I've gotten a lot of e-mails this week, two of them inspired by the recent WikiLeaks....leaks...
Email from CODEPINK:
Dear Jessica,
The recently released Wikileaks diplomatic cables reveal that Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu posited the Goldstone Report and a nuclear Iran as the main existential threats to his country, but that the real existential threat to Israel is its own policies.
On November 8, when I stood up in New Orleans at a large gathering of Jewish leaders to tell Netanyahu that illegal West Bank settlements betray Jewish values, I could not have predicted that these words would not only reverberate through the room, but would also shatter the "Israel barrier," the culture of silencing dissent towards Israel’s flagrant violations of international law that is so pervasive in my community. Supported by our allies at Jewish Voice for Peace, the five of us who disrupted Netanyahu's speech gave a name to the real cause of Israel’s delegitimization: Israeli policies such as the occupation, the siege of Gaza, the Loyalty Oath, and the silencing of dissent. The immediate response in the room was violent—I was actually put in a chokehold and pushed to the ground. But it was too late to silence us, and our message was soon circling the globe. The response to our actions was overwhelmingly positive.
Our young, Jewish, and proud voices join the chorus rising from the West Bank, Gaza, Israel and around the world clamoring for justice.
Tonight Jews begin the ritual lighting of the Chanukah candles. We light eight candles to celebrate the miracle of fuel that lasted beyond all expectations, and a victory in the face of impossible odds. Today, we'd like to invite you to join us in illuminating a path forward towards true equality for all in Israel and Palestine by taking part in the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement.
Season’s greetings to you and yours and onwards for a brighter future in the Middle East,
Rae Abileah
The second e-mail was from the U.S. Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation, linking an article from HuffPo:
...Cantor [House Majority Leader] would do well to read some of the 19 cables released so far by WikiLeaks from the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv, which shed important light on behind-the-scene tensions between Israel's quest for complete military dominance and U.S. attempts to militarize the Middle East, as evidenced by Gilad's admission. These documents display an incomplete, yet consistent, pattern of the United States saturating its allies with weapons while deflecting Israeli pressure not to do so....
As President Jimmy Carter once said, "We cannot be both the world's leading champion of peace and the world's leading supplier of the weapons of war."
