Occupy Movement and demands
In Libya, fighting may outlast the revolution
The New York Times reports: Many of the local militia leaders who helped topple Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi are abandoning a pledge to give up their weapons and now say they intend to preserve their autonomy and influence political decisions as “guardians of the revolution.”
The issue of the militias is one of the most urgent facing Libya’s new provisional government, the Transitional National Council. Scores of freewheeling brigades of armed volunteers sprang up around the country and often reported to local military councils, which became de facto local governments in cities like Misurata and Zintan, as well as the capital, Tripoli.
The provisional government’s departing prime minister, Mahmoud Jibril, suggested in a news conference Sunday night that instead of expecting the local militias to disband, the Transitional National Council should try to incorporate them by expanding to include their representatives.
“Nobody wants to give up arms now, and many tribes and cities are accumulating arms ‘just in case,’ ” said Mahmoud Shammam, a spokesman for the council’s executive board.
Noting reports of sporadic clashes between militias as well as vigilante revenge killings, many civilian leaders, along with some fighters, say the militias’ shift from merely dragging their feet about surrendering weapons to actively asserting a continuing political role poses a stark challenge to the council’s fragile authority.
“This could lead to a mess, to conflict between the councils,” said Ramadan Zarmoh, 63, a leader of the Misurata military council, who argued that the city’s militia should dissolve itself almost immediately after a new defense ministry is formed. “If we want to have democracy, we can’t have this.”
Will Greece abandon Eurozone?
Julian Assange loses appeal against extradition
The Guardian reports: The WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, has lost his high court appeal against extradition to Sweden to face rape allegations.
Lord Justice Thomas and Mr Justice Ouseley on Wednesday handed down their judgment in the 40-year-old Australian’s appeal against a European arrest warrant issued by Swedish prosecutors after rape and sexual assault accusations made by two Swedish women following his visit to Stockholm in August 2010.
Assange, who was wearing a navy blue suit, pale blue tie and a Remembrance Day poppy, remains on bail pending a decision on a further appeal. The judges ruled the issuing of the warrant and subsequent proceedings were “proportionate” and dismissed arguments that the warrant had been invalid and descriptions of the alleged offences unfair and inaccurate.
Assange gave no sign of emotion as the judges gave reasons for the decision.
For Pakistan, deep ties to Haqqani network may trump U.S. pressure
The New York Times reports: Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and other senior administration officials visited Pakistan in October to demand that Pakistan’s spy agency either deliver the Haqqani network, a virulent part of the insurgency fighting American forces in Afghanistan, to the negotiating table or help fight them in their stronghold in Pakistan’s rugged tribal areas.
But there are any number of reasons why the Pakistanis may disappoint the Americans. Not least is that the Haqqani leadership — contrary to the American emphasis on drone strikes in the tribal areas — does not have to hide in Pakistan’s ungoverned fringes. So close are the Haqqanis’ ties to Pakistan’s military and intelligence service that one might just as well look for them around the capital, Islamabad, or in the closely guarded military quarters of Rawalpindi.
Osama bin Laden was thought to have been hiding in the tribal areas, too, said a tribal elder reached by telephone in the Haqqani stronghold of North Waziristan. Instead, Bin Laden was killed by American commandos in Abbottabad, a small city deep in Pakistan that is home to a top military academy. Whether he was there with the knowledge of Pakistan’s spy agency is still unclear.
“The Americans have taken the hell out of us through drones all these years trying to target O.B.L.,” said the elder, referring to Bin Laden, and not wanting to be named for fear of his safety. “But they found him in Abbottabad. The same will happen with the Haqqanis, too.”
The freedom of movement the Haqqanis enjoy in Pakistan could be witnessed on a sweltering July day last year at a graduation ceremony at one of Pakistan’s largest religious schools, Darul Uloom Haqqania, well known for producing the ranks of the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban.
Among the thousands who had gathered that day in Akora Khattak, just an hour from the capital, were top members of the Haqqani family. The family patriarch, Jalaluddin Haqqani, is a graduate of the school and draws his last name from it.
The Haqqanis stayed for several hours at the event, which was almost certainly monitored by Pakistani intelligence agents, and, after lunch, left in a car with Islamabad license plates.
The Haqqani family, which runs the network like a mafia, maintains several town houses, including in Islamabad and elsewhere, and they have been known to visit military facilities in Rawalpindi, attend tribal gatherings and even travel abroad on pilgrimages, say military and political analysts who follow militant activity in Pakistan.
Netanyahu trying to persuade cabinet to support attack on Iran
Haaretz reports: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak are trying to muster a majority in the cabinet in favor of military action against Iran, a senior Israeli official has said. According to the official, there is a “small advantage” in the cabinet for the opponents of such an attack.
Netanyahu and Barak recently persuaded Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, who previously objected to attacking Iran, to support such a move.
Although more than a million Israelis have had to seek shelter during a week of rockets raining down on the south, political leaders have diverted their attention to arguing over a possible war with Iran. Leading ministers were publicly dropping hints on Tuesday that Israeli could attack Iran, although a member of the forum of eight senior ministers said no such decision had been taken.
Senior ministers and diplomats said the International Atomic Energy Agency’s report, due to be released on November 8, will have a decisive effect on the decisions Israel makes.
The commotion regarding Iran was sparked by journalist Nahum Barnea’s column in Yedioth Ahronoth last Friday. Barnea’s concerned tone and his editors’ decision to run the column under the main headline (“Atomic Pressure” ) repositioned the debate on Iran from closed rooms to the media’s front pages.
Reporters could suddenly ask the prime minister and defense minister whether they intend to attack Iran in the near future and the political scene went haywire.
Western intelligence officials agree that Iran is forging ahead with its nuclear program. Intelligence services now say it will take Iran two or three years to get the bomb once it decides to (it hasn’t made the decision yet ).
According to Western experts’ analyses, an attack on Iran in winter is almost impossible, because the thick clouds would obstruct the Israel Air Force’s performance.
Netanyahu did not rule out the possibility of the need for a military action on Iran this week. During his Knesset address on Monday, Netanyahu warned of Iran’s increased power and influence. “One of those regional powers is Iran, which is continuing its efforts to obtain nuclear weapons. A nuclear Iran would constitute a grave threat to the Middle East and the entire world, and of course it is a direct and grave threat on us,” he said.
Barak said Israel should not be intimidated but did not rule out the possibility that Israel would launch a military attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities. “I object to intimidation and saying Israel could be destroyed by Iran,” he said.
“We’re not hiding our thoughts. However there are issues we don’t discuss in public … We have to act in every way possible and no options should be taken off the table … I believe diplomatic pressure and sanctions must be brought to bear against Iran,” he said.
Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya’alon said he preferred an American military attack on Iran to an Israeli one. “A military move is the last resort,” he said.
Interior Minister Eli Yishai has not made his mind up yet on the issue. In a speech to Shas activists in the north on Monday Yishai said “this is a complicated time and it’s better not to talk about how complicated it is. This possible action is keeping me awake at night. Imagine we’re [attacked] from the north, south and center. They have short-range and long-range missiles – we believe they have about 100,000 rockets and missiles.”
Intelligence and Atomic Energy Minister Dan Meridor said he supports an American move against Iran. In an interview to the Walla! website some two weeks ago Meridor said “It’s clear to all that a nuclear Iran is a grave danger and the whole world, led by the United States, must make constant efforts to stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. The Iranians already have more than four tons of 3-4 percent enriched uranium and 70 kgs. of 20 percent enriched uranium. It’s clear to us they are continuing to make missiles. Iran’s nuclearization is not only a threat to Israel but to several other Western states, and the international interest must unite here.”
Former Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer said he feared a “horror scenario” in which Netanyahu and Barak decide to attack Iran. He warned of a “rash act” and said he hoped “common sense will prevail.”
On Tuesday, Barak said at the Knesset’s Finance Committee that the state budget must be increased by NIS 7-8 a year for five years to fulfill Israel’s security needs and answer the social protest. “The situation requires expanding the budget to enable us to act in a responsible way regarding the defense budget considering the challenges, as well as fulfill some of the demands coming from the Trajtenberg committee,” he said.
Israel rushes settlement growth after Unesco accepts Palestinians
The Guardian reports: Israel is to expedite the construction of about 2,000 homes in Jewish settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem in response to the Palestinians’ successful bid to join Unesco.
Israel also imposed a temporary halt on the transfer of tax revenues which it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority (PA) pending a final decision on whether to impose a long-term freeze. Israel collects about £630m a year in VAT and customs revenues which it passes on to the PA.
A meeting of eight senior cabinet ministers agreed the punitive measures – which include a ban on Unesco missions to Israel – on Tuesday following the symbolically significant vote at the United Nations’ cultural and educational agency.
The ministers are to reconvene to discuss further actions which may include revoking the special status of Palestinian ministers and senior officials which allows them to pass through Israeli military checkpoints.
In response, the PA said the Israeli measures would “speed up the destruction of the peace process”. Nabil Abu Rdainah, spokesman for Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas, described the decision to temporarily halt transfers of funds as “inhumane”.
Germany threatens to halt submarine sale to Israel
Der Spiegel reports: Germany is threatening to stop the delivery of a “Dolphin” submarine to Israel in protest over the country’s settlement policies. Government sources confirmed the development when asked by SPIEGEL following speculation last week in the Israeli media that Germany might halt the sale.
The move is in response to the recent decision by the Israeli government to approve the construction of 1,100 homes in Gilo, an Arab part of Jerusalem captured from Jordan in the 1967 Six Day War. The Israeli government considers the area to be a Jewish suburb, but the international community contests that description.
The threat by German Chancellor Angela Merkel has been the subject of considerable concern in Israel.
The nuclear-weapons capable Dolphin submarines are an important part of the Israeli military strategy. The navy already owns three of the submarines and two further vessels are currently being built by Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Werft (HDW), the shipbuilding division of German steelmaker Thyssen-Krupp, in Kiel, Germany.
This summer, the German government approved €135 million ($189 million) in funding to assist Israel with the purchase of a sixth Dolphin submarine over the next four years. Now, however, that deal for the sixth submarine is in jeopardy.
Senators predict massive U.S. withdrawal from international organizations
The Cable reports: Following the State Department’s announcement that it had cut off U.S. funding from UNESCO in response to its overwhelming vote in favor of accepting the Palestinian bid for full membership, senators from both parties predicted the United States would cut funding or even withdraw from several other international organizations the Palestinians seek to join.
As The Cable reported last month, the Obama administration is required by existing U.S. law to cut off funding for any international organization that grants the Palestinians full membership. . Membership in UNESCO also grants the Palestinians membership in the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO). The United States is not a member of UNIDO, but will be forced to stop contributing to WIPO.
But that’s only the tip of the iceberg. The Palestinians could seek membership in more prominent international organizations, which could result in the United States defunding or even withdrawing from institutions such as the World Health Organization and the International Atomic Energy Agency. The AP reported today that the Palestinian Authority was examining seeking membership in 16 more U.N. organizations.
While leading senators in both parties acknowledge that such an outcome would be negative for U.S. interests and influence, they have no intention of intervening to change the law. To the contrary, several top senators in both parties told The Cable they support the policy and will work to enforce it, despite the consequences.
Ian Williams writes: By reflexively withdrawing from Unesco in response to Palestine’s admission, the Obama-Clinton state department has taken the lunatic fringe and put them centre stage. Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Florida Republican who chairs the House foreign affairs committee, combines a Likudnik support of Israel with a recidivist hatred of the UN and has been trying to de-fund the UN and its agencies.
In contrast, Hillary Clinton, who visited Unesco’s Paris HQ earlier this year, had announced: “I am proud to be the first secretary of state from the United States ever to come to Unesco, and I come because I believe strongly in your mission.” Indeed. So strongly does she believe in it that she is prepared to pull out of the organisation for recognising the Palestinian statehood that Obama had himself called for at the UN general assembly in September 2010.
The voting lineup on Monday was indicative. France, much more diplomatically adroit than the US, and mindful of its global standing, supported Palestinian membership. Even subservient Britain could not bring itself to vote with the US and pusillanimously abstained. The voting suggests that when the security council resolution on Palestinian UN membership comes up next week, it will get the nine affirmative votes needed – which means the US will have to use its veto and risk consequences, such as those threatened by the Saudis.
If the US had put nearly as much pressure on Israel as it had on others to avoid using its threatened veto, it would be a much more credible and creditable world power. As it is, its desperate attempts to avoid a veto by getting others to do its dirty work for it have made the Obama administration look like a toddler who hides his head behind the curtains and cannot understand why everyone can still see him.
The security council vote apart, the Unesco vote presages Palestinian admission to other agencies. One looks forward to US withdrawal from the International Atomic Energy Agency, relieving the pressure in Iran, or from the World Health Organisation, as soon as Palestine is allowed to join.
Compounding the irony, Israel itself has so far not indicated it is pulling out of Unesco, nor indeed any other UN agency. On the contrary, WikiLeaks recently revealed that Israel was angling for a major position in Unesco.
The nature of the US approach is clear. There is a general lack of principle. For example, the route being followed by Palestine in its effort to join multilateral institutions replicates that of the Vatican, whose far more dubious claim to statehood derives from its original membership of the Universal Postal Union, since the postage stamp-sized enclave did indeed issue its own stamps.
The actual legislation the state department invokes is a 1990 prohibition on funding “the United Nations or any specialised agency thereof which accords the Palestine Liberation Organisation the same standing as a member state”, and another in 1994 banning payments to “any affiliated organisation of the United Nations which grants full membership as a state to any organisation or group that does not have the internationally recognised attributes of statehood”.
Any president, as we have seen, has ways to get around congressional mandates like this. For example, there are questions about which manifestation of Palestine is applying: the PLO or the Palestinian Authority. The congressional legislation was passed before the Oslo accords – and before the US began funding the Palestinians directly, so an executive decision could have declared that events had overtaken the intent of the law, and, what is more, that it was not the PLO but the Palestinian state that had been admitted.
Palestinians hit by cyber-attack following success at Unesco
The Guardian reports: Internet services in the West Bank and Gaza have come under “sustained attack” by unknown hackers in multiple locations, according to officials.
“There has been a sustained attack since the morning from many sources in many countries,” said Palestinian Authority spokesman Ghassan Khatib. “It is deliberate and continuous.”
Computer experts were trying to identify the sources of the attack and the authority would seek assistance from the governments of those countries involved, he said. The attack had interrupted services, causing internet connections to range from “very, very slow to completely stopped”.
The authority has no idea who was behind the cyber- attack and the reason for it, Khatib said.
The telecoms minister, Mashour Abu Daqqa, told Reuters that “all Palestinian IP addresses have been exposed to a focused, organised attack from abroad. I think this is organised by a state”.
Egypt’s military may soon regret jailing Alaa Abd El Fattah
Brian Whitaker writes: Alaa Abd El Fattah is in jail. He was arrested on Sunday – accused of inciting violence against the Egyptian military – and on Monday was given 15 days’ detention for refusing to answer questions to a military court.
A campaign to secure his release has also got under way with extraordinary rapidity: protests in the streets, a Twitter hashtag (#FreeAlaa) and even graffiti appeared within the first 24 hours or so. That is not especially surprising as Alaa, besides being a pioneer of Egyptian blogging, belongs to one of the most famous families of leftist agitators.
By arresting him, the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, which is currently running Egypt (and increasingly being referred to as “the junta”), has picked a fight with the core of the movement that toppled President Mubarak in January. Leftists, liberals and Islamists have all been rallying to Alaa’s support and it may not be long before the junta starts to regret its action.
Why does the U.S. spend more on prisons than higher education?
If California emptied its prisons today and sent every inmate to a University of California college it would save $7 billion a year!
That’s one of the stunning statistics presented in the chart below, created by Joseph Staten, an info-graphic researcher with Public Administration (h/t Brian Resnick at the Atlantic.)
In the land of the free, we should be asking why the government invests more in locking up it citizens than in equipping them with the skills to make the most of their liberty and why the country that is only the sixth largest in the world is #1 in the rate of incarceration.
Defections from Syria’s armed forces are growing
The Economist reports: The glue and the guts of President Bashar Assad’s regime are the army and its allies in the police and the Mukhabarat, the intelligence service. So far they have generally stayed loyal. But defectors are growing in number and are getting better organised.
Since the start of the uprising in March there have been defections, mainly from the ranks of Sunni conscripts. Some flee the country, others hide among civilians. In July, Riad al-Asaad, a colonel in his 50s, left for Turkey and announced the formation of the Free Syrian Army. Another group, calling itself the Free Officers’ Movement, also emerged.
At the time the two organisations were thin. Defecting soldiers worked in small and disparate groups. But in late September the two outfits announced a merger. They now seem more coherent. The Free Syrian Army says it has 22 “battalions” across the country, with field leaders taking orders from a central command in Turkey. These include the Khalid bin Walid battalion in Homs, where clashes with loyalist forces have been fiercest. In the past few weeks, fighting has also broken out in Idlib, in the north-west, and al-Bukamal, on the border with Iraq.
The role of defectors is changing. “Defected soldiers initially just fled, then they came out with weapons behind protesters just to ensure they were safe to go out,” says a man who received military training and took part in Free Syrian Army actions. Now he says the army defectors are becoming more belligerent, attacking checkpoints, armed pro-regime gangs and military equipment. They often make grandiose claims, for instance to have disabled tens of tanks at a time. These are probably exaggerations. But ambushes of convoys of security men are certainly taking place.
In an exclusive interview with The Daily Telegraph, President Assad dismissed the Syrian National Council, a broad front bringing together most of his main opponents.
“I wouldn’t waste my time talking about them,” he said. “I don’t know them. It’s better to investigate whether they really represent Syrians.”
He insisted that anti-government demonstrators were being paid and were motivated by money
“You have a lot of money being paid every day, a lot of money moving across the border,” he said. “Part of this money actually supports our economy.”
Speaking to the Sunday Telegraph, President Assad warned that foreign intervention in his country would “burn” the whole Middle East.
“Syria is the hub now in this region,” he said. “It is the fault line, and if you play with the ground you will cause an earthquake … Do you want to see another Afghanistan, or tens of Afghanistans?
“Any problem in Syria will burn the whole region. If the plan is to divide Syria, that is to divide the whole region.”
Opposition groups and activists accused the Syrian leader of raising false fears to deter action against his regime, which has killed at least 3,000 civilians, including 187 children, in months of street protests.
“After eight months of uprisings, why do you think this will suddenly descend to civil and then regional war?” said Nasser Ahme, a Kurdish activist member of the Sawa, or ‘Together’, youth movement, speaking from a hiding place in Turkey.
“He is trying to make the uprising seem threatening to the West and the Middle East,” said Walat Afimeh, another member of the group.
In Damascus, where Assad’s interview has been widely reported, ordinary Syrians voiced support for his views.
“Everybody’s talking about it,” said a café owner, Maher Omran, interviewed in the presence of a government minder. “What he said was powerful and very comforting for the Syrian people.”
Despite the unpopularity of the regime in many quarters, it also enjoys some uncoerced support. Massive demonstrations in support of Assad have taken place in three Syrian cities, including the capital, over the past week. Independent observers said the participants did not appear to have been forced to attend.
The latest pro-regime rally, yesterday, saw thousands of people holding Assad posters in the central square of the southern city of Sweida.
Activists meanwhile renewed the call for a Libyan-style no-fly zone, and the equipping of the ‘Syrian Free Army’ (SFA) – an opposition military group composed of defecting soldiers.
However, Western diplomatic sources said that there was “no appetite” for military intervention against Syria.
What follows from Palestine’s entry to UNESCO?
Daniel Levy makes five comments about the possible consequences of Palestine’s acceptance as a member of UNESCO.
2. What next at the U.N.? The Palestinian application for U.N. membership is, of course, still under discussion at the U.N. Security Council. That vote might take place by mid-November, though it could be further delayed. The Palestinian membership bid requires nine out of the 15 Security Council votes — and no vetoes — in order to succeed. In other words, it is guaranteed not to pass given the U.S. guarantee of a veto. So the remaining question at this stage becomes whether the Palestinians will muster enough votes (nine) to necessitate that veto, and what they will do once membership is rejected.
If one were to extrapolate the Security Council vote from today’s UNESCO vote, then one comes out with the following result: 9 in favor (China, Russia, Brazil, India, South Africa, France, Lebanon, Gabon, and Nigeria); 2 against (U.S. and Germany), and 4 abstentions (UK, Portugal, Bosnia, and Colombia). If that were replicated in the UNSC, then the U.S. veto would come into play. However, if the Palestinians lose just one vote from the”yes” column then America is spared from wielding the veto (it is worth remembering that America, anyway, will be blamed for applying pressure to achieve the no’s and abstentions).
However, some of those yes votes may go wobbly somewhere between Paris and Turtle Bay, in particular the French themselves, as France has stated that it would support Palestine at the UNGA but not at the UNSC. The Palestinians will then have to decide whether to pursue an upgrade of their status to a state, but one that is an observer or non-member at the U.N. General Assembly. Such a move by the PLO is considered likely, and a victory at the UNGA is guaranteed. But it would represent a more assertive and challenging move than anything undertaken to date (as it accords possible leverage that falls more into the sanctions than symbolism category, such as strengthening Palestine’s claim to International Criminal Court jurisdiction over the occupied Palestinian territories).
The Palestinians are also expected to pursue membership at a host of other U.N. bodies. However, if the U.S. continues to withhold its funding from any and every institution according Palestine membership, then one might expect a degree of attrition on the part of member countries voting for Palestine and that eventually the Palestinians might start getting blamed as much as the U.S. for the predictable consequences of their actions. Should they nevertheless continue to pursue this U.N. diplomatic track then there is a relatively simple answer to the de-funding question: namely, for the Gulf states to step up and fill the gaps created by American de-funding. America’s now withheld UNESCO contribution is $60 million.
That really is chump change for the GCC counties, especially when they are spending tens of billions on purchasing American weapons (Saudi Arabia alone has ordered $60 billion of U.S. arms ).
Goldstone’s latest act of atonement at the feet of the Zionists
“If this bloc of millions of Palestinians cannot vote, that will be an apartheid state.” Israel Defense Minister Ehud Barak, February, 2010.
In his latest act of atonement, Judge Richard Goldstone claims that those who assert Israel practices a form of apartheid, make this accusation in order to “retard rather than advance peace negotiations.” The discrimination that Palestinians face is neither intentional nor permanent, he says.
[In the West Bank] there is no intent to maintain “an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group.” This is a critical distinction, even if Israel acts oppressively toward Palestinians there. South Africa’s enforced racial separation was intended to permanently benefit the white minority, to the detriment of other races. By contrast, Israel has agreed in concept to the existence of a Palestinian state in Gaza and almost all of the West Bank, and is calling for the Palestinians to negotiate the parameters.
So, according to Goldstone’s way of thinking one could say that to the extent that Palestinians have to suffer living inside a system of Israeli oppression that looks like apartheid, it’s their own fault because they have so far failed to negotiate the terms for their own release. They’re like prisoners who keep on flunking in front of the parole board. (Let’s not raise the awkward question about what exactly they did in order to deserve being thrown in prison in the first place.)
Prof. Gerald Steinberg, president of NGO Monitor, is quick to use Goldstone’s rejection of the Israel-apartheid equation in order to advance his own organization’s agenda.
Those who invoke this false analogy to advance BDS, lawfare, and other forms of political warfare against Israel, have been named and shamed by the former South African judge who helped end apartheid and who was also critical of Israeli policies. This is a fatal blow to the BDS movement and the apartheid analogy.
I wonder whether NGO Monitor advisory board member, Alan Dershowitz, now shares Steinberg’s enthusiasm about Goldstone? Only last year Dershowitz compared Goldstone with the Nazi war criminal, Joseph Mengele.
In Israel, press freedom is under attack
Dimi Reider writes: On Sunday, the Tel Aviv District Court sentenced Anat Kamm, a 24-year-old journalist and former soldier, to four and a half years in prison for leaking documents containing evidence of what she suspected might be war crimes committed by her commanders.
Uri Blau, a prominent Israeli investigative reporter at Haaretz who received the documents from Ms. Kamm, is now waiting to hear whether the attorney general will indict him.
Meanwhile, the commanders implicated in the leaked documents were cleared by the attorney general, and one was promoted to deputy chief of staff of the Israel Defense Forces.
The verdict sends several chilling messages. To young soldiers it says: shut up, even if you suspect your commanders of violating the law; they will go unpunished and you will go to jail if you leak. To the source it says: no one will protect you; don’t be a self-sacrificing fool. And to the journalist it says: know your place; cover what we tell you to cover, print our news releases, and keep within your bounds.
The sentencing of Ms. Kamm — who has already spent two years under house arrest — marks a watershed in the relationship between the public and the news media in Israel.
Leaks are used by journalists as a matter of course. Journalists routinely meet people like Ms. Kamm — ordinary patriotic soldiers who are horrified by the contrast between their expectations of their country and its actual conduct.
These ordinary patriots are sometimes moved to make shocking revelations about their country’s inner workings. They act out of civic duty and a belief that their compatriots need to know the truth, regardless of what official institutions think the public should know.
Ms. Kamm and Mr. Blau operated by the unwritten code of conduct that has enabled the Israeli press to monitor at least some aspects of the country’s powerful security establishment for the past 63 years. Ms. Kamm did not leak her secrets to an enemy, or even to a foreign journalist. She gave the documents to a fellow Israeli, who consulted his editors, and submitted his article to the military censor, who gave him the go-ahead.
On Sunday, we learned that this code of conduct no longer applies.
The Occupy movement has rattled the establishment
Occupy London protestors outside St Paul's Cathedral challenge the church to live up to its principles.
Time reports: The London arm of the worldwide Occupy Wall Street movement has proved its ability to shake up an institution, as a third senior cleric from St. Paul’s Cathedral has resigned in less than three weeks.
The Occupy London protest has been camped outside the historic church for a little more than two weeks, and St. Paul’s muddled response to the anti-corporate greed protesters has already resulted in public backlash, dissent within the church’s governing body and even resignations.
On Monday, Reverend Graeme Knowles, the dean of St. Paul’s, announced that he would be resigning from his position in the wake of criticism over the cathedral’s managing of the protest camp issue. With his announcement, Rev. Knowles joins two other senior clerics who’ve recently left St. Paul’s over the protest. Last week, canon chancellor Giles Fraser resigned, saying he thought that the cathedral’s opposition to the protest signaled they were “set on a course of action that could mean there will be violence in the name of the church.” Just days later, a part-time chaplain, Fraser Dyer, resigned because, as he noted on his blog, he was dismayed by St. Paul’s decision to evict the camp, and he did not “relish the prospect of having to defend the cathedral’s position in the face of the inevitable questions that visitors to St Paul’s will pose in the coming weeks and months.”
Andrew Rawnsley writes: A big mistake is to think that because the protesters tend to be youthful it follows that they should be treated like children. Richard Chartres, the Bishop of London, has made that error by suggesting to the campers that they ought to leave in return for a debate under the dome of St Paul’s – gosh, thanks my Lord Bishop. He further asks them to go on the grounds that: “I am involved in ongoing discussion with City leaders about improving shareholder influence on excessive remuneration.”
I am sure that the bishop is well-meaning, but that is not going to cut it. There has been “ongoing discussion” for years. The result, according to the latest report by Incomes Data Services: Britain’s top executives gave themselves a 49% increase in their salaries, benefits and bonuses in the past year. It does not even occur to the business and financial elite that it might be good old cynical public relations to moderate their greed while so many of their fellow citizens are suffering the consequences of corporate follies.
Who is truly the more adult: the protesters or an establishment that regards itself as older and wiser? The protesters have largely been very decorously behaved. They have thus far displayed no propensity to riot or to loot. Their tents are erected in rather neat rows. They hold laboriously consensus-seeking meetings at which they keep minutes and take votes. Their spokespeople are polite and articulate. If they do not have all the answers, they are at least posing some of the right questions. I don’t see why they should be criticised for the absence of a manifesto when the leaders of Europe spent months quarrelling and flailing over the euro crisis before scrabbling together an expensively botched compromise.
The protesters shun formal leaders and hierarchies – and I also don’t see why they should be criticised for this at a time when conventional leaders and hierarchies have been so conspicuously useless. Here are some recent scenes in establishment politics. Silvio Berlusconi displays his incomparable charms by describing Angela Merkel as “culona ichiavabile” (“an unfuckable lard arse”). Rick Perry, contender to become Republican candidate for the great office of president of the United States, questions where Barack Obama was born five months after the White House released his long-form birth certificate, and excuses himself by saying: “It’s fun to poke at him.” A punch-up breaks out on the floor of the Italian parliament between one right-wing member of the government and an even more right-wing member. Nicolas Sarkozy tells David Cameron to “shut up” because he is “sick” of him. David Cameron elevates the tone at prime minister’s questions by shouting: “Complete mug!” at Ed Miliband.
Protesters or leaders? I know who looks the more grown-up.
A Guardian video: Occupy London, a street level view: ‘How clear are we all on what consensus actually is?’
As St Paul’s reopens its doors, and the cathedral joins with the City of London Corporation to take legal action to evict the Occupy London protest, the activists come to terms with a manifesto being leaked to the press.
An investment banker says bankers must listen to the Occupy movement
Ken Costa, one of the best-known investment bankers in the City, London’s financial district, recognizes that the Occupy movement resonates with a wide constituency that cannot be ignored.
A cloud of public anger has appeared on the horizon; it is growing. It may currently be no bigger than a man’s fist but it presents us with a clear choice to take the underlying arguments seriously and to strengthen the foundations of the market economy or to risk the consequences.
When such a wide range of people are singing a tune perhaps discordant to a City worker’s ears but seemingly in tune with the global view that the market economy has failed to deliver growth, jobs, and hope, we need to listen. The cure is not more legislation, or increased regulation. It is the pressing need to reconnect the financial with the ethical.
Free markets may be free in the sense that they permit uncoerced transactions between individuals but they do not exist in a moral vacuum. For markets to work freely, they need somehow to be nurtured and sustained by a moral spirit. This is not the box-ticking morality with which we have become familiar but somehow, improbable as it may seem to the many critics of the City, by a desire to do well, by doing good.
This argument is conservative inasmuch as it was outlined by Adam Smith who regarded moral foundations as integral to the success of the market economy. It is also radical in that it reflects the desire for change prevalent in the emerging generation. So what do I mean by “connecting the financial and the ethical”?
First we have to recognise that there is such a thing as morality. Good and bad do exist, not simply as opinions. They are objective rather than subjective; real rather than endlessly pliable; relevant to public life rather than restricted to private life; and, above all, necessary.
Put bluntly, ultimately businesses cannot work, banks cannot lend, economies cannot function and societies cannot flourish without mutual trust and respect, or without fundamental honesty and integrity. In the short term they can, as we have also seen, much to the advantage of practitioners. But such a system is simply unsustainable.
Second, we all need to learn the grammar of morality, not in a judgmental way but by becoming more comfortable in thinking, writing and talking openly about values and ethics. For many this will be like learning an entirely new language.
Third, leaders need to show that they read the signs of the times. Governments will not be able to resist the continuing anger and will be goaded by ever more strident calls for intervention. They have to advance the case for the free market vigorously in language that is compelling to this generation. We will only win the debate if we take seriously the need to reconnect the robust desire for profit and financial incentives that is core to the free market economy with the moral values that are its foundation. The price of economic freedom is moral vigilance. We forget this at our peril.