Alice Walker speaks in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah. (Lazar Simeonov / TEDxRamallah)
World-renowned American author Alice Walker has been disinvited from giving a speech at the University of Michigan because a donor objects to her views on Israel, the agent negotiating the contract was told.
Image: Students celebrate after UC Davis’ student government passed a divestment resolution Thursday night in a landslide vote. (Courtesy The Electronic Intifada)
The Australian government, Israel and its collaborator, the Palestinian Authority (PA) scored a victory over the Palestinian Boycott Divestment & Sanctions (BDS) Movement on November 29, 2014.
This was the shameful day that the Australia Palestine Advocacy Network (APAN) , at its AGM, voted for No.1 from the following options,
It’s been a year of fervent activism on police accountability, living wages, climate change, personal freedoms, immigrant rights, an open internet and diplomacy over war. The electoral beating the Democrats received has prompted both the Administration and some spineless congresspeople to realize that support for progressive issues could reinvigorate their base —a realization that has already led to Obama’s executive action on immigration and the opening to Cuba.
So here are some of the 2014 highlights.
In terms of losses in human lives, 2014 has been a horrific year for Palestinians, surpassing the horrors of both 2008 and 2009, when an Israeli war against the Gaza Strip killed and wounded thousands.
While some aspects of the conflict are stagnating between a corrupt, ineffectual Palestinian Authority (PA), and the criminality of Israeli wars and occupation, it would also be fair to argue that 2014 was also a game changer to some degree – and it is not all bad news.
Image: Winter has arrived in Gaza
This growth of the BDS movement is starting to turn the tide against Israel’s regime of occupation, settler-colonialism and apartheid, even among decision makers. Israel may soon be facing its South Africa moment.
The international surge in condemnation of Israel’s treatment of Palestine, and Gaza in particular, underlines the growing impact of BDS
Image: Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu (R) and California Gov. Jerry Brown (2nd L) sign a pact to strengthen economic and research ties between California and Israel at the Computer History Museum on March 5, 2014 in Mountain View. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
Dr. Mads Gilbert: I know you applaud for Gaza. I know you applaud for those who are there, the heroes of Gaza. This will be no easy appeal to make, because I am now overcome by the mildness, the warmth, the safety, the absence of bombs, jets, blood and death. And then all that we’ve had to keep inside comes to the surface – so forgive me if sometimes I break.
But at the end of the day the three leaders are three of a kind… three stooges of a very nasty foreign power and a severe embarrassment to the British people. They all must go. The growing BDS molvement, hopefully, will help them on their way.
