By Johan Galtung
This New Year announces itself with bangs all over, not whimpers.
Pope Francis made a tour d’horizon on all continents, strongly denouncing the violence in favor of his alternative: negotiation.
Much violence is copycat or copyrat; violence being a la mode. Copying–aka learning–is not wrong. But it depends on what is copied.
Here my 10-11 wishes:
By Jan Oberg
This is one of several stories I just have to tell.
You can see the original in large format here.
The destruction of Eastern Aleppo, Syria by Jan Oberg on Exposure
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Russia’s President Vladimir Putin makes the sign of the cross as he attends the Orthodox Christmas service at the Holy Face of Christ the Savior Church in the city of Sochi, Russia, late 06 January 2014.
Vacy Vlazna
Uri Avnery is widely regarded as an Israeli peacemaker with a balanced view of what he calls the ‘Israeli-Palestinian conflict’. But under the surface of dissent (often well-founded criticism of Israel), Avnery is a hard core zionist: a fantasy friend of Palestine;
“I have read a lot of Uri Avnery over the years and have always found him insightful and informative. But as time passed I began to regard him as complex, ambivalent and insidiously useful to Israel in the underlying message he conveys.” Allen Jasson
Benzi Gopstein holds a noose at a Lehava meeting shared on social media (Twitter/@ronnie_barkan)
The right-wing Jewish group ‘Lehava’ held a protest outside of the YMCA in Jerusalem, shouting at Palestinian Christian children and families as they were entering and leaving the annual Christmas-tree decoration party.
Right-wing Israeli groups on Sunday “raided” the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound under the protection of Israeli forces, witnesses told Ma’an.
Mutaz Zawahra was having the time of his life in France on a youth program with two other friends when he got the news that his oldest brother had fallen dangerously ill. His brother, Ghassan, was on hunger strike in Israeli prison protesting his internment without trial or charge, and family members told Mutaz that his older brother may not make it through his strike alive.
