2003-10-14

The project is due tomorrow, but I keep thinking about the things I want to do with OddMuse, and the books I want to read, and the newspaper waiting for me, and music to listen to... Argh!

OddMuse

Joi Ito describes the how Homeland Security works on the US borders. ¹ I think it explains very aptly why I’m not interested in travelling to the US. You hear all sorts of things:

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• Even before September 11, a friend of mine flew to the states to work for HP in California for 6 months. On one of the big airports in the US, where he was to change planes, he got interrogated, and put on the next plane home. He was not allowed to make phone calls at first, but then he was allowed one to his family. He quickly explained the situation to his dad. Dad calls HP, HP tries to intervene, but too late: Back home he goes.
• Read this somewhere in the news: A canadian citizen of Syrian descent was sent to *Syria* (not Canada!).
• If you’re suspected according to some mysterious piece of software, or according to the whim of an officer, you can be detained at airports essentially for ever without access to the law, because parts of international airports are considered *extra-territorial*. In effect, no law at all. Only the order imposed by people I don’t trust.
• People have been detained in the US for months and months without access to lawyers and without informing their families.
• People have been tortured (they have some sort of euphemism for this which I forget) in the US.
• The US is using Guantanmo, and as far as I can tell Diego Garcia, and some “allies” to torture prisoners (they also have other euphemisms for this).

Sure, people also get tortured and maltreated in Tunesia, Israel, Spain, England, France, Switzerland, Russia, etc. All over the world, in fact. But in the US the change for the worse is particularly obvious right now, and it seems that in the US, unlike other countries, I might end up being one of the suspects.

I think I’ll listen to some Omme Kolsoum now. ;)

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I’ve been reading the abstracts of an ElectronicIntifada article again. This is so sad. I’m posting it here – maybe because my subconscious has decided to do something against my InformationOverload, and so mysteriously all my mail in the “misc” group was marked as read...

ElectronicIntifada

InformationOverload

• *Diaries: EYEWITNESS ACCOUNT OF THE INVASION OF RAFAH Laura Gordon, writing from Rafah, occupied Gaza Electronic Intifada Diaries, 14 October 2003** Then the streets started screaming and we were running almost without thinking, down the edges of the street around the people who had lost their fear, around donkey carts loaded full, ran until we fround a corner to turn into and then we ran past families and children, through narrow streets far enough from the main street not to know the worst, far enough that we were the ones spreading the news that the army had come back. When it left, it left not through the streets as it had come, but by creating a path through the homes still standing in Yibneh, demolishing anything in its way and driving over the remains. Laura Gordon writes from Rafah about the invasion. ²

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• *Diaries: RAFAH BESIEGED AND UNDER CONSTANT ATTACK Mona Al-Farra, UHWC, 13 October 2003** The Israeli army invaded the Rafah Refugee camp last night in an operation that they said would go on for one week. Ambulance drivers, out of desperation resort to rough unpaved roads out of Rafah to try to evacuate the seriously injured casualties, this under threat of Israeli army tank and machine gun fire against anyone trying to circumvent checkpoints. Mona al-Farra reports. ³

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• *Human Rights: SECRETARY-GENERAL DEPLORES KILLING OF PALESTINIAN CIVILIANS Report, United Nations, 10 October 2003** United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today deplored the killing of Palestinian civilians, including two children, by an Israeli Defence Force missile during Israel’s incursion today into the Rafah refugee camp on the Gaza Strip. ⁴

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• *Human Rights: ISRAELI FORCES WITHDRAW FROM RAFAH, LEAVING 8 PALESTINIANS DEAD AND 2,000 HOMELESS Report, PCHR, 13 October 2003** Following an Israeli military incursion that left dead 8 Palestinians, Israeli occupying forces finally withdrew from Rafah refugee camp at midnight on Sunday, 12 October 2003. ⁵

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• *Development: ISRAELI INCURSION LEAVES 1,240 PALESTINIANS HOMELESS, UN AGENCY FINDS Report, UNRWA, 13 October 2003** The Israeli demolition of refugee shelters in Rafah camp on the southern Gaza Strip last week has left 1,240 people homeless, United Nations relief workers said today. ⁶

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• *Internet & Technology: STOPTHEWALL.ORG SITE LAUNCHED BY THE ANTI-APARTHEID WALL CAMPAIGN Announcement, StopTheWall.org, 10 October 2003** After months of anticipation, the Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign formally announces the new website for mobilizing to Stop the Wall in Palestine, at StopTheWall.org. The Stop the Wall site comes at a time when the Apartheid Wall’s pace is accelerating daily throughout the West Bank, making momentum and solidarity around the Campaign urgent. ⁷

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• *Human Rights: CURFEW ON JENIN ENTERS SECOND WEEK Report, PCHR, 11 October 2003** For the seventh successive day, Israeli occupying forces have imposed a strict curfew on Jenin and its refugee camps, prohibiting Palestinian civilians from obtaining food supplies, and abrogating their rights to movement, education and medical attention.

⁸ **Human Rights: ISRAELI FORCES DETAINED 70 FARMERS ON THE WESTERN SIDE OF THE WALL, OPPOSITE THEIR VILLAGE Report, PCHR, 13 October 2003** Israeli occupying forces are currently holding approximately 70 Palestinian farmers from the village of Jayous, northeast of Qalqilya, against their will. ⁹

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’’’Development: LATEST DONOR UPDATE ON THE IMPACT OF ISRAEL’S SEPARATION BARRIER Report, OCHA, 11 October 2003’’’ The co-chairs of the Local Aid Coordination Committee (LACC) - the group of international donors to the Palestinians – today released a report on the rapid expansion of Israel’s “separation barrier” around East Jerusalem. ¹⁰

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’’’Opinion/Editorial: THE OR COMMISSION INDEED DISCRIMINATED Marwan Dalal, Ha’aretz, 13 October 2003’’’ Today, 13 October 2003, Ha’aretz published an article by Adalah Attorney Marwan Dalal responding to Professor Amnon Rubenstein’s article “The Discrimination of the Or Commission” published in Ha’aretz on 5 October 2003. Professor Rubenstein is an Israeli legal scholar and a regular columnist to Ha’aretz. ¹¹

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• *Activism: MICHIGAN JEWISH ACTIVISTS HOLD VIGILS OUTSIDE CONSERVATIVE SYNAGOGUE Henry Herskovitz, Jewish Witnesses for Peace and friends, Ann Arbor, 14 October 2003** A small group of Jewish activists have organized to vigil in a solemn, dignified manner, the only conservative synagogue in Ann Arbor, Beth Israel Congregation. Our group is not completely Jewish – many non-Jewish supporters have elected to stand with us out of their convictions, and we are grateful. Vigils are scheduled for the start of worship services on Saturday mornings – we have completed three vigils so far and look forward to many more. Henry Herskovitz reports. ¹²

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