestinian cause and protect the Islamic and Christian holy sites.

In the past Hamas has shown great respect for the Christian tradition of Christmas and, I hear, Hamas officials in Bethlehem used to dress up as Santa Claus to distribute gifts to Christian children. So the question remains: has Hamas really become such a Scrooge* as to torpedo Christmas with a tree ban?

If so, it's a sure-fire way to lose friends and alienate people.

* for more about the mean-mindedness of that notorious character Ebenezer Scrooge, and his hatred of Christmas, see 'A Christmas Carol' by Charles Dickens. Scrooge eventually sees the light and redeems himself.

* Stuart Littlewood is author of the book Radio Free Palestine, which tells the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. Read other articles by Stuart.

O little town of Bethlehem
How still we see thee lie
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep
The silent stars go by
Yet in thy dark streets shineth
The everlasting Light
The hopes and fears of all the years
Are met in thee tonight

While carving the turkey for your family and merrily quaffing mulled wine 'midst happy laughter, remember that the romantic Little Town of Bethlehem at the centre of our childhood Christmases is now "an immense prison" in the words of Michel Sabbah, former Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, and entirely surrounded by Israel's ugly 8-metre separation wall bristling with machine-gun towers.

The good citizens of Bethlehem are cut off from their capital Jerusalem, only six miles away, the rest of the West Bank and the whole world.

Consider that the United Nations, for obvious reasons, designated Jerusalem and Bethlehem a protected international zone under UN administration. Israeli rule was not to be permitted.

Consider also that when Palestine was under British mandate Christians accounted for 20 per cent of the population and how 63 years of terror, illegal occupation, dispossession, interference and economic wrecking tactics have whittled their numbers down to less than 2 per cent.

Consider that, at this rate, there will soon be no Christians left in the land where Christianity was born... thanks to the cowardice and inaction of our political leaders.

How will the 26 bishops sitting around in our House of Lords, doing nothing, explain that to their dwindling congregations?

As usual, many Palestinians in Bethlehem and the other cities and villages throughout occupied Palestine will be unable to reunite with their families or celebrate Christmas at their holy places in Jerusalem and Bethlehem due to cruel Israeli-imposed travel restrictions. Imagine for a moment what sort of Christmas the half-starved children in blockaded Gaza are having this year, and every year... and what New Year prospects face all the other Palestinian children struggling to grow up with the Israeli army's boot on their necks.

Deep down it is not about religion at all. The struggle is between justice and a criminal conspiracy of huge international proportions, the tentacles of which spread far beyond the Holy Land and impact on all of us, even here in the deepest recesses of England's green and pleasant land.

In the New Year civil society must resolve to DO SOMETHING about it, one way or another, before the evil spins irreversibly out of control.

* Stuart Littlewood is author of the book Radio Free Palestine, which tells the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. Read other articles by Stuart.

As Israeli Jewish terrorist attacks on mosques in occupied Palestine are assuming a phenomenal frequency.

Indeed, with the Israeli government and security establishment doing next to nothing to put an end to this wanton and unprovoked terror, a huge fire is being started in the region.

In religious wars, all sides are usually variably culpable and blamable. However, in the occupied Palestinian territories, Jewish fanatics bear nearly 100% of the blame.

Their attacks against mosques are not provoked by similar Palestinian attacks against Jewish religious places. In fact, Jewish terror groups readily admit that arson attacks against mosques are meant to embarrass the Israeli occupation army.

The attacks are perpetrated under the slogan "Price Tag" every time the Israeli army moves to dismantle a Jewish settlement outpost.

So why is it that the Palestinians and their places of worship are attacked, not the Israeli army?

Well, it takes a thoroughly sick mind to rationalize, even glamorize such attacks, but the Israeli settler camp never faces a shortage of virulence, mental depravity and mental sickness.

We are talking after all about the worst of the worst that racist, Talmudic Judaism could breed, people who view the rest of mankind as subhuman.

The practical implications of such a venomous ideology are enormous and absolutely nefarious. If non-Jews are subhuman, then their lives must be worthless, have no sanctity and expendable.

Think not I am making an exaggeration as it is difficult to exaggerate the evilness of these racist thugs who spend a lifetime demonizing and dehumanizing humanity as they celebrate their Chosen-people or Master-race status.

Unfortunately, the Israeli government and security establishment are giving these criminal-minded thugs a free rein to gang up on virtually unprotected Palestinian civilians, torch mosques and churches and vandalize olive groves throughout occupied Palestine.

It is very hard to buy the Israeli government's argument that these terrorists are a marginal group. But even if they were a marginal group, this wouldn't minimize the gravity of their terrorist actions.

The Nazi Hitler Youth was once viewed as a marginal group. However, the world saw what that "marginal" group was able to do during Kristalnacht in November, 1938.

Hence, the question begs itself whether the Israeli government should wait until the so-called hill-top "troublemakers" morph into a Jewish Hitler Youth.

Unfortunately, the Israeli government, the most fascist ever, can't be given the benefit of the doubt.

In the final analysis, the suspected connivance and obvious leniency with which the Netanyahu government treats these despicable criminals, along with the mind-boggling reluctance to prosecute them raise many hard questions about the nature of that government.

One Israeli writer, when asked recently why the government didn't exercise its legal authority to arrest and try Jewish terrorists who attack Muslim and Christian holy place, said a venomous snake wouldn't bit its own tail.

There is another worrying dimension to this obscenity, namely the virtually complete absence of real condemnations of these terrorist acts by Jewish leaders in Israel and abroad.

Jewish leaders in Europe and North America wouldn't wait a minute to condemn the slightest anti-Semitic attack on Jewish targets, even if this target happened to be a lone Jewish grave in an isolated village in Eastern Europe .

Even remarks or even slip-of-the-tongue jokes are castigated and people are made to pay a price.

However, when fellow Jews carry out outrageous acts of terror, arson and vandalism against mosques and churches, we see that these same Jewish leaders become speechless as if the acts of terror took place in a different galaxy.

The Jewish leadership must realize that the orphans of Kahana and thuggish terrorists of Gush Emunim are more than trouble makers. They are in fact criminal fire-starters whose pyromania could burn Jews as well as non-Jews.

Hence, Jewish leaders must have the necessary courage and rectitude to admit that Jewish terrorism is a two-lane street and that Muslims won't stand idle if their peaceable holy places continue to be torched and vandalized in the most blatant and unprovoked manner.

Of course, it would be naïve to expect verbal condemnations by Jewish leaders to stem the tide of Jewish settler terror against Muslim and Christian holy places.

However, this is the very least Jewish leaders should and can do to exonerate themselves from the ostensibly logical Charge that these leaders adopt a duplicitous attitude toward Jewish terror in Palestine by denouncing it when speaking to a non-Jewish audience while praising it privately.

Finally, the Palestinians themselves must not entrust the task of protecting mosques and Churches to Israel . The Palestinian Authority (PA) must deploy armed guards in the vicinity of mosques in order to protect them from Jewish terror. Crying out for help won't help very much. We have to do our own duty first and none would blame us for doing what anyone else would if they were in our shoes.

* Khalid Amayreh a journalist based in the Occupied Palestinian town of Dura. He obtained his MA in journalism from the University of Southern Illinois in 1983.

Prime minister David Cameron has told Britain: "We are a Christian country and we should not be afraid to say so."

He was speaking on the occasion of the 400^th anniversary of the King James version of the Bible which, he said, had helped to give Britain a set of values and morals that make us what we are today.

And Cameron doesn't accept the argument about the church not getting involved in politics. "To me, Christianity, faith, religion, the Church and the Bible are all inherently involved in politics because so many political questions are moral questions."

True, but can our churchmen 'do politics'? They perpetually fail to get a result even on the Church's 'home turf', the Holy Land.

It's painful to be reminded that while Israel was planning its murderous 3-week assault on the people of Gaza (including the Christian community there), which it launched three Christmases ago, the Archbishop of Canterbury was visiting the former Nazi camps of Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland with the Chief Rabbi to show joint solidarity against genocide.

"This is a pilgrimage not to a holy place but to a place of utter profanity," he announced. "How shall we be able to read the signs... that evil is gathering force once again?"

He needed to look no further than the prison camp that the Holy Land has been turned into by the never-ending Israeli occupation. Couldn't he sniff the stench of profanity besieging the Gaza Strip which, some claim, Israel uses as a warfare laboratory? Hasn't he noticed a strong whiff of evil in the judaisation of Jerusalem and the expulsion of its non-Jewish citizens?

And when the Archbishop visited the Holy Land in 2010 the Israelis prevented him seeing the horrors their thugs had inflicted on Gaza and obstructed him in his Christian mission there. But he still fraternised with their rabbinate and their President, and paid homage to Yad Vashem and the Holocaust, thus appearing to legitimise the blockade, the persecution of Muslim and Christian communities and Israel's contempt for international law and human rights.

The Pope fell for the same propaganda trick.

The Church clearly needs the mother of all shake-ups before it'll be capable of rolling up its sleeves and getting political.

Our not-so-Christian government

Britain as a country may still be Christian but what about its government? Mr Cameron describes himself as a "committed" Christian but only a "vaguely practising" one. What does that mean? Are Christian principles getting in his way?

Or is he sending a coded message of comfort to friends in Tel Aviv and Washington?

For Cameron also claims to be a Zionist.

He voted enthusiastically for the Iraq war, an irresponsible and un-Christian thing to do based on neo-con lies. And look what it has cost in lives and wholesale destruction. Now he and foreign secretary William Hague are upping sanctions designed to cripple the Iranian economy and bring misery to that country's civilian population. Shades of Iraq... sadistic action once again based on mere suspicion of wrongdoing, not actual proof. Is this proper behaviour for even the "vaguest" of Christians?

The political baggage Cameron has brought with him includes a foreign secretary who has been a member of Conservative Friends of Israel since his teenage years and a minister for Middle East affairs who's a former officer of that same fan club.

His defence secretary Liam Fox, now departed in disgrace, was dubbed "a champion of Israel within the government". He famously said: "In the battle for the values that we stand for, for democracy against theocracy, for democratic liberal values against repression - Israel's enemies are our enemies..."

How can it be right for Ministers of the Crown to make such ludicrous commitments to a belligerent foreign power that continually defies international and humanitarian law and, I hear, shoots children for amusement - according to a horrifying article by surgeon David Halpin, 'The methodical shooting of boys at work in Gaza by snipers of the Israeli Occupation Force'?

When Cameron became Conservative leader he proclaimed: "You need to know that if I become Prime Minister, Israel has a friend who will never turn his back on Israel." And once in Downing Street he pledged: "In me, you have a Prime Minister whose belief in Israel is indestructible...I want to be clear, we will always support Israel..."

Supporting Israel means, of course, endorsing the regime's lawlessness and criminal ambitions. Is that an option for a real Christian? And when will Mr Cameron have time to concentrate on Britain's best interests in the Middle East, which is the job he was elected for?

Furthermore Britain, like all other countries that think themselves civilised, is under a solemn international obligation to make sure there's no hiding place for the world's vilest criminals. It's a responsibility no Christian should shirk. However, when Tzipi Livni, who was responsible for mounting Operation Cast Lead and for the 1,400 deaths that followed, complained that a warrant had been issued for her arrest in London, Cameron and Hague immediately mangled our Universal Jurisdiction laws to create a safe haven for her and other Israelis wanted for crimes against humanity.

Having ensured that Madam Livni could safely go shopping in Bond Street, the devoted Mr Hague said: "The UK is committed to upholding international justice and all of our international obligations. Our core principle remains that those guilty of war crimes must be brought to justice."

The Zionist cuckoo in Christianity's nest

Cameron waxes lyrical about the King James Bible but acts as if he was brought up on the less admirable Scofield version, which has been the standard religious text on the other side of the Atlantic.

Cyrus Scofield, a convicted criminal and described by one American newspaper as "a shyster", was commissioned to re-write the King James version by inserting Zionist-friendly notes. The idea was to change the Christian view of Zionism by creating and promoting a pro-Zionist sub-culture within Christianity. The Oxford University Press appointed Scofield as editor, and the Scofield Reference Bible has been a best-seller especially in the US for nearly 100 years.

It introduced a new worship icon, the modern State of Israel, which did not exist until 1948 but was already on the drawing board of the World Zionist movement.

American journalist Grace Halsell explained the re-hashed Biblical message:

"Simply stated it is this: Every act taken by Israel is orchestrated by God, and should be condoned, supported, and even praised by the rest of us. Never mind what Israel does, say the Christian Zionists. God wants this to happen...

"Scofield said that Christ cannot return to earth until certain events occur: The Jews must return to Palestine, gain control of Jerusalem and rebuild a temple, and then we all must engage in the final, great battle called Armageddon. Estimates vary, but most students of Armageddon theology agree that as a result of these relatively recent interpretations of Biblical scripture, 10 to 40 million Americans believe Palestine is God's chosen land for the Jews."

Ultra-literal reading of certain Old Testament texts has persuaded Zionists to believe that Old Testament promises made to the ancient Jewish tribes are transferable to the largely unrelated people that comprise the modern state of Israel. They hope for, and are obviously working towards, the final battle they call Armageddon, in which Israel's enemies (and God's, of course) will be defeated. After that Jesus will return as the Jewish Messiah and King to reign in Jerusalem for a thousand years, and the Jewish people will enjoy privileged status in the world.

That is the Zionist dream of world domination in a nutshell.

We see how politicians become eager stooges, but if you are as puzzled as I am how a true Christian could possibly be taken in by Zionism, a short paper on the phenomenon is available from Sadaka [PDF].

An effective antidote is The Jerusalem Declaration on Christian Zionism, a statement by the Latin Patriarch and Local Heads of Churches in Jerusalem issued in 2006. They are in the front line. They know the score. It is summed up in a single sentence:

"We categorically reject Christian Zionist doctrines as a false teaching that corrupts the biblical message of love, justice and reconciliation."

Merry Christmas, Mr Cameron.

* Stuart Littlewood is author of the book Radio Free Palestine, which tells the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. Read other articles by Stuart.

Video link: http://youtu.be/obp2J3rVgSA

Usually at this time of year I put up a Christmas post in which I feature the folk Christmas tune called "The Cherry Tree Carol" and I point out its relationship to the beautiful story of the birth of Jesus in the Quran. Items 1 and 2 below are taken from my original Cherry Tree Carol post from 2009. Sting's rendition of the song is just plain gorgeous. It will change your mood. Please take a few moments and give it a listen.

1. The Cherry Tree Carol is a haunting story of the mystery and beauty of Christmas derived from one of the apocryphal Gospels, that of Psuedo- Matthew, which is also know as The Infancy Gospel of Matthew.

In this now popular Christmas carol, Joseph and Mary are walking near or through an orchard of cherry trees. She asks Joseph to pick some cherries for her because she is with child and would appreciate a helping hand. Joseph, as husbands tend to do when they discover their wives are pregnant and they know they are not the father, gets angry and tells her to just let the guy who got her pregnant get the cherries for her. No doubt dejected and feeling rejected, Mary knows not what to do.

But then a voice cries out from within his mother's womb. It's the voice of Jesus who commands the cherry trees bow down so that his mother may have something to eat. The trees do what any tree would do if ordered by Jesus, they bow down and Mary exclaims to the effect of "Hey Joseph, look, I can get all the cherries I want, nyah nyah." Joseph then realizes that there's more going on than he at first realized.

Now in the Psuedo-Gospel of Matthew, Chapter Twenty, the story as one might expect, is a bit different, but the similarities are clear. In this version, thought to be the inspiration for The Cherry Tree Carol, Mary, Joseph and a very infant Jesus are in the desert in Egypt and are exhausted from the heat. They come across a date palm tree where they rest. Mary asks Joseph for some dates, but they are pretty high up in the tree and he whines about it saying that instead she should be concerned because of the lack of water and their thirst. The baby Jesus orders the date palm to lower it's branches and his Mother is able to eat. Now the date palm, being humble and worshipful, did not rise back up after she had eaten, but rather it awaited Jesus' command. Jesus tells it to rise, says it will have its place in paradise, and then he makes one more request of it – something interesting in light of the Quranic version of this story that I will discuss below. He asks it to provide water through one of its hidden roots and it does so – providing clear, cool and sparkling water for the three of them and their animals.

2. Many features of the Cherry Tree Carol and the story from which it is derived are found in the Quranic version of the story in Surah 19, verses 16-34. In this version Joseph is noticeably absent, an absence which highlights the miraculous nature of Jesus' birth. The angel Gabriel appears to Mary, who has gone away from her people for some sort of religious purpose, in fully human form and tells her she will give birth to a son. She is astonished by this and asks how on earth that could be possible since she has never been touched by a man. Gabriel tells her that this is easy for God and that her son will be sent as a mercy to mankind.

So she is now with child and is driven to a date palm tree during the pains of childbirth, pains so severe she wishes she had never been born. But then a voice cries out – said by commentators to be that of Gabriel though in my own view it could even be that of Jesus – who tells her that all is well and that water has been provided for her beneath her feet. He then tells her to shake the date-palm and that fresh and ripe dates will come pouring down. He tells her to eat and drink and "cool thine eye." Lastly the voice commands her that if she comes across any man to say that she has vowed to speak to no one that day.

The next thing we see is Mary carrying her new baby back to her people who challenge her morality, as she had no doubt expected and feared. But keeping to her command, she said nothing to them and merely pointed to her baby. The crowd mocked her telling her that they could not possibly converse with a new born. At this point, the baby Jesus performs his own version of "enough is enough" as he addresses the crowd in no uncertain terms telling them, among other things, that God has made him a prophet and that he is to be blessed wherever he is. He also tells them that he has been commanded to be faithful to his mother, something he clearly intends to do. No doubt the audience was dumb struck. . .

The new-born Jesus then closes: "And peace be upon me the day I was born, the day that I die, and the day that I am raised up alive."

3. The video below is the entire Surah of Mary recited in Arabic by Shaykh Idris Akbar. The story of Mary and her baby begins at exactly 2:59 into the video and runs to about 8:06. So if you want to hear the Quranic story of the birth of Jesus recited in Arabic by a great reciter, enjoy. The video includes the Arabic script so readers of this page who are studying Arabic can follow along.

When you hear "wathkur filkitaab Maryam" you will know you are at the start of the right section.

Video link: http://youtu.be/_PESbd1PqkE

4. The story of Jesus in the Quran may well have saved the lives of about 80 to 100 of the first Muslims living in Mecca with Muhammad. They had to flee Mecca to Abyssinia because of religious persecution and they sought refuge from the Christian ruler there. The Meccans tried to bribe the ruler into forcing them to return to Mecca, but this ruler actually behaved like a Christian ruler should and granted the Muslims asylum. (No doubt he'd never stand a chance of becoming the president of the US today, but I digress.) As part of the discussion and debate between the pagan Meccans who had come to Abysinnia to bribe the ruler on the one hand, and the Muslims seeking protection on the other, the Muslims recited the story about Jesus to which I have linked above. After hearing it, the Christian ruler was so moved that he granted his protection to them. Things sure have changed.

A frequent commentator on this blog, Perry, mentioned the film on Muhammad's life called "The Message" produced by the late Mustafa Akkad. Akkad did two versions of the film, one in Arabic and one in English – filming them at the same time and using different actors. Below is the English version of the story of the King of Abyssinia. Very nicely done. Thanks to Perry for bringing this movie back to my mind.

Video link: http://youtu.be/KePlv9olUAU

5. I also love Judy Collins' rendition of the Cherry Tree Carol.

Video link: http://youtu.be/YNeQNQdo8TM

6. "No US administration has done more in support of Israel's security than ours. None. Don't let anybody tell you otherwise. It is a fact," Obama told a cheering crowd.

"To back up his position, Obama cited American cooperation with Israel on developing the Iron Dome anti-rocket system, efforts to clear out the besieged Israeli embassy in Cairo in September, and actions to counter attempts to delegitimize Israel in international forums like the United Nations."

"Shoring up his hard line on Iran, Obama reiterated that no options were off the table inpreventing the Islamic Republic from obtaining a nuclear weapon, and touted his administration's imposition of "the most comprehensive, the hardest-hitting sanctions the Iranian regime has ever faced. We haven't just talked about it, we've done it."

7. Israel goes entire week without killing a Palestinian in Gaza, but finally gets its fix.

8. Somebody help me here, just why is it that we are supposed to kill these people? Abe? Alan? Newt? Michelle? Mitt? Herman? Barack? Please remind me, I just can't seem to remember.

(Note to Shas Party members, the young lady on your right in the video below has a beautiful voice. Not to be missed.)

Video link: http://youtu.be/nEX_G7wZlFY

Merry Christmas folks.

By Mohamed Khodr * | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

This image shows Anders Behring Breivik from a manifesto attributed to him that was discovered Saturday, July 23, 2011. / AP PHOTO

Where's the label of "Christian terrorist"; where's the label of "radical extremist Jihadist" since the culprit calls for a Christian holy war against Muslims; he called the killing of civilians "necessary"; but leave it to Ms. Rubin, the blind solid and countable zionist delphi oracle to immediately jump on her usual pro israel bandwagon that muslim terrorists are responsible for the Norway attack. This woman's entire purpose at the Pro Israel Post (it didn't use to be that way under Katherine Graham) but now is under her daughter's tutelage.

I'm not surprised that the Post deems Rubin's column worthy of an apology, after all the issue deals with the despicable Muslim world, a world genetically and religiously predisposed to terrorism; never mind the Babylonial Talmud and the multiple Halakic ruling of Israel's rabbis that gentiles are meant to serve and die for Jews and their children can be killed at times of war.

Forgotten is that Zionist terrorists and Israel introduced terrorism to the world of car bombings, hijacking of and shooting down of civilian planes, introduction of letter bombs, assassination of UN representatives, manufacturing deceitful bombings blamed on Arabs to inflame the U.S. such as the Lavon Affairs and the USS LIberty, the impunity of constant wars and attacks upon civilians, Lebanon multiple times, Sabra and Chatils, the multiple attacks on Gaza, imprisonment and torture of Palestinian women and children, and the total defiance of the UN and humiliation of U.S. Presidents.

Europe and the U.S. xenophobia against Islam and Muslim immigrants is so hypocritical given that both invaded and colonized the Arab and Muslim world with Christian soldier "immigrants" that came by overwhelming force to "civilize" and "education", and "Christianize" the southern hemiphere. They were not wanted but they stayed anyway, now Muslim immigrants in Europe, needed to do fill the jobs unwanted by Europeans (Hispanics) are despised and deported. Europe is aging and with low fertility needs foreign workers as long as they are not Africans, Asians, or Muslims.

It is as Prof. Samuel Huntington said in his book "clash of civilizations"

"The West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact, non-Westerners never do."

"Hypocrisy, double standards, and "but nots" are the price of universalist pretensions. Democracy is promoted but not if it brings Islamic fundamentalists to power; nonproliferation is preached for Iran and Iraq but not for Israel; free trade is the elixir of economic growth but not for agriculture; human rights are an issue for China but not with Saudi Arabia; aggression against oil-owning Kuwaitis is massively repulsed but not against non-oil-owning Bosnians. Double standards in practice are the unavoidable price of universal standards of principle"

The Post like the rest of the MSM have the same corrupt power on our government and society that Murdoch has in England. You are complicit in Israel's intransigence to avoid peace at all costs as it continues to steal Palestinian land and its water resources to thirst Palestinians while filling illegal settler swimming pools and fountains.

I doubt the Post will apologize for its knee-jerk attack against Muslims or ever change its ways to bring peace in the Holy Land despite its important to U.S. interests.

Rubin's attack on Muslims is the real "Anti-Semitism" since Arabs are the only true remaining Semites (languages not religion or ethnicity) while the Jews of today are not.

* Mohamed Khodr is a political activist who frequently writes on the plight of Palestinians living under the brutal occupation of Israel, U.S. Foreign Policy, Islam, and Arab politics.

By Philip Giraldi * | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

The issue of Israel is of critical importance to the antiwar movement, as frequenters of this website are surely aware. This is because Israel and its lobby in the United States have succeeded in so intertwining their interests with those of the United States that whenever Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sneezes four hundred congressmen say "Gesundheit!" What Israel does has consequences for every American citizen, and not only because Tel Aviv is the largest recipient of US economic and military assistance. It is indisputable that Israel and its friends in the White House and Defense Department played a major role in creating the lies and generating the momentum in the drive to war against Iraq in 2002, a conflict that continues to claim American casualties and which has left Iraq in ruins. Now the push is on to "do something" about Iran. There have been a number of bills in Congress that stop just short of declaring war on the Mullahs and there are signs that the Israeli government might be planning a military action before the end of the summer. Does anyone doubt that the United States would immediately be drawn into such a conflict, with disastrous consequences in terms of a terrorist response and energy prices that would skyrocket? It would be a particular misfortune in that there is no actual evidence of the alleged casus belli that Iran has a nuclear weapons program, the US is not threatened by anything Tehran does or could possibly do, and John Citizen has absolutely nothing to gain and everything to lose by Washington going to war.

There were two stories last week that illustrate just how bad the situation has become in the wake of the virtual capitulation by President Barack Obama during Netanyahu's triumphal May visit to Washington, the first time in recorded history that a small nation with less than eight million citizens has subjugated a much larger country with a population of more than 310 million.

The first story is about the annual meeting of Ralph Reed's evangelical Faith and Freedom Coalition in Washington on June 3rd and 4th, which included cameo appearances and a number of speeches by Republican presidential candidates. Support for Israel was on the menu du jour in nearly every speech and for every panel. It dominated the conference. One panel had as its subject "Israel: surrounded yet undaunted in the face of evil." Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention's oddly named Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission spoke for fifteen minutes about Israel, saying "If we want God to bless America, then we have to bless the Jews. God gave that land to his chosen people forever. That issue is settled by God almighty." Land called Obama "...the worst president of the United States that Israel has ever had," an assertion that probably had much deeper meaning than he intended. Danny Danon, a Knesset member for the Likud Party, warned President Obama "Take your hands from Jerusalem! Jerusalem will remain under Jewish control forever!"

Among the Republicans, only Mitt Romney failed to mention Israel, but he had already denounced Obama for "throwing Israel under the bus." Godfather Pizza magnate Herman Cain demonstrated complete ignorance on basic Middle Eastern issues when he revealed in an interview that he did not understand the meaning of "right of return." But he reportedly "blew the audience away" with his expressions of support-"You mess with Israel and you mess with the United States of America"-and then flew up to New York City to attend a Salute to Israel rally in Central Park. Michele Bachmann produced a standing ovation when she cited a "shocking display of betrayal of our greatest friend and ally Israel." She added "I stand with Israel...President Obama...does not speak for us on the issue of Israel." Tim Pawlenty enthused "We need a president of the United States who stands shoulder to shoulder with our great friend Israel."

The second story comes from a reported visit by Illinois Republican Senator Mark Kirk to Israel. The coverage of the visit by Josh Rogin (isn't he an actor?) on the Foreign Policy website, is headlined as a "new policy approach." The story features a photo of a beaming Kirk standing next to a similarly glowing Netanyahu, demonstrating beyond all doubt that excellent dentistry is available in both countries. Kirk, who appears to have some problem in keeping his resume straight regarding his military record, traveled to the Middle East on an "intense fact finding" mission funded by you and me, unfortunately.

Senator Kirk envisions a "host of ways" to bring about a lot more Israeli-US defense cooperation, suggesting that the $3 billion plus per year they already get is inadequate to their needs. He would like to have the Israeli navy assist the United States navy in patrolling for pirates in the Indian Ocean. Sounds good, doesn't it? The world's mightiest navy with eleven carrier battle groups needs help from Israel's three corvettes to patrol the Indian Ocean. Ah, but there must be a catch and I would guess that since Israel's navy is inadequate to the task, the United States will generously pay to muscle it up, provide a few new vessels and maybe some advanced weapons systems. Probably also cover all the operating costs. It makes perfect sense as everyone knows that Israel is vulnerable to attack from the sea, particularly by car ferries manned by ferocious Turks wielding sticks delivering aid to the Gazans.

Kirk would also like to have the Defense Department consider the purchase of Israel's Iron Dome defensive missile system to protect "our borders" in case either the Canadians or Mexicans decide to attack with Katyusha rockets. Iron Dome was largely developed with US funding but the sales would all go to Israel. Ka-ching!, just listen to that cash register opening up. Kirk would also like to have NATO buy the system to protect against somebody somewhere at some time who might be considering something bad. Ka-ching! Ka-ching!

But Senator Kirk's brilliant insights into the state of the Middle East do not end with the Israeli navy and buying needful things. Kirk advocates ending US funding to the Palestinians as long as Hamas is involved and also terminating it anyway if the Palestinians dare to declare statehood in the UN. Or if they fail to curb "anti-Israeli incitement in Palestinian schools." If those three reasons won't do, there are almost certainly others. Oh yes, and Kirk wants the Turkish humanitarian relief organization IHH, which supported the flotilla bringing aid to Gaza in May, declared a terrorist organization.

Kirk concluded his visit by making a video with Jewish Agency Chairman Natan Sharansky on human rights in Iran. Sharansky recited a list of dissidents in prison in Iran. He apparently misplaced the list of dissidents in prison in Israel, which would be a whole lot longer, as would the corresponding list of those shot and killed by Israeli security forces on the West Bank and in Gaza.

I really don't care what America's hypocritical evangelicals do except insofar as they waste my tax money on their divinely sanctioned wars and demand my grandson for cannon fodder. The fact that they ignore Christian teachings of love and forgiveness and seem to gravitate instead towards Old Testament bloodshed because of their skewed and ridiculous interpretation of what they think it says in the bible is a symptom of their ignorance and hubris. That a US senator goes to Israel to genuflect and kiss the Netanyahu ring is not that surprising either. But it would be a mistake to dismiss Ralph Reed's followers and the nincompoops that seem to proliferate in Congress because of their witlessness and hypocrisy. People like Land and the gaggle of Republican wannabes are both powerful and dangerous. The evangelicals appear to control who will be the next Republican presidential nominee, and their choice might well turn out to be a Bachmann or a Palin, with terrible consequences for the United States if they are elected and are able to carry out their fundamentalist agenda. Senator Mark Kirk is, by comparison, a useful idiot. He will give Netanyahu what he wants in return for support from the Chicago political machine to get reelected. But he buys that support with a Faustian bargain, using taxpayer money and compromising the security of every American. There was a time when someone like Kirk would be laughed out of the public forum, but currently every fool appears to have his day.

Americans have to make a hard decision on what kind of country they want to have. If they want a state shaped by a holy book and guided by the venal and hypocritical they can have it and it will turn out something like the Muslim equivalents in Iran and Saudi Arabia. Thought and moral guidance police on every corner with mandatory prayer services. Or we can opt to throw all this nonsense into the garbage where it belongs. Make Ralph Reed and his cheering Israel firsters go away or emigrate to Israel if that is their wont. We can make do without them.

* Philip Giraldi is a recognized authority on international security and counterterrorism issues. He is a former CIA counter-terrorism specialist and military intelligence officer who served 18 years overseas in Turkey, Italy, Germany, and Spain. He was Chief of Base in Barcelona from 1989 to 1992 designated as the Agency's senior officer for Olympic Games support. He is a contributing editor to The American Conservative, a columnist with AntiWar.com, and his frequent media appearances include 60 Minutes, al-Jazeera TV, National Public Radio, and the British Broadcasting Corporation.

"We need advocates for the truth," they tell him

By Stuart Littlewood * | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

Dr Williams is the 104th Archbishop of Canterbury

Kairos Palestine, the voice of Palestinian Christians, has given the Archbishop of Canterbury a strong ticking-off for remarks he made during a BBC interview.

Rifat Kassis, Coordinator of Kairos Palestine, said he was "deeply troubled" by the archbishop's "inaccurate and erroneous remarks" about the situation of Christians in the Middle East. He called the archbishop's failure to mention the Israeli occupation and the regime's oppressive policies "shocking".

In a letter [.PDF] to the archbishop, he said:

We were deeply saddened by your declarations because we know that Your Grace is well informed ... and you know very well that in the Bethlehem area alone there are 19 illegal Israeli settlements (such as nearby Har Homa built on Jabal Abu Ghneim) and the wall that have devoured Christian lands and put Bethlehem in a chokehold. You know well that only 13 per cent of Bethlehem area is available for Palestinian use and the wall isolates 25 per cent or the Bethlehem area's agricultural land. Not to mention the situation of Christians in Jerusalem, which you know very well, since you should have received reports from the Anglican bishop in the city whose residency permit was denied by the occupying power.

Mr Kassis ended by saying: "We would like to remind Your Grace that Christian Palestinians need advocates for the truth. It is the truth, and only the truth, that will lead to peace and justice in our home."

So what did Archbishop Rowan Williams say to the BBC that so infuriated his Palestinian brethren?

Apparently, it was the way he talked about the ethnic cleansing of Christians, referring to extreme pressure in Iraq while suggesting that the exodus of Christians from Palestine was due to "a much more undramatic but equally steady and strong pressure".

Interviewer: But that's a strong term to use isn't it, ethnic cleansing?

Archbishop: It is a strong term but I think not disproportionate where Iraq is concerned. The level of violence has been extreme.

However, Williams seemed careful to avoid connecting the term "ethnic cleansing" with Israel's programme to dispossess and terrorize Palestinians:

Interviewer: Do you think that the British government, other governments, should be more vocal in their support for Christians who you are seeing at the moment under great difficulty in a number of these countries?

Archbishop: Well, to be honest, I think at the moment there is quite a lot of support. And I can't fault what's been said by our government on this issue because I think the issue of religious freedom in general has very high priority in the Foreign Office at the moment. So I hope that continues.

The truth is that the British Foreign Office is infested with pro-Israel placemen and has not lifted a finger for religious or any other freedoms in the occupied Palestinian territories.

The archbishop continued: "Also I think people in the West know perfectly well that if foreign powers take up the cause of a minority in another country it can be utterly counterproductive."

Was he, by any chance, thinking about the foreign powers that implanted Jewish aliens in the Holy Land in 1947 and the running sore ever since?

He went on the say:

I think there are still perhaps too few people in this country who are aware of the haemorrhaging of Christian populations from the Holy Land. The fact that Bethlehem, a majority Christian city just a couple of decades ago, is now very definitely a place where Christians are a marginalized minority. We want that to be a little bit higher on people's radar...

But the archbishop was careful not to offend the Israeli occupiers.

Interviewer: Would you see what's happening in Bethlehem as another example of what you've described as ethnic cleansing?

Archbishop: It's not ethnic cleansing exactly because it's been far less deliberate than that I think. What we've seen, though, is a kind of Newtonian passing on of energy or force from one body to another so that some Muslim populations in the West Bank, under pressure, move away from certain areas like Hebron, move into other areas like Bethlehem. And there's nowhere much else for Christian populations to go except away from Palestine.

I'm sure that trapped and imprisoned Palestinian Christians will be relieved to hear that their misery is all down to Newtonian energy effects.

Archbishop Williams's comments about Bethlehem were "particularly faulty and offensive", according to Rifat Kassis, especially his claim that Muslims coming into the Bethlehem area, where space is limited, was forcing Christians to leave.

Are the archbishop and his Anglican Church the "advocates for the truth" so desperately needed?

It is not the first time the archbishop has upset Palestinian Christians. For decades the Israelis' game has clearly been to obstruct and paralyse Christianity in the Holy Land. When Palestine was under British mandate, Christians accounted for 20 per cent of the population. Sixty-three years of hostilities, dispossession, interference and economic ruination have whittled their numbers down to less than 2 per cent. At this rate, there will soon be no Christians left in the land where Christianity was born.

And in November 2008, while Israel was planning its murderous assault against Gaza's civilians (including the Christian community), the Archbishop of Canterbury was gallivanting with Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks on a visit to the former Nazi camps of Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland to demonstrate their joint solidarity against the extremes of hostility and genocide.

"This is a pilgrimage not to a holy place but to a place of utter profanity," said the archbishop, "a place where the name of God was profaned because the image of God in human beings was abused and disfigured. How shall we be able to read the signs of the times, the indications that evil is gathering force once again and societies are slipping towards the same collective corruption and moral sickness that made the Shoah possible?"

Evil was again gathering its forces and corruption and moral sickness were on the rampage even as he spoke. And did the Archbishop and the chief rabbi afterwards go to sniff the stench where the name of God had been profaned in the ruins of the Gaza Strip and utter the same brave words?

Did they hell!

When the Church of England's head honcho finally visited Gaza, the Israelis refused him access to the Strip but at the last minute allowed him into the shattered enclave for just one-and-a-half hours, enough time to show his face at the hospital and no more. He said nothing about his experience to the House of Lords where he has a seat and the support of a large gaggle of bishops.

This despite his claim to be "in a unique position to bring the needs and voices of those fighting poverty, disease and the effects of conflict, to the attention of national and international policy makers", despite his declaration that "Christians need to witness boldly and clearly", and despite his urging greater awareness of the humanitarian crisis to ensure that the people of Gaza are not forgotten.

The archbishop's website, however, did report how he hobnobbed with the Chief Rabbinate of Israel, paid his respects to Yad Vashem and the Holocaust, and talked with the president of Israel. There was no mention of any similar get-togethers with senior Islamic figures, leaving a question-mark over his real commitment to inter-faith engagement.

The archbishop's agreeing to accept the hospitality of Jewish political and religious dignitaries while they squished his wish to carry out his Christian duties in Gaza, tells us a great deal.

So is the guy a closet Zionist like so many other so-called Christians?

I'm reminded of the he words of Desmond Tutu: "Where there is oppression, those who do nothing side with the oppressor."

"Christianity destroyed not by Muslims but by Israel"

The archbishop has a chance to redeem himself with the international conference on Christians in the Holy Land he plans to hold next month. For two days I've been asking his press office for details of delegates, keynote speakers, etc but have received nothing. We are left to speculate.

It would be nice if the conference were addressed by that excellent trio from the Holy Land: Archbishop Theodosius Hanna (Greek Orthodox Church), Monsignor Manuel Musallam (Latin Catholic) and Mr Constantine Dabbagh (Executive Director of the Middle East Council of Churches). These courageous spiritual leaders and human rights defenders toured Ireland last November to raise awareness of the situation in their homeland under Israeli military occupation and the plight of the dwindling Christian community. Their central message was simple: "We need only one thing - to be protected by the world against the crimes of Israel" (For details please see my article "No such thing as justice in the Holy Land".)

Fr Manuel told members of the Irish government:

Christianity in the region has been destroyed not by Muslims but by Israel. Israel destroyed the church of Palestine and the church of Jerusalem beginning in 1948. It, not Muslims, has sent Christians in the region into a diaspora... Christians in Palestine are not suffering persecution, because we are not considered to be a religious community, but rather the people of Palestine. We have the same rights and the same obligations.

We have spoken to Israel for more than 18 years and the result has been zero. We have signed agreements here and there at various times and then when there is a change in the government of Israel we have to start again from the beginning. We ask for our life and to be given back our Jerusalem, to be given our state and for enough water to drink... I have not seen Jerusalem since 1990.

However, given the Anglican Church's recent form, it wouldn't surprise me if the conference is hosted by the CMJ (the Church's Ministry among Jewish People). The CMJ is "propelled by devotion to God and the fulfillment of His promises to His people Israel". In its statement of faith the CMJ says Christians have "a special responsibility to love, defend and share the Gospel with God's historic, chosen People, the Jews".

The CMJ's attitude to the Israel-Palestine struggle is unhelpful to the Palestinians. For example:

• Gentiles are "fellow-citizens with God's people"...
• CMJ rejoices that, "after 2,000 years ... the Jewish people now, at last, have returned to the land from which the majority were dispersed in AD70..."
• CMJ recognizes that the state of Israel was set up "as a result of a majority vote of the United Nations in 1947..." However the ministry does not hold any official position as to the appropriate location of the borders of the state.

That signifies approval for Israel's continuing land-grab and lawlessness. If CMJ recognizes the UN's partition it should also accept the borders on which it was based.

According to Wikipedia, "CMJ has always adopted a Zionist position, and expressed the view that the Jewish people deserved a state in the Holy Land decades before Zionism began as a movement."

The CMJ was adopted as an official ministry of the Church of England in 1995 and has been operating in the shadows ever since. It is, if you like, the Church of England's Zionist wing.

* Stuart Littlewood is author of the book Radio Free Palestine, which tells the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. Read other articles by Stuart, or visit Stuart's website.

By Tim Murphy * | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

American TV personality and evangelical Christian leader Pat Robertson, backed by an Israeli flag, delivers a speech on a pilgrimage to Israel. AP Photo/Brennan Linsley

Robertson: I was thinking, you know, if you oppose Muslims, what is said? Well, you're a bigot, right? Terrible bigotry. I wonder what were people who opposed the Nazis. Were they bigots?

Co-host: Well, in that day I think they were looked down upon and frowned upon.

Robertson: Why can't we speak out against an institution that is intent on dominating us and imposing Sharia law and making us all part of a universal caliphate? That's the goal of some of these people. Why is that bigoted? Why is it bigoted to resist Adolf Hitler and the Nazis and to say we don't want to live under Nazi Germany?

Watch:

Video link: http://youtu.be/mQOujxM585w

Not to nitpick here, but people who opposed the Nazis were not "looked down upon and frowned upon" as bigots. This was a few decades ago, so it's understandably a little obscure, but the United States actually went to war with Nazi Germany. There was a movie about it and everything.

As you'd probably guess, this is hardly the first time Robertson has compared a large and diverse group of people to Nazis:

Here's Robertson in 1995:

"Since the advent of the head of the Justice Department, Janet Reno, things have gotten out of control. Something is going on that is just very unwholesome in this nation....this is a shocking abuse of federal power. It is reminiscent of the Nazis. Something has got to be done."

And in 1993:

"Just like what Nazi Germany did to the Jews, so liberal America is now doing to the evangelical Christians. It's no different. It is the same thing. It is happening all over again. It is the Democratic Congress, the liberal-based media and the homosexuals who want to destroy the Christians."

Also in 1993:

"When lawlessness is abroad in the land, the same thing will happen here that happened in Nazi Germany. Many of those people involved in Adolph Hitler were Satanists. Many of them were homosexuals. The two things seem to go together."

And in 1990:

"[T]he liberal media and the screenwriters...are the spiritual descendants of Goebbels and the Nazis. They're not just talking about kikes and Jews; they're not talking about, quote, 'n-----s.' They're talking about Christians now."

And in 1984:

"The state is steadily attempting to do something that a few states other than the Soviets and the Nazis have attempted to do, namely, to take the children away from the parents and educate them in a philosophy that is amoral, anti-Christian and humanistic and to show them a collectivist philosophy that will ultimately lead to Marxism, socialism, and a communistic type of ideology."

So as you can see, Muslims are the new gays are the new Clinton Justice Department are the new gays (again) are the new screenwriters are the new public schools are the new Nazis; it's worse than we thought.

* Tim Murphy is a reporter at Mother Jones. Email him with tips and insights at tmurphy [at] motherjones [dot] com.

Source: Mother Jones

By Mohamed Khodr* | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

"A shocking crime was committed on the unscrupulous initiative of few individuals, with the blessing of more, and amid the passive acquiescence of all."
-Tacitus, First Century Historian and Senator in the Roman Empire

• No, America, you are not the land of the free, home of the brave.

• You are not the greatest nation on earth.

• You are not the superpower you proclaim.

• You are not the beacon of freedom, equality, and liberty to all.

• You are not the Promised Land.

• You are not the democracy of the First Amendment where there is Freedom of Speech, of the Press, of Religion, of freedom to petition and assemble.

• Your President is not the leader of the free world.

• You do not have a government of the people, by the people, and for the people.

Thus, what will history record of whom and what you are?

What you are in essence and action is a nation of ignorant cowards, SLAVES, to be exact, to the very nation you created and continue to pay for with your tax dollars, weapons, and the lives of your sons and daughters-Israel.

What you are is a nation of fools according to Israel, "detached from reality"; "delusional", and full of "illusions"; in other words a nation of mental defects who are unaware of who's the real boss of this nation and your supposedly elected government.

It's Israel, Stupid.

But your arrogance and conceit of greatness, of a democracy, of a representative government, a nation where the people freely choose their President and Congressional Representatives, a nation of "American Exceptionalism", blinds you to the reality that you neither control, own, nor create your own destiny.

Who does? It's the little nation from afar-Israel.

No candidate or politician can ever hope to be elected without the obligatory visit to Yad Vashem (Holocaust Memorial in Israel) while being forced to wear the mind numbing Yarmulke, and the obligatory pandering and shameful visit and speech to the true altar of "your" government-AIPAC. They've been Washington's real power and policy makers for decades.

As Early as 1957:

"I am aware how almost impossible it is in this country to carry out a foreign policy [in the Middle East] not approved by the Jews... terrific control the Jews have over the news media and the barrage the Jews have built up on congressmen ... I am very much concerned over the fact that the Jewish influence here is completely dominating the scene and making it almost impossible to get congress to do anything they don't approve of. The Israeli embassy is practically dictating to the congress through influential Jewish people in the country"

–Secretary of State John Foster Dulles in February, 1957 quoted on p.99 of "Fallen Pillars" by Donald Neff

You think you have freedom of speech? Then why are you and your government so cowardly intimidated and silent to even mention Israel, Jews, or Judaism, in political or personal debates or conversations? Your knees tremble when these issues come up and you lose your vocal cords while your heart rate and blood pressure rise and your visit to the restroom becomes imperative.

You think you have freedom of the press? You know, the press that's owned, controlled, and run by Jews. Why is there not one single American Jew, Christian, Muslim or person of any faith on television criticizing Israel? Why? They will lose their jobs a la Helen Thomas, Rick Sanchez, Octavia Nasr, and many, many others, not to mention the many politicians who lost their jobs for daring to speak out against Israel. Try to submit an op-ed to the major papers critical of our government's Israeli formulated foreign policy in the Middle East.

Do you wonder why Islam and Sharia Law, two unknown subjects to Americans, have become the hysteria du jour and who's behind it? It's to distract your short attention span away from the control, theft of money, weapons, spying, and wars you pay and die for Israel's security.

Who do you think wants to push Muslims and Christians into a World War III?

Do you honestly think your government represents you? Once they arrive in Congress your representatives are immediately welcomed by an army of AIPAC minions to brainwash them and let them know not to ever cross Israel and always vote for anything AIPAC sends. Most of the Legislative Staff in Congress is Jewish. Do you ever wonder why our Congress cuts meals to our children while sending billions to Israel with overwhelming bipartisan support? Look up the Congressional votes on resolutions supportive of Israel. It's a shocking embarrassment.

For Congressional Votes and Support of Israel visit: http://thomas.loc.gov/

Do you think you have freedom of religion? Who do you think is behind the push that you, yes you Christians, can't celebrate Christmas, not even mentioning it by name instead having to use "holiday"? Who's against school prayers, no displays of Nativity Scene, no courses on world religions, and no school prayers?

It's not the Muslims.

Many Israeli TV Shows mock and use blasphemous remarks against Jesus and the Virgin Mary, yet not ONE Single Christian church, seminary, university, media outlet, organization, or person has ever gone on TV or wrote an Op-ed to a paper condemning our "closes ally" for this filth.

Imagine if this was on Iranian TV?

See the Videos and judge for yourself, then ask yourself, why are you so cowardly not to respond to this visual and literal neo crucifixion of Christ?

From the Israeli Children TV show "Toffee VeHa-Gorillah" a Girl in Bikini makes fun with a monkey of how Jesus Christ, a Nazi, was Crucified and how all Christians are an Evil People.

Video link: http://sabbah.in/l6Hj8h

Israeli TV Show Blaspheme Jesus and Virgin Mary:

Video link: http://youtu.be/qtVpHUjwQSA

Monkey Christ:

Video link: http://youtu.be/-zUvFaW3WY0

Jews and Hasidic Gentiles-United to Save America (JAHG-USA)
http://www.noahide.com/yeshu.htm

"Jesus a false Prophet...with an evil agenda".

However, slam views Jesus, peace be upon him, as the true Messiah, born through a miracle from the Virgin Mary, peace be upon her, and performed miracles during his life

How can Israeli Jews feel such supremacy and the freedom to blaspheme Jesus, the Virgin Mary, peace be upon them both, and all Non-Jews?

Here's a Rabbinical explanation?

"Goyim were born only to serve us. Without that, they have no place in the world – only to serve the People of Israel,"

According to Rabbi Yosef, the lives of non-Jews in Israel are safeguarded by divinity, to prevent losses to Jews.

"In Israel, death has no dominion over them... With gentiles, it will be like any person – they need to die, but [God] will give them longevity. Why? Imagine that one's donkey would die, they'd lose their money....This is his servant... That's why he gets a long life, to work well for this Jew."

"Why are gentiles needed? They will work, they will plow, they will reap. We will sit like an effendi and eat....That is why gentiles were created."

– Jerusalem Post; "Yosef: Gentiles exist only to serve Jews"; October 25, 2010

Only Israel can slap America's Presidents, Congress, and the American people over and over and over while they all keep turning the other cheek over and over.

What hold do these Zionists have on our government, our minds, souls, freedoms, and courage to speak and act that we in this alleged superpower are so intimidated, so afraid, so cowardly to even raise a whisper in public about the historical costs to our lives, wealth, worldwide credibility, and our very humanity, by a people we saved in Europe, a people whom we against all divine and human laws gifted a foreign land to them, a nation that wouldn't exist without our recognition, support, and protection, a nation that commits genocide in our name and with our tax dollars?

Supporting Israel means supporting genocides against innocent civilians, ethnic cleansing, an expansionist military policy that's based on stealing more land and expelling more people, destroying villages by the hundreds, demolishing tens of thousands of homes, imprisoning hundreds of thousands of people over decades without the rule of law, allowing torture as policy, shooting children in classrooms, stealing drinking and irrigating water for settler swimming pools, building illegal settlements on hilltops, allowing racist settlers free reign to kill, burn, beat, and terrorize families, destroying electrical and water plants, hospitals, schools, churches, mosques, ambulances, and littering lands with cluster bombs to kill and mutilate children.

It means never holding Israel accountable for violating hundreds of U.N. Resolutions due to our, yes you America, vetoes.

It means being subservient to a rogue, terrorist, racist, murderous state whom we have elevated and put on a pedestal for our idolatrous worship.

Here's the nation we support:

"It is the duty of the [Israeli] leadership to explain to the public a number of truths. One truth is that there is no Zionism, no settlement, and no Jewish state without evacuating Arabs, and without expropriating lands and their fencing off."
– Yesha'ayahu Ben-Porat, Yedi'ot Aharonot 07/14/1972

Such is our support of Israel against the hapless long suffering Palestinians who by the millions have lived for decades as refugees in squalor camps and impoverished lives because of Israel's founding, a founding America created. They are homeless and stateless and America is too cowardly and fearful of Israel and organized Jewry to even cast a symbolic vote to support a Palestinian state for the stateless.

Israel has made fools of us, our government, our religions, our beliefs, and everything Americans have come to value about themselves and their country.

America, your new Manifest Destiny, is to serve Israel and only Israel, so help you God.

And so continues the illegal occupations of America and Palestine.

* Mohamed Khodr is a political activist who frequently writes on the plight of Palestinians living under the brutal occupation of Israel, U.S. Foreign Policy, Islam, and Arab politics.

Here is a new Christmas video for Palestine.

Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0wpyhHFOTg

Once again the Israelis/Zionists felt threatened by a video that reminds the world of the linkage between Christmas and Palestine, on many different levels.

It seems they made a organized effort to remove this video from YouTube by flagging it and voting it down.

So far, they only managed to get it restricted to "adults only" on the grounds that includes "inappropriate material". That means that only people with a youtube account can see it, thus severely restricting viewership. The same happened last Christmas when our video Christmas video was indeed removed.

Anyway, we need all the help we can get to spread this video, especially since people can see the video if it is embedded on a website or blog. For those with a youtube or gmail account (you login to youtube using any gmail account), you can also help by voting (pressing the "like" or "thumbs up" button) and putting a comment.

Hat tip: The Never Before Campaign Team

By Stuart Littlewood * | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

"We need only one thing, to be protected by the world against the crimes of 
Israel"

Outside the Irish Parliament. Left to Right: Alan Lonergan (SADAKA), Constantine Dabbagh, Fr Manuel Musallam, John Ging, Archbishop Theodosius Hanna

We are not here as politicians, they said. We come as representatives of the various churches in Jerusalem.

But the trio from the Holy Land showed they were more than a match for Western politicians who fancy they know all about the Middle East.

Archbishop Theodosius Hanna (Greek Orthodox Church), Monsignor Manuel Musallam (Latin Catholic) and Mr Constantine Dabbagh (Executive Director of the Middle East Council of Churches) are courageous human rights defenders and spiritual leaders from Palestine. They have just completed a tour of Ireland to raise awareness of the situation in their homeland under Israeli military occupation and the plight of the dwindling Christian community there.

"We need only one thing, to be protected by the world against the crimes of Israel," was their central message.

The week-long visit was arranged by SADAKA, the Ireland Palestine Alliance, and part funded by Trócaire, the overseas development agency of the Catholic Church in Ireland, and Christian Aid.

After delivering a special Christmas greeting from the Holy Land to the president and the people of Ireland, the Palestinian church leaders were able to establish a mutual understanding with President Mary McAleese that peace is more than an absence of violence – "the only lasting peace is a just peace".

During their visit the churchmen described the Israeli occupation as the "crucifixion of the nation of Palestine", and made a plea to all of Ireland's leaders to "act and intervene, or nothing will change".

They met with other Irish government ministers and the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs, whom they briefed on the reality of life in the Holy Land, where the Israeli occupation denies even freedom of religion. A transcript of the meeting can be found at here.

Archbishop Hanna began by reminding the committee:

Palestine is the place from where Christianity comes. Jerusalem, Bethlehem and the Holy Land in general are very important for Christians... Everything that has happened to the Palestinians between 1948 and today has happened to all Palestinians, including Christian Palestinians.

What we are after is freedom and dignity just as freedom and dignity have been bestowed on so many nations in the world. We want that too. When we speak about peace, we also speak about justice because it is impossible to have peace without justice. Peace is part of justice. Unfortunately, in the Holy Land there is no such thing as justice.

He explained that in Gaza 1.5 million live in an open air prison. "Christian or Muslim, we all are Palestinians and we all experience the same."

He said Jerusalem also was under siege. A Canadian could visit the city but Monsignor Musallam, who lives 20 minutes away in Birzeit, cannot. "What happens to him happens to all Palestinians in the West Bank. I was very happy to see Mr Dabbagh [who lives in Gaza] over here because I cannot see him in Palestine. I had to come to Ireland to see him."

The archbishop spoke briefly about the Kairos Palestine Document, the Christian Palestinians' message to the world requesting the international community to stand by the Palestinian people who have faced oppression, displacement and apartheid for more than six decades. The suffering continues while the international community silently looks on. It asks Christians all over the world to stand against injustice and apartheid and to work for a just peace in the Holy Land.

The document declares that the military occupation of Palestine "is a sin against God and humanity, and that any theology that legitimizes the occupation is far from Christian teachings".

"We are not terrorists. We have not occupied Israel. Peace is possible if justice is possible."

Fr Manuel Musallam told the committee:

I was in Gaza during the war [Operation Cast Lead] and suffered with my people for 22 days. I saw with my own eyes a phosphoric bomb in the school yard. I saw people injured by these phosphoric bombs, although these bombs are forbidden. These crimes against us were ignored by all the people of the world. No-one was courageous enough until now to say "No" to Israel or "No" to America or to say "Stop killing" and "Stop making war".

What happened in Gaza was not a war. A war is a clash between soldiers, aircraft and weapons. We were victims, just victims. They destroyed Gaza. I was there and saw with my own eyes what happened. We in Gaza were treated like animals... We are not terrorists. We have not occupied Israel.

We do not want to die to liberate Palestine. We want to live to build Palestine... We are asking the world to give the Palestinian people their rights. The question is whether peace is possible. Despite all the difficulties, the crimes and the war, we as Palestinians say peace is possible if justice is possible.

Fr Manuel believes a religious war is brewing in the Middle East. "This war will not stop at the Middle East," he warned. "It will also happen here."

At some point a state should be recognized, he says.

From 1948 to the present, our state has no borders. It is the only country state without borders... They refused to discuss borders. They refused to end the state of war. Europe and America were partners in this war and all the crimes committed against us, because they set up Israel in Palestine. People were gathered from more than 20 countries...

What Constantine Dabbagh said to the committee was clear and simple. "We want to live as Palestinians and for the two-state recognition to be applied in accordance with UN resolutions. This would mean that the Palestinian state would have the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza, lands which were occupied in 1967." He expressed appreciation for the worldwide support for justice but, he said, it evaporates when it comes to the rights of the Palestinians and the vetoes which are imposed by the United States and other governments.

The occupation within Gaza has ceased but we are cordoned off and are living in a big prison... A population of 1.5 million people includes 2,000 Christians but we are part and parcel of this community. We have no problem with our Muslim compatriots but it is true that the extremists are growing and I repeat the warning on this point from Monsignor Musallam. This is as a result of the occupation, the oppression and humiliation and the poverty. These factors are making more people side with the extremists and this is what we want to stop. This will only happen with the support and help of the international community and the United States in particular.

The Irish government's "Zionist Tendency"

At question time it emerged that even the Irish government has its "Zionist Tendency". Deputy Alan Shatter argued:

I find it extraordinary that a group such as this should make a presentation to the committee on the plight confronting Christians on the West Bank and Gaza and on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict without any particular mention or emphasis on the substantial difficulties that fundamentalism in the Muslim world has created, of the major difficulties in Gaza created by Hamas and of the significant problems for the Christian community posed by extremists within Gaza...

It is my understanding that there have been a number of incidents in Gaza. When I met President Abbas he detailed many deaths that occurred in Gaza in the context of the Christian community. Fr Musallam commented on one of the events, which was an attack and looting on the Latin Catholic church in Gaza and a nearby school run by nuns in 2007. From my knowledge of having visited Gaza, pressure has been put on the Christian community. There has been a series of attempts to impose a fundamentalist Muslim perspective on the workings in Gaza.

Archbishop Hanna was able to quickly put the deputy in his place."Deputy Shatter's speech was full of inaccuracies and non-factual statements," he said. "We are not here as politicians; we are men of spirituality and are talking about peace. At one point, I believed the deputy speaking was the Israeli ambassador, not an Irish parliamentarian.

Archbishop Hanna added: "I urge the deputy to check his facts. With regard to religious extremism and segregation, we are absolutely against any kind of religious fundamentalism, be it Jewish, Muslim or Christian. I and others from the Christian community and Muslim mosques, and even some Jewish people, work together against fundamentalism..."
"We do not need cookies from Israel"

The archbishop continued:

The problem in Palestine has nothing to do with religion – it is not a religious issue. It is not a conflict of Christians, Muslims and Jewish people. It is a conflict between those who are the holders of a rightful cause and those who took away that right by military might. Palestinian people as a whole, including Christians and Muslims, have said repeatedly that what they want is peace. We want two states that live together in peace. However, the reality on the ground is that we are extremely far away from that goal because Israel does not want peace.

He admitted there may be some Palestinian extremists who use religion in the wrong way, but he emphasized that the Church and its community stood against terrorism or violence wherever it comes from. Israel, he pointed out, has a violent attitude towards the Palestinians as a matter of state policy.

Fr Manuel added that Palestinians are not terrorists.

All we ask of Israel is to respect us and not treat us like animals. We also ask parliamentarians and governments across the world not to give us food aid. We do not need cookies from Israel. We do not even need to trade with Israel. All we need is to be protected. We are suffering a war that we have endured for more than 60 years.

If we have Hamas, then Israel has Sharon, Avigdor Lieberman, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef and others. We do not agree with any of these fanatic persons on either side. Does Deputy Shatter expect us as Palestinians to protect those who occupy us?

"Be assured that Hamas will protect Christians in Gaza" – Haniyeh
Fr Manuel continued: "As for the church, Christianity in the region has been destroyed not by Muslims but by Israel. Israel destroyed the church of Palestine and the church of Jerusalem beginning in 1948. It, not Muslims, has sent Christians in the region into a diaspora."

He told his listeners how he had seen the Israeli army target the Christian school in Gaza.

Five Hamas ministers visited the school after it was attacked and promised they would repair the damage. Someone intended to create havoc in the area, particularly when Hamas and Fatah were clashing. When I visited the school, a Hamas minister, a Muslim, picked up the Holy Bible thrown on the ground, kissed it and put it back on the altar. He said Muslims were forbidden to do such things to the Bible. Hamas paid more than 122,000 dollars to repair all the damage caused.

Afterwards I met the Hamas prime minister, Ismail Haniyeh. When he embraced me he said this, and we believed it. He said: "Go to your family, but be assured that Hamas will employ weapons against Muslims to protect Christians in Gaza." This is the reality. Christians in Palestine are not suffering persecution, because we are not considered to be a religious community, but rather the people of Palestine. We have the same rights and the same obligations.

Islamic fundamentalism ... came about because of the occupation of Palestine and the different wars we have suffered. It is a fact that there is fundamentalism in Palestine, yet if the occupation continues it will explode and destroy the world, not just us.

He finished by telling them what it's really like:

We have spoken to Israel for more than 18 years and the result has been zero. We have signed agreements here and there at various times and then when there is a change in the government of Israel we have to start again from the beginning. We ask for our life and to be given back our Jerusalem, to be given our state and for enough water to drink. We want to be given more opportunity to reach Jerusalem. I have not seen Jerusalem since 1990.

He described the nightmarish system of entry and exit permits, which Israel invariably refused. "We want to see an end to this occupation, and please do not ask us to protect those who are occupying our territory.
"They shoot at any farmer who tends to his land"
Mr Dabbagh rounded off the churchmen's contribution:

We are not just a community but part and parcel of the whole society. This does not mean that we have not encountered any difficulties. Such difficulties come from those extremists who derive their raison d'être, unfortunately, from the policies of the West. They are even very dangerous to Hamas, which is giving protection to the Christians, whenever it is needed.

We hate to see rockets being launched from Gaza, but committee members should consider the state of Israel with its arsenal of weapons and the destruction which is being inflicted on Gaza. I would like them to come to Gaza again and witness the daily incursions over the border... These daily incursions are led by tanks and bulldozers. The Israelis keep a buffer zone of between 300 metres and 500 metres along a 45 km strip of the border with Gaza... They shoot at any farmer who tends to his land.

As regards the two-state solution, he asks what state they want Palestinians to accept:

Do they want us to have cantons here and there and call them viable? The state of Palestine next to the state of Israel should be in compliance with UN resolutions, which means that Israel should evacuate Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem to give Palestinians the opportunity to establish our state, in order to have security for Israel and for us Palestinians as well.

We are suffering from the siege. People cannot travel for medical treatment, for education, for normal business. I could not get into the West Bank or Jerusalem to attend meetings or prayers. A number of Christians in Gaza are given permits to go there at Christmas time and for the New Year, but many others are deprived. My children are under 35 years and they could not go. Are they not allowed to go to church until they are 35 and older? This is unfair.

Muslims are deprived completely and this creates another struggle between Christians and Muslims. Muslims see a few hundred of us getting out at Christmas, but they are not allowed to get out to pray in Jerusalem.

The inhuman conditions imposed by Israel should be stopped but that won't happen, he says, "unless the international community brings a just peace, ends the occupation and allows for the establishment of a Palestinian state next to the Israeli state in accordance with UN resolutions".

Deputy Marie Crawley intervened with a no-nonsense challenge to a suggestion from another deputy that the international community and the negotiations need to be approached with balance.

This is not a balanced situation. This is not a conflict of equals. This is an occupation. We have an occupier and we have an occupied people. We have an oppressor and we have an oppressed people. We have a powerful people and we have a powerless people. To approach that situation with balance is to side with the occupier.

The international community does not need to approach the situation with a sense of balance, but needs to exert pressure on the state of Israel until such time as it complies with international law and ends the occupation.

Earlier, the church leaders met the minister for foreign affairs, Michael Martin, and stressed the need for Ireland and other Western states to put pressure on Israel to comply with international law and UN Security Council resolutions. They urged the Irish government to consider the preferential trade relations Israel has been allowed enjoy with the EU.

Mr Martin also agreed to raise the issue of Palestinian students being prevented by Israel from travelling to Europe to participate in the EU's Erasmus Programme (a scheme for higher education students to spend part of their studies in another European country) while encouraging and allowing Israeli students to do so.

By coincidence, John Ging, Director of Operations in Gaza for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, happened to be in town and bumped into the Holy Land trio at the gates of the Irish parliament. Ging was pleasantly surprise to see familiar Gaza faces in Dublin (see photo).

* Stuart Littlewood is author of the book Radio Free Palestine, which tells the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. Read other articles by Stuart, or visit Stuart's website.

By Stuart Littlewood * | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

Rarely do I enter a church unless it's to admire the medieval architecture, a soaring testament to man's faith in a more dangerous and uncertain age.

One reason being that church leaders, by and large, ignore the fate of the Holy Land, which of course underpins the whole structure of their faith. The performance of our bishops, who have a voice in the House of Lords but never use it, is beyond pathetic.

However, every year at this time I make a point of visiting the parish church in the small market town of Fakenham, in Norfolk, to enjoy their dazzling Christmas Tree Festival. The event has been going for 10 years and this year raised money for 78 local and national charities.

Each charity decorates a tree supplied by one of the festival's sponsors, a local garden centre, and under each tree is a collection box. The trees are displayed in the church for a week, then taken down in time to be used to good effect somewhere else in the run-up to Christmas. Last year 25,000 people visited the magical festival. This year the church was crowded and the admiring chatter was accompanied by a continual chink-chink of money falling into the boxes.

The charities taking part ranged from the Gurkha Welfare Trust and the East Anglian Air Ambulance to Chernobyl Children and numerous local nursery schools. Prayers are said every hour for thye charities in turn. As usual I looked around hopefully for an appeal on behalf of the children of the brutally occupied Holy Land – and especially Gaza - who are always on my mind as Christmas approaches.

But no luck.

People are at their most generous about now, and there's perhaps an opening here for those who work to alleviate the awful suffering of young and old living amid the wreckage of homes and infrastructure in the Gaza Strip. The rector at Fakenham believes his church more or less pioneered the tree festival but he’s aware that other churches are taking up the idea. Are any of the UK’s 1500 mosques doing it? Is there an opportunity for inter-faith joint working?

I phoned the Islamic centre in the two nearest cities several times but they don’t answer. I left voice and email messages but no-one got back to me. So much for their front-line communication...

Last Christmas I wrote that our then prime minister, Gordon Brown, wished the Jewish community a happy Chanuka from Number10.gov.uk and recalled how he celebrated Israel’s 60th birthday with them.

But he had no festive greeting for the shivering and shattered Gazans who had been bombed and blasted by his ‘friends’ during their Christmas festival. And no word of cheer, either, for the Christian communities in Gaza and the West Bank endlessly persecuted by the Israelis.

One presumes that Brown, a staunch ally of Israel, knew about the hell that his friends were about to inflict on Gaza during the Christmas celebrations of 2008/9, just as Mr Abbas did according to leaked US cables. Christians living in the Strip were certainly aware of the invasion threat and abandoned plans to celebrate the midnight Christmas mass in protest. But they couldn’t have imagined the enormity of the devastation and slaughter that was about to be unleashed on them and their children while Western leaders stayed shtum.

And Brown is the son of a Church of Scotland minister.

Many of the 1.5 million people packed into the ravaged Strip, I hear, have had to scavenge through rubbish tips for food to survive.

So what sort of Christmas is in store for their little ones this year while the criminals who inflicted such savagery and torment, and continue to deny them their human rights, have their snouts in the Yuletide trough and enjoy a warm bed?

This year The Jewish Chronicle reports that David Cameron, our new prime minister, has wished the Jewish community around the world "a happy and peaceful Chanucah".

He called the story of Chanucah "an inspiring message of the power of hope to sustain people through the toughest of times".

From his echo-chamber Foreign Secretary William Hague, in a Chanucah video message, added: "It's a great pleasure to send warm good wishes to the Jewish community in Britain and all over the world."

I wonder if either of them will have the good grace to send similar messages of hope to sustain the good people of Gaza "through the toughest of times".

The UN says that imports are only at 36 per cent of pre-siege levels, thanks to Cameron’s friends, and exports are still not allowed (except a few strawberries), so the hardship must still be unimaginable.

Last week, here in England, we were treated to the spectacle of the Royal Navy's flagship, the aircraft carrier Ark Royal, returning to her home port for the last time, to be de-commissioned and turned into a museum or tourist attraction - or sold for scrap - after only 25 years' service. The original Ark Royal was Lord Howard's flagship in the naval actions to beat off the Spanish Armada's invasion force in those swashbuckling days of 1588.

Fighting for freedom, you see.

A pity the present Ark Royal couldn't have gone to her grave with a bang rather than a whimper... for example, by making a last voyage to the Eastern Med, perhaps with a multi-national crew, to bust the evil blockade and land supplies on Gaza's beach... a long-overdue Christmas present for the imprisoned Christians and Muslims alike from a heroic Santa.

Fanciful thinking? Of course, given the international community's spineless leaders.

* Stuart Littlewood is author of the book Radio Free Palestine, which tells the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. Read other articles by Stuart, or visit Stuart's website.

By Neve Gordon * | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

Despite the fact that it was the seventh demolition since last July, this time the destruction of the Bedouin village of Al-Arakib in the Israeli Negev was different. The difference is not because the homeless residents had to deal this time with the harsh desert winter; nor in the fact that the bulldozers began razing the homes just minutes before the 40 children left for school, thus engraving another violent scene in their memory. Rather, the demolition was different because this time Christian evangelists from the United States and England were involved.

I know this for a fact because right next to the demolished homes, the Jewish National Fund (JNF) put up a big sign that reads:

"GOD-TV FOREST, a generous donation by God-TV made 1,000,000 tree saplings available to be planted in the land of Israel and also provided for the creation of water projects throughout the Negev."

GOD-TV justifies this contribution by citing the book of Isaiah:

"I will turn the desert into pools of water and the parched ground into springs."

The JNF's objective, however, is not altruistic, but rather to plant a pine or eucalyptus forest on the desert land so that the Bedouins cannot return to their ancestral homes. The practice of planting forests in an attempt to Judaize more territory is by no means new. Right after Israel's establishment in 1948, the JNF planted millions of trees to cover up the remains of Palestinian villages that had been destroyed during or after the war. The objective was to help ensure that the 750,000 Palestinian residents who either fled or were expelled during the war would never return to their villages and to suppress the fact that they had been the rightful owners of the land before the State of Israel was created. Scores of Palestinian villages disappeared from the landscape in this way, and the grounds were converted into picnic parks, thus helping engender a national amnesia regarding the Palestinian Nakba.

For several years, I thought this practice had been discontinued, but thanks to the JNF's new bedfellows and the generous donation of Rory and Wendy Alec, who established the international evangelical television channel GOD-TV, within the next few months a million saplings will be planted on land belonging to uprooted Bedouins.

God-TV can afford such lavish gifts, since it boasts a viewership of nearly half a billion people, with 20 million in the United States and 14 million in Britain. The television channel regularly features evangelical leaders such as Joyce Meyer, Creflo Dollar, Benny Hinn, Kenneth Copeland and John Hagee, at least some of whom espouse Christian Dispensationalism and believe that all Jews must convert to Christianity before the "Second Coming".

The viewers are asked to open their wallets in order to "sow a seed for God". In this case, the donations seem to have actually been allocated toward sowing seeds, but these seeds are ones of hate and strife. They are antithetical to Isaiah's prophecy about the people beating their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Indeed, if Isaiah were alive today, he would probably be among the first to lie in front of the bulldozers in an effort to stop the destruction of the Bedouin homes.

* Neve Gordon is the author of Israel's Occupation and can be contacted through his website www.israelsoccupation.info

Tell how it really is in Gaza, especially if you're an archbishop

By Stuart Littlewood * | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

Archbishop Barry Morgan of Wales

To their eternal shame, Western churchmen seem to care little about the plight of their brothers and sisters in the Holy Land or the fate of the holy places where Christianity was born.

There are, of course, honourable exceptions. One such is the Archbishop of Wales, the Most Reverend Dr Barry Morgan, whose church has provided the Gazans with a mobile dental unit.

He is not best pleased that the Israelis make it difficult to obtain fuel and medical supplies for it, and he didn't mince his words when recently reporting to the Church's governing body how things really are in Gaza.

The truth of the matter seemed to annoy a certain Mr Simon McIlwaine, who complained that the archbishop's words put the state of Israel in an unduly harsh light and he was compelled to "provide some badly needed context". Whereupon Mr McIlwaine launched into the familiar anti-Gaza, anti-Hamas rant we're used to hearing from the pro-Israel lobby.

"The archbishop raises a central issue of the Arab-Israeli conflict – anti-Semitism..."

The central issue is 62 years of criminal oppression. The charges include land theft, illegal occupation, ethnic cleansing, disregard for human rights, and war crimes such as those documented in the Goldstone report. The action required is set out in international law, numerous UN resolutions and every code of human decency.

"Hamas is an explicitly anti-Semitic organization that at the very least seeks to exercise a veto over the Jewish right to self-determination."

Israel is deeply anti-Arab and continues to dispossess and remove Arabs not only from Israel proper, but also from areas of the West Bank and East Jerusalem that Israel has earmarked for permanent occupation.

Palestinians have been denied the right to self-determination for decades and Israel even refuses to recognize their perfectly satisfactory democratic process.

"Hamas's anti-Semitic ideology pre-existed the blockade..."

Israel's illegal occupation pre-dates the founding of Hamas.

"Hamas's attacks against Israel are not merely motivated by a desire to end the blockade, but to deprive the Jewish people of their ability to enjoy a national life of their own."

The irony of that remark is apparently lost on Mr McIlwaine.

"Clearly, anti-Semitism plays a significant role in fomenting violence against Israel in the Middle East."

Playing the anti-Semitism card yet again. Israel is the violator. Hamas chief Khaled Mesh'al has explained that armed resistance against Israel is the result of Israeli occupation, injustice and oppression, not religious differences.

"The archbishop describes the devastation in the Gaza Strip without acknowledging the role Hamas played in bringing the destruction about."

Israel broke the ceasefire with a raid killing at least six Palestinians in order to provoke the sort of retaliation that could then be used as an excuse to launch Operation Cast Lead, the three-week onslaught Israel had been preparing for months.

"History has shown that isolating tyrannical regimes such as Hamas results in civilian suffering."

Israel was making Palestinians' lives a misery long before Hamas appeared on the scene. What right has Israel or anyone else to isolate a democratically elected government and its people anyway?

Hamas is an Islamic party legitimately ruling a mainly Islamic country. It is the people's choice. How can it be any more "tyrannical" than the Jewish State with its exclusivity laws and lethal attitude towards non-Jews?

"...Responsibility for the disruption of daily life in the Gaza Strip lies with Hamas. By way of comparison, daily life in the West Bank, which has not been the source of rocket attacks, is improving."

As long as Israel occupies Gaza's airspace, coastal waters and air-waves, controls all access points (except now the Egyptian border, although it still interferes there), maintains a sea blockade and attacks and even murders volunteers bringing humanitarian supplies, it is ridiculous to suggest that anyone else is responsible for disrupting daily life.

In 2007, when Israel tightened the siege on Gaza, the prime minister's adviser, Dov Weisglass, said: "The idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger." According to documents just released under a Freedom of Information petition by Gisha, an Israeli law centre, Israel operated "a policy of deliberate reduction" of basic goods in the Gaza Strip. Gisha's director accuses Israel of "paralyzing normal life in Gaza", and adds: "I am sorry to say that major elements of this policy are still in place."

The documents confirm that the siege was not for security reasons but aimed at keeping Gazans at near-starvation level. Since around half the population are growing children this act of collective punishment has meant that hundreds of thousands are undernourished.

Mr McIlwaine is right that no rockets have been fired from the West Bank. Why, then, are the shredded remains of that territory still under cruel occupation and tight restriction?

"Hamas has murdered its political opponents, threatened its critics and stolen humanitarian aid shipped in from outside."

Another classic piece of irony for us to savour. Assassinations and extra-judicial executions are an Israeli speciality. So is thieving. They even steal British passports for their murder squads.

We never hear what happens to humanitarian aid seized in international waters by Israeli thugs who abduct passengers and crew and rob them of their possessions. Remember how Israel kept stealing Gaza's tax revenues? Did they ever give the money back?

Simon McIlwaine is co-director of Anglican Friends of Israel, an organization whose aims include:

• Securing defensible borders for the State of Israel. (What borders? Its ever-expanding illegal borders enclosing stolen lands or its internationally-recognized 1967 borders?)
• Calling Anglicans to repentance for the wrongs inflicted by Christians on the Jewish people and the nation of Israel.
• Protecting the Christian communities threatened by Islamic extremism in the Middle East (though not, it seems, against the crushing oppression of Israeli extremists).

The puzzle is why any Anglican would befriend a regime with so much blood on its hands and attack a bishop who speaks up for its wretched victims. St Augustine must be spinning in his grave.

At least Dr Morgan went to Gaza to see for himself. Did Mr McIlwaine?

What did the good archbishop say that so rattled Mr McIlwaine's cage?

Regarding Gaza, Dr Morgan observed: "Two-thirds of these people live in abject poverty, in refugee camps, after the confiscation of their homes and land by the Israeli government. The situation is worse now than when I visited in 2001..." He described how people lived in zinc shacks, without electricity or water and with open sewers running down the streets, and how Gaza City itself was like a bombsite.

Only 32 per cent of the industrial fuel needed in one week in August 2010 for Gaza's power plant was allowed into Gaza. The result was that the power plant shut down completely for two days after exhausting its reserves of fuel, triggering power cuts of 16 hours per day – affecting water supply, sewage treatment and removal, and the functioning of health services. Thirty per cent of households in Gaza have access to running water for only four to eight hours per week; 40 per cent receive water once every four days and the other 30 per cent obtain it once every two days. Half of the normal level of need of cooking gas entered Gaza in August; no diesel or petrol has been delivered for weeks - hence diesel and petrol being taken through the tunnels at the risk of attack by the Israelis. Imports are limited, raw materials severely restricted, no building materials are allowed into Gaza, exports from Gaza are banned entirely.

"The blockade in Gaza has destroyed public service infrastructure and hospitals have power cuts for twelve hours a day, emergency medical treatment for residents of Gaza is denied, and 40 million litres of sewage is being discharged every day into the sea because of lack of fuel to pump or treat human waste. Family members in Gaza have been separated from relatives living in the West Bank and elsewhere.

All of which is confirmed by other sources.

Dr Morgan continued: "The United Nations, the Security Council and the European Union want crossings to Gaza to be permanently open to allow access for humanitarian and commercial aid and all of this was agreed between Israel and the Palestinian authorities in 2005."

He also referred to the Kairos document issued by Palestinian Church leaders a year ago and the report "Justice and Peace for Palestine" discussed recently by the Methodist Church. "Both of those reports say that the key hindrance to security and a lasting peace for all in the region is the occupation of Palestinian territory by the State of Israel..."

For 43 long years. Who is foolish enough to believe there can be peace under the jackboot of occupation?

Settlements by Israeli settlers are illegal under international law, and over one third have been built on Palestinian privately owned land. The wall that has been built covering a distance of 702 kilometres ... not only separates Israelis from Palestinians but Palestinians from family members and friends. In rural areas, it effectively cuts them off from their olive trees and fruit and vegetable plantations. In July 2004, the International Court of Justice declared the separation barrier illegal, and called on Israel to cease construction to dismantle constructed areas and provide reparation to those materially damaged by the construction.

"Settlers" is too nice a word for my taste. It suggests peaceful pioneers wishing to integrate. Israeli "settlers" are anything but. They are squatters, half a million in over 100 illegal colonies – ugly blots on an otherwise lovely landscape. They include gangs of armed delinquents who terrorize local villagers, vandalize their crops, pollute their land and harass their children.

Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention clearly forbids an occupying power from transferring parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.

Next time, the archbishop might question why the Separation Wall, if meant for security, wasn't built within Israel's internationally-recognized borders. Its actual route bites deep into Palestinian territory and is designed to annex choice agricultural land and the Palestinians' precious water supplies. Palestinians are now severely rationed and have to pay Israel inflated prices for a dribble of their own water while Israelis splash around in their swimming pools and wash their cars.

The archbishop finished by saying:

Now we, as a Church, perhaps cannot do very much except that we ought to acquaint ourselves with what is going on, and fight against injustice, and demand that the rule of law be upheld wherever it is being flouted for whatever reason. We have a duty to speak out.

On an earlier occasion in 2009, after Israel's blitz on Gaza, Dr Morgan was saying:

Having visited Gaza twice over the past few years I have seen the appalling conditions in which the people there live ... with no proper homes, sanitation or means of escape. Their lives are now unbearable as they come under daily fire and are too scared to even leave their homes. We have heard that it has now become too dangerous for our clinic, which was being used as a frontline hospital dealing with casualties, to continue its work.

It is tragic that there is so much violence in an area known as the Holy Land... It is time for the fighting to stop – enough children have died and enough homes have been destroyed and it is immoral for the world to stand by and do nothing.

How very refreshing. Those other bishops who loaf around the House of Lords and never open their mouths when so much needs to be said and done, please note.

* Stuart Littlewood is author of the book Radio Free Palestine, which tells the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. Read other articles by Stuart, or visit Stuart's website.