Alternatives International Journal

NELSON MANDELA – FROZEN ICON

Sam Noumoff — 2014-01-02T02:58:09Z

Much has been written, and is still counting, about the iconic figure of Nelson Mandela. He has been portrayed as the quintessential symbol of a new non racist Africa, having endured the hardships of struggle, incarceration, and ultimate freedom. His most enduring achievement was his destruction of the pernicious system of apartheid in which class and race were organically fused. He constructed a tri-partite nominally anti-imperialist alliance, between the African National Congress, the Communist Party of South Africa, for which he was a member of the Central Committee, and the COSATU trade union federation. A central characteristic of this alliance was its composition - the Black masses and the White elite. The liberation programme was enshrined in 1955 by The Freedom Charter which called for the nationalization of industry and land distribution for the peasantry. Mandela continued to work as a trained lawyer and organizer, disguising himself as a chauffeur, until 1962 when he was captured by the police, betrayed by a U.S. Central Intelligence Agency agent who had infiltrated the ANC; with his trial for treason sandwiched between 1961 and sabotage in 1963. He remained in prison on Robben Island for the next twenty-seven years. The cold war raged pitting the western capitalist countries, including Israel, supporting the South African racist regime, against the USSR and the ANC. South Africa was seen as a critical geo-strategic location, located on the tip of the southern sea lanes as well as a source of its critical resources.

The change of dynamic began in 1985 when Mandela contacted the Afrikaans Minister of Justice Kobisee Cotsee asking a review of his case and the hard line Afrikaans regime of P.W. Botha was replaced by his shrewder successor, P.D. de Klerk. De Klerk cobbled together a multipart coalition of English capital, Afrikaans bureaucracy, and multinational capital to negotiate regime change. Mandela would come to head this new regime, with the following broad features; a withering of the Freedom Charter in in 1992 and replacing it by a multiracial free market capitalist economy, influenced at the Davos World Economic Forum; abolish the putative armed struggle which began in the name of Umkhonto we Sizwe (Spear of the Nation); embed the principles of racial reconciliation and peace. On the international scale, the Soviet Union was weakening and imploded in the same year that Mandela was set free, thereby undermining the patronage of the South African Communist Party. As well, Chase-Manhattan bank cut off loans to Apartheid institutions.

Mandela came to head a national movement not a liberation movement

This national independence movement, was only the first stage of infolding of the struggle. As part of the anti-imperialist agenda of the early 1920's the anti-imperialist league was initiated which expressed the view that capitalism had become a global integrated system, whose weakest point could be attacked in the overexploited undeveloped regions of the planet. From this movements of national independence were formed

Nelson Mandela came to symbolize the vanguard of this movement within South Africa. His version of this struggle took the best of the idealist tradition as far as it could go.

Every society has a particular formation, economic, political, social, racial in its composition and, profile and demographic. The pyramidal structure of the Apartheid system in South Africa placed white skinned Afrikaans at the apex, followed by other whites with privilege, and subsequently mixed race, brown and black skinned masses coming up the rear.

The profile of privilege and relative exploitation then coincides with the color code of white to black. The post Apartheid South Africa has frozen the system with the so called sunset clause which retains white privilege and includes what Franz Fanon described as those with black skins- but while masks.

A socioeconomic profile almost immediately displayed the frozen nature of reality which undermined the expectation of the black masses and to the benefit of the neo-imperialist forces of inequality. In 1994 the International Monetary Fund introduced a structural adjustment which hobbled growth and redistribution and foreign capital was required to repay twenty-five billion US$ Apartheid era loans, foreign exchange controls were eased permitting capital to be patriated abroad. During the Mandela Presidency, the Geni Coefficient fell to 0.67 from 0.56, 60% of working age persons are unemployed, one-third of the population earn less than $2.00 per/day, 53% of the population are above the poverty line, between 1992 and 2112 the economic growth rate was only 3.2%, while the black/white apartheid reality persists-the average white income is six times that of blacks, with white wages are 19,000 rand per month, while black workers earn 2,500 rand.

The two subsequent Presidencies after Mandela retired, have been burdened with corruption, nepotism and miners strikes and a black elite bourgeoisie.

The view that a non-racial South Africa as a rainbow remains an idealist fantasy which can only be realized with the liberation of the masses, who, can join as equals with their non-black comrades. And that is the next stage from national independence to national liberation.

People's Social Forum in 2014 and the World Social Forum in 2016

Ronald Cameron — 2014-01-02T02:58:06Z

While expressing support for the idea of eventually holding a World Social Forum (WSF) in Montreal, the board of Alternatives nonetheless spoke out against the project to hold one in 2015. This was in order to protect the mobilization for Peoples Social Forum (PSF) in 2014, which enjoys significant support from civil society organizations in Quebec, Canada and the first nations. In this context, we welcome the decision of the International Council of the WSF to recognize Tunisia as a new site for the next WSF in 2015. But at the same time, the IC also began to consider a new WSF in 2016, recognizing that Montreal could be a host, possibly in a polycentric model with India.

This decision of the IC is not a definitive one. This decision, as far as Montreal is considered, depends on the success of the PSF in 2014. It is then for us to overcome the issue of dispersion of forces and focus on this first event that is the PSF 2014.

The need for a broad consensus

Alternatives always wishes and continues to do so, that an eventual WSF be held in Montreal. We have always worked and wished for every WSF to be a success since the first one held in 2001 in Porto Alegre.

The contribution of WSF in the development of a social and political alternative at the global level, as a counterpoint to neoliberal orientations expressed by the Davos summit, is of primary importance for social movements around the world. However, such gatherings require a major mobilization of social networks and an unequivocal commitment of organizations and social movements.

To organize a WSF in Montreal in 2016, it is essential to achieve broad consensus and a common position in the movement. We do not find that such a consensus exists for now and we might be able to further evaluate this in the light of the experience gained with the PSF 2014.

Requirements of the WSF and the influence of the IC

We are pleased that Montreal is considered as a possible option for holding a WSF. However, the decision of the IC is not a confirmation, especially when the event is 30 months away. Not only it is conditioned by the development of the mobilization for the PSF in 2014, it must also be reconfirmed thereafter.

In addition, the Council provides no resources and it is upto the host organizations to ensure the financing of such an event. Therefore, we consider that the real test will remain for the civil society organizations to secure funding.

People's Social Forum 2014

The idea of a WSF in Montreal was developed for the first time when it was proposed to hold it in 2013. Alternatives had promoted this idea in the IC but finally joined other members of the IC and rallied behind the idea of holding it in Tunis instead. We all experienced the great success of the WSF-2013 and hope it will repeat in 2015.

During this period it was the consensus of a large majority of civil society organizations in Quebec that came forward with the project of building a Quebec-First Nations-Canada Social Forum, which today has taken the form of People's Social Forum. Since then, the necessary consensus required to make the project a success are being concretized at all levels including democratic functioning, organizational, financial and technical.

To hold the PSF in August 2014 is unavoidable. It already involves more than 50 progressive organizations from Canada, Quebec and indigenous communities. The event itself is aiming to bring together over 10 000 people making this a unique and a historic event in Canada. Nothing close to this has been accomplished in the past. The People's Social Forum is aiming to construct a real pan-Canadian extra-parliamentary opposition to the austerity measures being imposed by the present federal government.

Like the International Council of the WSF, we believe it is essential that all forces come together to make the PSF in 2014, a success. This is a prerequisite to seriously consider any proposed WSF in 2016. The World Social Forum in Montreal in 2016 will only exist if the Forum in 2014 would bring its actors to consider the project of a WSF as a lever to go further. However, one should also check the political conjuncture at that time, because the mobilization could also be build through other channels, including one that will be marked by the election period.

Based on the assessment of PSF in 2014, it will not be too late to plan the holding a WSF thereafter. If consensus exists and that political conditions are favourable, we will be among the first organization that supports the International Council proposal to hold the WSF in Montreal post-2015.

Israeli filmmaker Lia Tarachansky tells Frank...

FRANK BARAT — 2014-01-02T02:58:02Z

Israeli filmmaker Lia Tarachansky tells Frank Barat about the challenges and rewards of making On The Side of the Road.

Your film On The Side of the Road premiered in Tel Aviv on 28 November during the International Film Festival on Nakba and Return. Can you tell us about this festival, and the subject of your film?

The film festival is the first in the world that focuses entirely on the return of the refugees that were expelled and fled in 1948, and the Nakba itself. Being held in Israel is revolutionary on its own. My film opened the festival. It's a film that has never been done here in Israel before. It includes my story: someone that grew up in a settlement, deep inside of the colonial mentality and colonial project of Israel, who wakes up to the Palestinians and the Nakba. It profiles the soldiers who perpetrated the Nakba, who expelled and massacred the Palestinians. They talk about what they've done and return with me to the places that they have destroyed. The film focuses on the concept of return not from the perspective of the refugees, but from the view of the perpetrators. In that way, the film connects 1948 and 1967 to today, as one continuous project of dispossession.

Only two former Israeli soldiers testify in the film, even though you got in touch with many more. So how difficult is it to talk about the Nakba in Israel?

It's incredibly difficult. As soon as you start talking about the conflict – whether it is with Israelis or Palestinians – you inevitably end up at 1948 within five minutes. It is not just something that happened, it's an entire ideology, a mentality. The Israeli fear is based on the fact that what we did to the Palestinians in 1948 will be done to us. When I contacted other veterans, most of them did not want to talk about it in a critical light. They wanted to talk about it as this miraculous victory in a war where all odds were against us. Now that historians have started digging up the facts of the war, we're starting to discover that what we believed about the State of Israel is pure mythology. When you talk to Israelis, if you start talking about the Nakba, it brings up this intense fear. In fact, veterans tend to be a lot more honest, because they did those things, but for their children or their grandchildren, for whom 1948 is just a concept, it brings this deeply embedded fear. The strongest element of Israeli DNA is knowing what questions you cannot ask. Once you start touching these questions about 1948, everything else starts to unravel. It's an incredibly violent and terrifying process.

The film shows a scary side of Israeli society, racist and violent. Is it really that bad?

I am not sure how to answer this question. Israelis and Palestinians are incredibly politicized. Violence is a daily reality here and it's mostly experienced by Palestinians and mostly perpetrated by the colonial project. The State, soldiers, the settlers and everyone else. The film itself shows violence against an idea. It profiles the Nakba as a very violent process of ethnic cleansing and destruction, where hundreds of villages were wiped off the map and refugees forbidden to return. It focuses specifically on the psychological violence against the idea of questioning. It starts and ends with Israeli Independence Day, one year apart. The whole film fits into what happened within one year, when the Israeli parliament tried to pass a law that forbids mourning what happened in 1948. It tried to silence history, silence people's feelings about history, something that on its surface is an incredibly fascist move. The film starts and ends with this one day when we celebrate this big mythological bubble. On that day, when we are supposed to be celebrating our miraculous victory, our State, everything, activists from the organization Zochrot tried to question what this mythology is based on. The response from not only the State and the police but also from people is incredibly violent. They try to violently shut up these activists because you cannot talk about 1948 in Israel and certainly not on Independence Day. That's why this festival is so important.

The film touches upon your own story. When did you, a girl raised in a Zionist family that moved to one of the biggest settlements in Palestine, Ariel, realize that what you thought was the truth was not?

I'm still realizing it. Unlearning and decolonizing your understanding is a lifelong process. The first time that I started to question things was at university in Canada. There was an Israel week organized by the Jewish student organization along with the Israeli affairs committee on my campus. These two Zionist groups organized what they thought was a celebration of Israel. For a whole week we had Israeli flags everywhere, displays showing that Israel is a democratic country, a queer-friendly country… I remember thinking that it was crazy for them to organize such an event on campus and say such things. I then realized none of them had ever lived in Israel.

What do you want to achieve with this film? Do you want to change people's views? Have your parents seen the film? What did they make of it?

My parents refused to watch it, for different reasons. My whole family treats my journalism [for the Real News Network] as this thing that ‘Lia does and that we do not talk about'. My journalism and my filmmaking is something that we don't talk about because every time they try to talk about it, it turns into me asking them uncomfortable questions and it is not a conversation you can have on a daily basis. We had a very deep conversation with my mum about the film and what is in the film and what is not. She believes it is a very dangerous film because it gives ammunition to the people who are resisting Israel.

As for the process of the film, it started as a very journalistic movie. It was going to profile the seven myths that we believe about the founding of the state of Israel through the stories of the historians and the journalists that have covered that history. I evolved, with the film, into someone who started to understand that you cannot fit this place into black and white, you cannot fit this place into any other kind of political conflict. The film evolved with me. I realized that the facts do not convince; the facts weren't what changed my mind. It was the people that I met that changed my mind. Even when you bring every fact in the world into a conversation with Israelis they will bring you 400 other facts and you will never be actually talking about the essence of the thing. I wanted to touch on the essence of the thing and the only way to do that would be to talk to the persons, the individual people.

How did you manage to raise the funds to make such a film – a film that criticizes and demystifies 1948 and the creation of Israel?

Well, I have a sugar daddy! I'm joking! No, the entire film is funded by individuals. We did crowd-funding; there were two associate producers who donated quite big sums to the film and also regular people who care about this issue, who know me and the film, people who heard about me from my journalism work… The vast majority of the people who donated to the film are struggling themselves, financially. It is an enormous honour to see that people see the power in such a story that they are willing to put their wallets where their mouth is.

Source: http://newint.org/features/web-exclusive/2013/12/12/lia-tarachansky-interview/

Madiba in Palestine

Robin D. G. Kelley and Erica Lorraine Williams — 2014-01-02T02:57:57Z

Nelson Mandela's death has produced both an outpouring of international solidarity, remembrance, and celebration commemorating Madiba's leadership in defeating apartheid in South Africa. It has also generated a wave of historical revision and mythmaking—the sort of thing we've come to expect when radicals become icons. Mainstream media outlets and statesmen who had only a few years earlier heaped opprobrium on Mr. Mandela, eulogized him not for his commitment to the African National Congress's unrelenting struggle against the apartheid system, but rather for forgiving his oppressors. In other words, Mandela was great because he transcended race – he chose not to “hate.” Of course, “hate” is far-removed from the politics of the ANC, a non-racial organization open to all committed to democracy.

The magic wand of mass media has transformed what was a potent international boycott of South African products and all firms doing with business with the apartheid regime into a slogan: Free Nelson Mandela. Yet again, a broader social movement to overthrow a racist, oppressive regime is individualized as being about one exceptional figure. The boycott, a global, non-violent movement conducted in solidarity with the disenfranchised, dispossessed, and subjugated people of South Africa, was organized to pressure the South African regime to abide by international law and dismantle apartheid. And it succeeded.

Rather than participate in this mythmaking and what Cornel West calls the “Santa Claus-ification” of the man who was only removed from the U.S. Terrorist Watch list in 2008, let us reflect on Mandela's transition as an occasion to remember not only his understanding and advocacy of boycotts as a strategy of resistance, but also his unwavering support of the Palestinian right to self-determination.

Shortly after being released from prison in 1990, Nelson Mandela met Yasser Arafat in Zambia. He embraced the Palestinian leader as a “fellow freedom fighter.” On a trip to Australia in October 1990, Mandela referred to Israel as a “terrorist state,” which is perhaps not surprising since Israel “provided expertise and technology that was central to [apartheid] South Africa's development of its nuclear bombs.” Israel's illegal occupation also made it something of a rogue state in Mandela's view. In 1990 he told a Los Angeles Times reporter that “the boundaries of Israel should not include the West Bank, the Gaza Strip or the Golan heights,” and “we [the ANC] identify with the PLO because, just like us, they are fighting for the right to self-determination.” Not surprisingly, Mandela was roundly criticized for his support of the PLO and dismissed as a terrorist himself. A decade later he explained to Larry King, “I was called a terrorist yesterday, but when I came out of jail, many people embraced me, including my enemies, and that is what I normally tell other people who say those who are struggling for liberation in their country are terrorists.”

While Mandela never publicly characterized Israel as an apartheid state and waxed enthusiastically about the Oslo peace accords, he always conceived of the Palestinian struggle for nationhood as a global movement, a struggle that demanded the kind of international solidarity the ANC and the United Democratic Front enjoyed in South Africa. In his address at the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, delivered in Pretoria on December 4, 1997, he cautioned just how easy it was to “fall into the trap of washing our hands of difficulties that others face. . . . But we know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians.” In an address delivered a year later, Mandela reminded the world that solidarity cut both ways: “South Africans drew courage and strength from the support so generously given by the Palestinian people even though they themselves lacked freedom…South Africans have a duty to lend a supportive hand to others seeking justice and equality.”

The profound political ties between Palestinians and South Africans are quite strong—matched, perhaps, only by the deep connections to the black freedom movement in the U.S. Madiba's death has generated an outpouring of mourning and remembrance from Palestinian activists. Marwan Barghouti, who has often been referred to as the “Palestinian Mandela,” wrote the following words about Madiba from his prison cell: “I tell you our freedom seems possible because you reached yours. Apartheid did not prevail in South Africa, and Apartheid shall not prevail in Palestine.” Reflecting on his experience growing up in a refugee camp in Gaza, Ramzy Baroud wrote, “To be a Palestinian, especially a Palestinian refugee, was in many ways to be a black South African.” Magid Shihade, faculty member at the Institute for International Studies at Birzeit University in Ramallah, recalls an unforgettable experience of hearing Mandela speak in Seattle during the late 1990s. “American leaders,” Mandela told the crowd, “wanted me always to distance myself from my politics, from people who stood next to me and support me when we were struggling against Apartheid. They want me to distance myself from Yasser Arafat, Saddam Hussein, Qaddafi. Well, these are the people who stood with us. It was not you, and who are you to tell who to be friends with.” Years later, Shihade recalls meeting the first Colored South African ambassador in Ramallah: “He told me that before arriving to his post, Mandela told him: ‘This is not any typical diplomatic post. The Palestinian cause is our cause. Arafat is a dear friend of mine. He helped my family financially for over 20 years while I was in prison. Please go to Palestine not just an ambassador, but as an ally.'”

Under Mandela's presidency, the South African government tried to be an ally, maintaining full diplomatic relations with the “State of Palestine” and providing technical assistance in a variety of areas—from Disaster Management to “women's empowerment.” But it was an exceedingly difficult position for Madiba since recognition of the occupied territories as a “state” without real sovereignty veered closely to a policy he staunchly rejected: recognition of the Bantustans or “black homelands” created to separate African “tribes” under apartheid regime. Through a combination of force and legislation, the South African government created these separate states with their own semi-governmental apparatus designating citizenship, not only for Bantustan residents but for those with “tribal” affiliations living in South Africa. The Bantustans had no power, no military, no sovereignty, no real economy, no control over its borders, and remained subordinate to South African authority. It is not uncommon for Palestinians to refer to the West Bank, Gaza, East Jerusalem—the territories that will allegedly make up the Palestinian “state”—as a “Bantustan.”

The analogy is critical, because at no point in the ANC's modern history was a “two-state“ or multiple state solution on the table. The idea of dividing South Africa on the basis of race or ethnicity was anathema to Mandela and the movement. They pushed for one secular, democratic state based on universal franchise, equality, and citizenship for all. As the late Edward Said and others have pointed out about Mandela's principled stance, unlike Arafat he refused anything less than one democratic state—he would not accept leadership of a Jim Crow, economically and politically dependent “nation,” and indeed that refusal was partly the source of Chief Mangosuthu Gatsha Buthelezi's deployment of Inkatha to wage war on the ANC and its allies. Mandela was clear: democracy was impossible under a racist state.

Palestinian activists and their allies who reject the “two-state” solution drew some of their inspiration from Mandela, even though his own politics backed a separate Palestinian state. Here is precisely where the apartheid analogy takes hold. Israel is governed by racial policies of exclusion, dispossession, and subjugation, defined by separation walls and paved settler-only roads in the occupied territories; that limits nationality to Jews-only and denies millions of displaced Palestinians the right to return; that denies Palestinian Muslims, Christians, and Bedouin people equal access to property, social and welfare services, and material resources administered by the state; that denies Palestinians forced out of their communities (in 1948, 1967, and still continuing today) the rights to lands, houses, bank accounts, bank safes, other property they once owned; that force Palestinian citizens of Israel to live in exclusively “Arab” communities that have been prohibited from expanding, attend underfunded schools, deny them government employment, and the right to live with their spouse if she or he is a Palestinian from the Occupied Territories.

What Mandela and the ANC offered was a vision of citizenship that was not based on race or religion. For Palestinians it is an old idea (the notion of a bi-national state) given new life (the demand for one democratic state). As writer/activist Ali Abunimah reminds us, Mandela accepted Afrikaner claims on a South African identity, and in so doing, “was able to accept his enemy's narrative without compromising on the demand that Afrikaners relinquish their exclusive claim on power. Mandela urged South Africans to embrace any Afrikaner who abandoned apartheid, and thus Afrikaners gained a legitimacy in the eyes of other South Africans that they were unable to wrest through centuries of domination. It is an incredibly simple and powerful maneuver, yet one that so far has been beyond the ability of most Israelis and Palestinians.”

As many of us work to build the BDS movement and the academic and cultural boycott of Israel to end the occupation, guarantee the right of Palestinians to return, and dismantle the system of apartheid in Israel (including the separation wall), Madiba continues to be an inspiration. He and his comrades recognized the international boycott as a turning point in the anti-apartheid struggle. Indeed, the case of South Africa may be the best example we have of how a principled international boycott can help change the conditions of struggle on the ground. Archbishop Tutu drew inspiration from Mandela's warning against reading “reconciliation and fairness as meaning parity between justice and injustice” in defending his own support for BDS, in general, and the academic and cultural boycott, in particular: “It can never be business as usual. Israeli Universities are an intimate part of the Israeli regime, by active choice… Palestinians have chosen, like we did, the nonviolent tools of boycott, divestment and sanctions.”

After attending the Russell Tribunal on Palestine, Mandela's long-time friend, colleague, and Robben Island prison mate, Ahmed Kathrada wrote, “I am deeply convinced that the Palestinians are experiencing life akin to – and in many respects far worse than – what we had under Apartheid in South Africa.” Kathrada goes on to say, “Some would have us believe that the South African story is only one of dialogue and reconciliation. It was indeed about these. However, it is also about a struggle against occupation and one for justice.” And South Africa continues to walk the talk. Besides being home to one of the largest BDS campaigns on the planet, South Africa's own government has backed the boycott when it decided to ban products made in illegal Jewish settlements in the West Bank. South Africa also withdrew its ambassador from Israel to protest the IDF's violent raid on the MV Marvi Marmara (part of the Free Gaza Flotilla) off the Gaza Coast in May 2011.

Finally, the experience of the anti-apartheid movement's academic boycott has a great deal to teach us as we debate the decision on the part of the American Studies Association to support the boycott of Israeli academic and cultural institutions (not individuals). We are reminded that the role of the boycott movement wasn't just economic or even primarily economic – it was educational. The public campaigns made the world aware of the brutal character of apartheid, challenging South African's white minority representation of itself as an enlightened democracy. According to Salim Vally, director of the Centre for Education Rights and Transformation at the University of Johannesburg and veteran of the movement, the boycott radically altered the internal politics of the university in South Africa by eliminating the option of “neutrality” and opening up debate over inequality, repression, and redress.

As one of his white colleagues mused, “Academic associations (some more than others) examined the nature and conditions of research in their disciplines, and faculty unions became part of broader struggles for justice rather than bodies protecting narrow professional interests. Universities became sites of intense debate, and, indeed, intellectuals became critically involved in debates about the nature of current and future South African societies. In the wake of the boycott, there was not a curtailing of academic freedom, then, but a flourishing of intellectual thought that was rich, varied, and exciting.”

In the end, apartheid died on the sharp edge of principles, struggle and solidarity, not forgiveness, apologetics, and compromise. This was Madiba's gift and the gift of the movement. South Africa is certainly not the country envisioned in the Freedom Charter, and the kind of neoliberal politics that has sadly prevailed has also found its proponents among Palestinian elites. But what remains deeply embedded in civil society—both in South Africa and Palestine—is a legacy of principled movement, driven by a vision of democracy free of domination or exclusion. To help bring this vision into being is the best way to commemorate Madiba's life and work.

Source: http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/12/10/madiba-in-palestine/

Robin D. G. Kelley, who teaches at UCLA, is the author of Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original (2009) and most recently Africa Speaks, America Answers: Modern Jazz in Revolutionary Times (2012).

Erica Lorraine Williams is an Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Spelman College. She is the author of Sex Tourism in Bahia: Ambiguous Entanglements (University of Illinois Press, 2013). Follow her on Twitter at @ericalwilliams7

How Dare Israeli Leaders Mourn Mandela?

Michel (Mikado) Warschawski — 2014-01-02T02:57:50Z

“Mandela was an exemplary figure of our era, and he will be remembered as a first class moral leader. He was a liberation fighter who rejected violence…” By these words, Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu not only reveals his very limited of South African history (to say the least), but has passed over on the other side of decency. In the unanimous worldwide expression of admiration for Mandela, the best that official representatives of the state of Israel can do is to shut their mouth with shame and humility.

Until today, no Israeli leader has asked Mandela and the South African people forgiveness for Israel's active role in defending and maintaining the apartheid regime in Pretoria.

The alliance between Israel and racist South Africa was a strategic one: economic and military, but also ideological. Years after the majority of the international community launched boycott of the apartheid regime, Israel continued to keep excellent relations with Pretoria and even to help it to bypass international sanctions. According to the international media, Israel could not continue its nuclear program without the collaboration of apartheid South Africa. Such an alliance was based not only on joint interests, but also on a philosophy of both being white countries in a non-white, hostile environment, of a joint struggle against communism on the one hand and the rise of third world peoples on the other.

Several weeks ago I saw a fascinating report on Israeli television about a famous Israeli millionaire who was simultaneously a successful film producer and a Mossad agent. Among the many revelations (for me at least), the man told us about millions of dollars he received from the US administration and the South African regime to make films with one single objective: legitimizing the apartheid regime in Pretoria… including its pro-Nazi leaders. When asked if he has some regrets, he answered “yes, a little”; his eyes, however, revealed that hi answer was fake.

When Mandela was finally released from prison and accepted throughout the world as a central leader of the new South Africa, the various Israeli governments continued to maintain a distance from the black communist/terrorist, and preferred the supposed moderate Desmond Tutu to the ANC leader.

Israel was definitely not the only country to support the apartheid regime, and the United States did use the Israeli state to do some of the dirty work on its behalf. However, the strength of the relationship between Tel Aviv and Pretoria was not made only of interests, but on a common vision of the world and common values. This is precisely the reason why Israel was the last country to cut its ties with the regime.

The “mourning” of Benjamin Netanyahu and the statement of Israeli President Shimon Peres are as fake as the answer of the Israeli film producer/Mossad agent. Let's hope that the family, friends and millions of supporters of Nelson Mandela will not let these Israeli figures and their statements pollute the mourning events of one of the greater liberation fighters of the last century.

NSA Surveillance Is About Power, Not "Safety"

Edward Snowden — 2014-01-02T02:57:30Z

An open letter to the people of Brazil. This letter was published today in the Brazilian newspaper A Folha in Portuguese and this original text was provided via the Facebook page of Glenn Greenwald's husband David Miranda

Six months ago, I stepped out from the shadows of the United States Government's National Security Agency to stand in front of a journalist's camera. I shared with the world evidence proving some governments are building a world-wide surveillance system to secretly track how we live, who we talk to, and what we say. I went in front of that camera with open eyes, knowing that the decision would cost me family and my home, and would risk my life. I was motivated by a belief that the citizens of the world deserve to understand the system in which they live.

My greatest fear was that no one would listen to my warning. Never have I been so glad to have been so wrong. The reaction in certain countries has been particularly inspiring to me, and Brazil is certainly one of those.

At the NSA, I witnessed with growing alarm the surveillance of whole populations without any suspicion of wrongdoing, and it threatens to become the greatest human rights challenge of our time. The NSA and other spying agencies tell us that for our own "safety"—for Dilma's "safety," for Petrobras' "safety"—they have revoked our right to privacy and broken into our lives. And they did it without asking the public in any country, even their own.

Today, if you carry a cell phone in Sao Paolo, the NSA can and does keep track of your location: they do this 5 billion times a day to people around the world. When someone in Florianopolis visits a website, the NSA keeps a record of when it happened and what you did there. If a mother in Porto Alegre calls her son to wish him luck on his university exam, NSA can keep that call log for five years or more. They even keep track of who is having an affair or looking at pornography, in case they need to damage their target's reputation.

American Senators tell us that Brazil should not worry, because this is not "surveillance," it's "data collection." They say it is done to keep you safe. They're wrong. There is a huge difference between legal programs, legitimate spying, legitimate law enforcement — where individuals are targeted based on a reasonable, individualized suspicion — and these programs of dragnet mass surveillance that put entire populations under an all-seeing eye and save copies forever. These programs were never about terrorism: they're about economic spying, social control, and diplomatic manipulation. They're about power.

Many Brazilian senators agree, and have asked for my assistance with their investigations of suspected crimes against Brazilian citizens. I have expressed my willingness to assist wherever appropriate and lawful, but unfortunately the United States government has worked very hard to limit my ability to do so — going so far as to force down the Presidential Plane of Evo Morales to prevent me from traveling to Latin America! Until a country grants permanent political asylum, the US government will continue to interfere with my ability to speak.

Six months ago, I revealed that the NSA wanted to listen to the whole world. Now, the whole world is listening back, and speaking out, too. And the NSA doesn't like what it's hearing. The culture of indiscriminate worldwide surveillance, exposed to public debates and real investigations on every continent, is collapsing. Only three weeks ago, Brazil led the United Nations Human Rights Committee to recognize for the first time in history that privacy does not stop where the digital network starts, and that the mass surveillance of innocents is a violation of human rights.

The tide has turned, and we can finally see a future where we can enjoy security without sacrificing our privacy. Our rights cannot be limited by a secret organization, and American officials should never decide the freedoms of Brazilian citizens. Even the defenders of mass surveillance, those who may not be persuaded that our surveillance technologies have dangerously outpaced democratic controls, now agree that in democracies, surveillance of the public must be debated by the public.

My act of conscience began with a statement: "I don't want to live in a world where everything that I say, everything I do, everyone I talk to, every expression of creativity or love or friendship is recorded. That's not something I'm willing to support, it's not something I'm willing to build, and it's not something I'm willing to live under."

Days later, I was told my government had made me stateless and wanted to imprison me. The price for my speech was my passport, but I would pay it again: I will not be the one to ignore criminality for the sake of political comfort. I would rather be without a state than without a voice.

If Brazil hears only one thing from me, let it be this: when all of us band together against injustices and in defense of privacy and basic human rights, we can defend ourselves from even the most powerful systems.

Source: countercurrents.org

Whistleblower Edward Joseph Snowden is a US former technical contractor for the National Security Agency (NSA) and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) employee who leaked details of top-secret US and British government mass surveillance programs to the press.

An Interview with Roger Waters

FRANK BARAT — 2014-01-02T02:57:19Z

Frank Barat: When did you make the decision to make the Wall tour (that ended in Paris in September 2013) so political? And why did you dedicate the final concert to Jean-Charles De Menezes?

Roger Waters: The first show was October 14th 2010. We started working on content of show with Sean Evans in 2009. I had already decided to make it much broader politically than it had been in 1979/80. It could not be just about this whinny little guy who didn't like his teachers. It had to be more universal. That's why ‘fallen loved ones' came into it (the shows are showing pictures of people that died during wars) trying to universalise the sense of grief and loss that we all feel towards family members killed in conflict. Whatever the wars or the circumstances, they (in the non western world), feel has much lost as we do. Wars become an important symbol because of that separation between ‘us and them,' which is fundamental to all conflicts. Regarding Jean-Charles, we used to do Brick II with three solos at the end and I decided that three solos was too much, it was boring me. So sitting in a hotel room, one night, I was thinking about what I could do instead of that. Somebody had recently sent me a photograph of Jean-Charles De Menezes to go on the wall. So he was in my mind and I thought that I should sing his story. I wrote that song, taught it to the band, and that's what we did.

FB: A lot of artist would say that mixing arts and politics is wrong. That their goal is only to entertain. What would you say to those people?

RW: Well it's funny you should say that because I just finished yesterday the text of a new piece which will be a new album of mine. It's about a grandfather in Northern Ireland going on a quest with his grandchild to find the answer to the question: “Why are they killing the children?”, because the child is really worried about it. Right at the very end of it, I decided to add something more. In the song, the child tells his grandpa: “Is that it?” and the grandpa replies “No, we cannot leave on that note, give me another note”. A new song starts and the grandpa makes a speech. He says: “We live on a tiny dot in a middle of a lot of fucking nothing. Now, if you're not interested in any of this, if you're one of those “Roger I love Pink Floyd but I hate your fucking politics”, if you believe artists should be mute, emasculated, nodding dogs dangling aimlessly over the dashboard of life, you might be well advised to fuck off to the bar now, because, time keeps slipping away.” That's my answer to your question.

FB: When will album be out?

RW: I've got no idea. I'm working away furiously on lots of old projects. I'm going to give a first listen to this to Sean Evans. He's coming to my house tomorrow to listen to it. I've made a demo which is one hour and six minutes long. It's pretty heavy I confess, but there is also some humor in it, I hope, but it's extremely radical and it poses very important questions. Look, if I'm the only one doing it, I am entirely content. I mean, I'm not, I wish there were more people writing about politics and our real situation. Even from what could be considered extreme points of view. It's very important that Goya did what he did, same for Picasso and Guernica and all those anti-war novels that came out during and after the Vietnam war.

FB: You're talking about yourself being one of the only one, in your position, taking radical political positions. When it comes to Palestine, you are very open about your support for a cultural boycott of Israel. People opposing this tactic say that culture should not be boycotted. What would you answer to that?

RW: I would say that I understand their opinion. Everybody should have one. But I can't agree with them, I think that they are entirely wrong. The situation in Israel/ Palestine, with the occupation, the ethnic cleansing and the systematic racist apartheid Israeli regime is un acceptable. So for an artist to go and play in a country that occupies other people's land and oppresses them the way Israel does, is plain wrong. They should say no. I would not have played for the Vichy government in occupied France in the Second World War, I would not have played in Berlin either during this time. Many people did, back in the day. There were many people that pretended that the oppression of the Jews was not going on. From 1933 until 1946. So this is not a new scenario. Except that this time it's the Palestinian People being murdered. It's the duty of every thinking human being to ask: “What can I do?”. Anybody who looks at the situation will see that if you choose not to take up arms to fight your oppressor, the non violent route, and the Boycott Divestment and Sanctions (B.D.S) movement, which started in Palestine with 100% support from Palestinian civil society in 2004-2005, a movement that has now been joined by many people around the world, the global civil society, is a legitimate form of resistance to this brutal and oppressive regime. I have nearly finished Max Blumenthal's book “Goliath: Life and Loathing in greater Israel”. It's a chilling read. It's extremely well written in my view. He is a very good journalist and takes great pains to make sure that what he writes is correct. He also gives a voice to the other side. The voice, for instance, of the right wing rabbinate, which is so bizarre and hard to hear that you can hardly believe that it's real. They believe some very weird stuff you know, they believe that everybody that is not a Jew is only on earth to serve them and they believe that the Indigenous people of the region that they kicked off the land in 1948 and have continued to kick off the land ever since are sub-human. The parallels with what went on in the 30's in Germany are so crushingly obvious that it doesn't surprise me that the movement that both you and I are involved in is growing every day. The Russell Tribunal on Palestine was trying to shed light on this when we met, I only took part in two sessions, you took part in many more. It is an extremely obvious and fundamental problem of human rights which every thinking human being should apply himself to.

FB: The scary thing is that the extreme Rabbinate you were talking about with the extreme right wing views about the Palestinians and the non-Jews are having a more and more prominent place in terms of the Israeli society, regime and power structure and that is very scary.

I wanted to follow up on the Cultural Boycott and about the fact that you are one of the only ones who take such a stand. You could, as many others do, I guess enjoy the benefits of your success and lead a quiet, at least politically, non-controversial life. Why do you do it but more importantly why do you think not more people are doing it? Why a lot of artists who often take position against wars, why don't they touch Palestine?

RW: Well, where I live, in the USA, I think, A: they are frightened and B: I think the propaganda machine that starts in Israeli schools and that continues through all the Netanyahu's bluster is poured all over the United States, not just Fox but also CNN and in fact in all the mainstream media. It's like a huge bucket of crap that they are pouring into the mouth of a gullible public in my view, when they say “we are afraid of Iran, it is going to get nuclear weapons…”. It's a diversionary tactic. The lie that they have told for the last 20 years is “Oh, we want to make peace”, you know and they talk about Clinton and Arafat and Barak being in Camp David and that they came very close to agreeing, and the story that they sold was “Oh Arafat fucked it all up”. Well, no, he did not. This is not the story. The fact of the matter is no Israeli government has been serious about creating a Palestinian state since 1948. They've always had the Ben Gurion agenda of kicking all the Arabs out of the country and becoming greater Israel. They tell a lie as part of their propaganda machinery whilst doing the other thing but they have been doing it so obviously in the last 10 years . For instance, even after when Obama went to Cairo and made that speech about Arabs and the Israelis, everybody was like “Oh, this is a step in a new direction at least”. But as soon as he visited Israel, they said. “Oh by the way, we are building another 1200 settlements”. Exactly the same when Kerry went last year saying, “Oh I am going to try to get the sides together and talk peace”. Netanhayu said “Fuck you. We are going to build another 1500 settlements and we a going to build them in E1, this is our plan.” This is so transparent that you'd have to have an IQ above room temperature not to understand what is going on. It is just dopey.

You know I read some piece the other day where it said “apparently only the Secretary State of the United States, believes that these current peace talks are real, no one else in the world does”.

It is a very complicated situation which is why you and I and all the other people in the world who care about their brothers and sisters and not just about the people of our own faith, our own colour, our own race or our own whatever, have to stand in solidarity shoulder to shoulder. This has been a very hard sell particularly where I live in the United States of America. The Jewish lobby is extraordinary powerful here and particularly in the industry that I work in, the music industry and in rock'n roll as they say. I promise you, naming no names, I've spoken to people who are terrified that if they stand shoulder to shoulder with me they are going to get fucked. They have said to me “aren't you worried for your life?” and I go “No, I'm not”. A few years ago, I was touring and 9/11 happened in the middle of the tour and 2 or 3 people in my band who happened to be United States citizens wouldn't come on the next leg of the tour. I said “ why not? Don't you like the music anymore?” and they replied “no, we love the music but we are Americans and it's too dangerous for us to travel abroad, they are trying to kill us” and I thought “Wow!”.

FB: Yes, the brainwashing works!

RW: Obviously it does, that is why I am happy to be doing this interview with you because it is super important that we make as much noise as possible. I'm so glad that this right wing newspaper in Israel, Yedioth Ahronoth, printed my interview with Alon Hadar. At least they printed it. Although they changed the context and made it sound different that what is actually was but at least they printed something. You know, I would expect to be completely suppressed and ignored.

You know that Shuki Weiss (preeminent Israeli promotor) was offering me a hundred thousand people at hundred dollars a ticket a few months ago to come and play in Tel Aviv! “Hang on, that's 10 million dollars”, how could they offer it to me?! And I thought Shuki are you fucking deaf or just dumb?! I am part of the BDS movement, I'm not going anywhere in Israel, for any money, all I would be doing would be legitimizing the policies of the government.

I have a confession to make to you. I did actually write to Cindy Lauper a couple of weeks ago. I did not make the letter public but I wrote her a letter because I know her a bit, she worked with me on the Wall in Berlin which is why I found it super difficult to understand that she is doing a gig in Tel Aviv on January the 4th. Apparently, quite extraordinary, reprehensible in my view, but I don't know her personal story and people have to make up their own mind about these things. One can't get to personal about it.

FB: For sure but you can help them, I guess by what you are doing, by writing to them. You can open their eyes because that's what they need I think.

RW: Yes but if their eyes were going to be opened they would need to either visit the Holy land, visit the West Bank or Gaza or even visit Israel or any single checkpoint anywhere and see what it's like. All they would need to do is visiting or, read, read a book! Check out the history. Read Max Blumenthal's book. Then say “Oh I know what I am going to do, I am going to play a gig in Tel Aviv”. That would be a good plan! (sarcastic tone).

Frank Barat is one of the producers of “The Wall has ears; conversation for Palestine”.

Source: http://www.facebook.com/l/qAQFvok8nAQG-pRRcGX6n8mGf6DyLUKdUYx9Sg4GBOXbuaA/lemuradesoreilles.org/2013/12/06/conversation-with-roger-waters/

Geo-Strategic Challenges in the United States and China Relationship

Donald Cuccioletta — 2014-01-02T02:57:12Z

Current Sino-U.S. relations seem to be, as we progress into the second decade of the 21st century, in a holding pattern. This state of affairs leads some observers to believe, that this relationship is in a state of limbo while others believe, because of the lack of a clear definition of this relationship, that we are heading towards a “Quasi Cold War “ senario. One of the major proponents of this Cold War scenario is Liu Jianhua, who postulates that this geo-strategic confrontation is based on, what he calls “a growing strategic suspicion between the two major powers of the world”. As we can surmise, in this relationship there seems to be a lot more suspicion than trust.

The element that triggered and eventually shifted the relationship towards a climate of mistrust was the announcement by the Obama administration in defining the United States as an Asian-Pacific hegemonic nation, with a long historical presence in that part of the world. This announcement was interpreted by the Chinese foreign ministry, and the new president of Xi Xiping, as a warning that the United States, would remain an uncontested Asian nation that it would continue to be fully engaged in the region and as in the past, fulfill its commitments to its Asian allies. Most observers around the world, named this policy, Obama's “Asian Pivot”. In other words, it was a reaffirmation by the United States, that the U.S. role in the Asian Pacific zone and in particular in South-east Asia would remain crucial and central to American foreign policy. This announcement by Obama was also a message signaling to Beijing, that they were in the eye of Washington.

Another trigger that made the western world and in particular the United States to become more incisive in its presence, is the assessment of China's present power status. This assessment is based on the concern with the speed of “China's Rise”. China's new direction taken in the late 1970's under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping, placed more emphasis on a rapid economic rise and the rejection of the revolutionary program of the Maoist period based on social measures. China had now turned towards capitalism as the way to enrich and solidify its political institutions. Socialism with Chinese characteristics became the buzzword for State Capitalism, with the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) remaining the dominant watchdog against any dissenters who dared deviate from the new party line.

Besides enriching the country, there lurked behind this new economic policy, a new foreign policy to elevate China to the status of major power. In order to attain this new objective, would require China to also raise its presence as a new economic power on the international scene. This approach has, within the last 20 years, brought China to a level of an economic superpower around the world. In other words, in order to re-enforce a new foreign policy, China would have to construction an economic policy that would help penetrate new foreign markets and solidify diplomatic ties.

Hence China now sees the world as an open supermarket. China, with accumulated wealth from a controlled authoritarian state-capitalism, can now compete with United States and buy up necessary natural resources around the world. This is being done while avoiding any critical stance to be taken on human rights, democracy, minority rights etc. This added economic momentum, has lead to China's growing impact on the world. All this has been done in a very short time and framework.

China's rapid “Rise” therefore has precipitated a different approach from the U.S. But it has also precipitated a raging debate within intellectual and academic circles throughout China. What does it mean to be a major power with a new power status in our present world? Some believe the need to promote future economic growth to advance China's power status. Others meanwhile look to the differences in the military gap between China and the United States. While others believe that China must find the genesis of its new power status within its long and complicated history.

The growing military presence of the United States in Asia, has even pushed certain researchers in China to speculate on an accelerated pace for China to become a second tier super power by 2020. When we read the different views among Chinese researchers, we can observe the uneasiness with which the debate, as to superpower status of China, has monopolized the relationship with the United States.

The announcement of the “Asia Pivot” was not just a shift in diplomatic policy, but one that involved concrete practical decisions that would eventually promote a US military and physical presence in South East Asia and Asia in general. For many in China, China's rise has made the US fearful and suspicious of China's “negative” influences in the region. This has led many important international relations specialists, such as Dr. Yan Xuetong to point out to many of the maneuvers made by the United States since Obama's “Asian Pivot”.

China suspects that the U.S. is trying to impede China's rise through the following: controlling weapons and high-tech exports to China: continuous arms shipments to Taiwan: disturbing any form of East-Asian co-operation: getting involved in maritime disputes in the South China seas: demanding the depreciation of the RMB: and building up an ABM defense system. We can also observe a form of political containment of China.

After the retreat from Afghanistan, the US will leave in place some troops to support a friendly regime. India, now an important ally of the United States, has already received under the presidency of George W. Bush, 21st century nuclear technology. Two marine bases have been deployed in Australia. Pakistan has been given the role of pacifier of the Taliban in the eventual new Afghan government. Vietnam now has a free trade deal with the United States. Japan, under a conservative government is now rearming with the help of the US and has accepted the placement of a drone base on their territory. South Korea remains steadfast in its support of the United States. And of course Taiwan remains firmly in the US camp. China cannot but be concerned when it sees all these developments in the continent and around their borders.

Contrary to popular belief that the eventual confrontation between Chinese interests and United Sates interests will occur in Asia and more specifically in South East Asia, Africa has all ready become in many observer's eyes the continent of confrontation. As stated by Simon Tisdall, journalist of The Guardian and quoted by Liu Jianhua , “In Africa, fierce contests between China and the U.S. for materials, economic resources, political influences and military strongholds are being held in the in Sub-Sahara Africa. Natural resources, whether oil, uranium, copper, zinc and even “Rare earth” are at the heart of this confrontation.”

The discussion on how to expand for Chinese interests in Africa, has reached a high level of debate. The questions surrounding “African Integration and Unification” are part of the reexamining of Chinese intervention in Africa. International criticisms from NGOs on the ground, concerning China's complete abstraction of the immense poverty in African, the refusal to criticize the dictatorial rulers it deals with, the importing of Chinese workers rather than hiring local workers for construction and mining projects, on the premise that local workers are not reliable, have all made certain elements of Chinese elite reflect. While other intellectuals deny any allusions towards a Chinese neo-colonial policy in Africa. While glorifying the rapidity of China's “Rise” in becoming a major power, China still remains deficient in understanding its responsible role in avoiding a new form of neo-colonialism, especially in Africa.

The hit spot in this uneasy relationship remains South East Asia and in particular the South China Sea. The South China Sea because of China's “Rise” has become in the last 10 years the most important shipping corridor in the world. 75% of the world shipping trade goes through the channels of the South China Sea. This links the eastern seaboard of China, where the important economic cities are situated, to Indochina, India, Pakistan, Australia, Eastern Africa, South Africa, the Arab and Gulf Sates, Iran and points West. This vital economic and trade corridor has led China to build in Pakistan a deepwater port for commercial shipping. Of course for the United States this deep water port in Pakistan can be easily used for Chinese naval vessels patrolling the South China seas. Another reason for US interest to keep Pakistan among its circle of allies, uneasy allies, but nevertheless allies. The return of the US navy to Subic Bay in the Philippine's, at the bequest of the Philippine government is not simply coincidental.

The US support of Japan in its dispute with China over the Diaoyu Islands has pushed China to declare around this area a restricted fly zone, under Chinese surveillance. The US has responded by sending in two unarmed B 52's that surprised China and did not command an immediate response. Subsequently a few days later China sent in two fighter jets to signified that it would no longer tolerate any presence in this restricted fly zone.

China remains hostile to Japan on the question of the Islands, which it considers part of China. This reminds them of the Taiwan situation, which they deem is similar. Nationalist feelings have risen in China over the rise of Japanese presence in the South China sea. Japan as we know has now taken a more offensive stance with its defense forces in the area.

These are some of the recent incidences that have precipitated the visits of Vice-President Joe Biden to try to deflate some of the volatile rhetoric coming out of the foreign ministry and the PLO (People's Liberation Army). Of course China's has not remained inactive during this recent tug of war that has been going on in the last few weeks. China and its President Xi Xiping did not waste any time in solidify relations, economic and political with Malaysia, Vietnam, Singapore and even the Philippines, in the absence of President Obama at the Asian-Pacific conference due to the government shut down crisis.

The United States and China are now maneuvering on the geo-strategic chessboard, which at times can lead to stressful and difficult exchanges. But this resembles, in my humbled opinion, the beginning of a heavyweight championship fight, where the two pugilists in the first few rounds try to feel each other out. Every boxing match can either end up in a knock out win, which could mean war, or a unanimous or split decision, which means the economic or political confrontation continues or even a draw, which could led to a realization that these two major powers must find ways to restore a relationship that can lead to a more multilateral approach to the world of the 21st century.

Donald Cuccioletta Ph.D. Professor of History, Université du Québec en Outaouais
(And was visiting professor (September-October 2013) in the International Relations department at Tsinghua University, Beijing.