The Alternative Information Center

The spirit of privatization and the neoliberal ideology of Darwinian individualism, in which the strong crush the weak (or the weakened), is the spirit that is intentionally abusing the oppressed populations in Israel, particularly children. This is the spirit whispering in the ears of the local “elite” in the towns and villages, in the impoverished neighborhoods and the hungry moshavs; “you can also be like Silvan (Shalom, served as Israeli Foreign Minister and Finance Minister, member of Likud and born in Tunisia) and Sheetrit (Meir, current Israeli Minister of Interior from the Kadima party, born in Morocco).” The spirit, essentially the American Dream, promises paradise on earth to everyone—as everyone can succeed if s/he just works hard enough and makes an effort. This is the wind blowing throughout Israel’s periphery.

The selection of Shimshon Shoshani as the new General Director of the Ministry of Education is not surprising. Shoshani has not left the headlines throughout the years due to the various education reforms he initiated. All of these reforms, without exception, resulted in a deepening of the privatization of the public education system.

Shoshani is skilled, and not only at privatizing of the system, but also in wrapping the reforms in pretty paper as being progressive education reforms for the good of the children and their parents. For this reason, it is no wonder that he is often identified as an active reformist and not, as it should be, as the initiator of overall privatization of the public education system and the destruction of public education. Few will identify him as responsible for the poor results of the education system and the open and hidden dropout rates.

A brief review of his initiatives will clarify this point.

The Te'udat Bagrut is the official Israeli high school matriculation certificate given to students after passing a set of exams.

All standardized exams in the education system, including matriculation exams, are meant to examine two primary things: the standards that the system determines for the purposes of measurement, and the achievements of the system in the wake of this established standard. The student is a secondary player, measured on the basis of comparative parameters, i.e., competition—with the world, and particularly amongst the student populations in OECD countries. Achievements are measured on the basis of national averages.  

I wrote in the past that the results of standardized tests, with their eternal failures, do not result in any change within the education system. There are no additional hours of instruction, no closing of gaps in the learning conditions of the social periphery (which impact the national averages due to that sector’s low results), no lessening in the number of students per classroom, no encouragement by way of allocating additional resources and a perception of changing the manner of instruction. In short, nothing. However the exam results, as if on auto pilot, crash into the system time after time. And every year, following publication of the results, a parade of analyses, self criticism and a desire to find miracle solutions begins, none of which even touch the real issue. 

Cuban physicist and longtime activist, Celia Hart Santamaría, died in a car accident in Havana on 7 September.

I wish to devote this article to an amazing Cuban woman, a revolutionary in all possible ways, whom I had the privilege of knowing.  

I received an email from a South American friend, notifying me of the death of Celia Hart Santamaría, who was killed in a car accident in Cuba on 8 September. The pain of her loss is both mine and that of hundreds of thousands—and perhaps millions—of people who knew her personally, read her articles and her books, listened to her speeches, and for whom she served as a revolutionary light in the Cuban and South American skies.  

Two years ago, I was invited to participate in an international educational conference held in Cuba in memory of Paulo Freire, who established the stream of critical education in the world. Prior to my trip, I contacted several South American friends for suggestions. Although I noted that I was interested in meeting people connected to the fields of education and community activism, they told me time after time that it was “mandatory” for me to meet Celia Hart Santamaría.  

Celia was the daughter of two of the most important leaders of the Cuban revolution and the right hand of Fidel Castro and Che Guevara. Her mother, Aida Santamaría, was the sole woman at the level of “commander” in the guerilla forces. Following the revolution, Aida filled numerous governmental positions, her last one being the president of Casa de las Americas, an institute for literature and non-fiction writing, which is considered even today as the most important in South America, and which acted for decades to publish the writings and art of creators from the third world. Aida committed suicide in the 1970’s; some say this was on the backdrop of her loss of faith in Fidel and the Cuban Communist Party, with its oppression of Cuban writers and authors. 

Last week, during my trip to Kosovo and Serbia, at times I had difficulties knowing where I was: was I home in Jerusalem, or in Prishtina, the capital of Kosovo? Ethnic states with the practice of ethnic cleansing and “homogenous societies” started to blur together. Yugoslavia has always played an important role in my life: in my childhood, I was fascinated by the stories of Tito and his Partisans Army that liberated Yugoslavia from the Nazi occupation and its local collaborators. Later on, I became interested in a communist regime independent from Soviet Union and developing an imaginative system of “self-management socialism.” When I was a student, I studied the independent Yugoslavian Marxists organized in the “Praxis” group, and was even supposed to come to their yearly summer school.

Above all, I focused my interest on the national issue in Yugoslavia and the ways to combine a federal state with national, regional, and local enlarged autonomies. In particular, the 1976 Yugoslavian constitution which, in many aspects, was a theoretical model of true recognition of the national rights for national minorities. This included the rights of national minorities living within a broader national minority, like the Albanians of Kosovo among the Serbs, or even like the Serbian minority living in Kosovo. Complicated? Maybe, but it remains fascinating.

Last month, the great conductor Daniel Barenboim was invited for a concert in Cairo. Among his many passports, Barenboim has also an Israeli one, a fact that reopened, in Egypt, the public debate about normalization.

At the Austrian Cultural Center of Cairo, the maestro tried to justify his presence in Egypt: “I don’t represent the Israeli government and I am here as a person who has never hesitated to criticize the Israeli government.”

Israel is not a normal state. Israel is a colonial settler state, built on the ruins of Palestine and the dispossession of its people. This is why, for several decades, the Arab world—and many other countries in Africa and Asia—refused to recognize it and to maintain normal diplomatic, economic and cultural relations with Israel. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, normalization was the main aspiration of the Israeli leaders, i.e., to be accepted by its Arab neighbors as a legitimate state, and to have normal relationship with them. The continuous aggressive policy towards the Arab countries (1956, 1967, 1970, 1975) made it impossible for the pro-American Arab regimes to normalize relations with Israel, even when they expressed their readiness to do so, like Gamal Abdel Nasser in 1955 and later on in 1970 (under the mediation of Nahum Goldman, chairman of the World Jewish Congress).

Egypt President Anwar Sadat was the first Arab leader to break the siege on the state of Israel, and to call for normalization with it. In a dramatic move, he flew to Israel (1977) and addressed the Knesset with an unambiguous offer of normalization between the two states. Sadat’s initiative was soon followed by diplomatic relations between Egypt and Israel. Sadat’s recognition of Israel was perceived by many around the Arab world, as treason, and in October 1981 he was assassinated.

I do not like Cardinal Ratzinger, today called Pope Benedict XVI. He is a reactionary person in all possible ways: convinced of the superiority of the “Christian west,” hates Islam and does not like Jews. Joseph Ratzinger expresses the conservative stream of the Catholic Church, which includes within it numerous Holocaust deniers and those who advocate for crusades against Islam. Ratzinger represents the counter-reformation in the Catholic Church and all those interested in erasing the achievements of Vatican II. The fact that in his youth he joined the Nazi youth does not necessarily testify to his anti-Semitism, but suggests his conservatism and his nationalism.

Representing the Alternative Information Center at Geneva , I was the only Israeli-Jew participating in this important gathering. Here are some of my impressions:

Between Durban II and Durban I there is no more in common than between the First Intifada and the so-call Second Intifada, i.e. absolutely nothing.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas meets with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak at the Presidential palace in Cairo. Egypt actively supported Israel's attack on the Gaza Strip.

What is going on in the West Bank in relation to the Israeli attack on Gaza? Why is the reaction not so strong?

The reaction in the West Bank is strongly affected by the internal Palestinian split: the power in the West Bank is presently held by Fatah and the Palestinian Authority. Soon after the 2006 election in which Hamas won, the antagonism between the former Fatah-led PA and the new Hamas government became manifest. This opposition can be read as the difference between two strategic choices: the one represented by the Fatah leadership and supported by many Arab regimes loyal to the USA power, which sees the peace negotiations and the involvement of international institutions as the only way to solve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. The other strategy is the resistance movement, currently led by Hamas with the participation of the leftist groups (PFLP, DFLP), the Fatah al-Aqsa Brigades, the Islamic Jihad and so on. When Israel attacked Gaza 20 days ago, the political position of the PA in the West Bank was clear: “we are not part of the attack.” Therefore, they are using all their power to keep the West Bank as calm as possible, employing the Palestinian policemen in order to prevent any clashes between the Palestinian demonstrators and the Israeli soldiers. As a result of this policy, the reactions in the West Bank are not effective enough.

As Livni herself announced several times, the attack on Gaza, which is a massacre, a genocide, is not being done in order to topple Hamas or to stop the firing of the rockets: they are attacking Gaza to destroy any group or any Palestinian movement that sees resistance as the main way to face the Israeli occupation. Only by getting rid of the Palestinian resistance movement will Israel will be able to impose its conditions on the table. The Fatah leadership in the West Bank should take concrete actions against the occupation and should not provide any political cover for the Israeli aggression on Gaza. On the contrary, the PA is acting as a mediator, like Egypt and the other Arab regimes, instead of putting pressure on Israel while the resistance fights to prevent Israel from achieving a real success. Keeping the West Bank calm is of great help to Israel, the same for the Arab regimes that do not take strong positions against the attack. This gives Israel more time to turn the situation in Gaza.to its favor, first militarily and then politically. 

A Palestinian child being brought to the Shifa hospital in Gaza City. The child was wounded during Israeli military operations in Gaza, 4 January 2009.

The European leaders and their supporting propaganda arms do not miss any occasion, whether important or trivial, to arrogantly demonstrate for us (and the EU-citizenry themselves) their hobby of acting as educator to us, the backwards, underdeveloped nations, and instruct us in the principles of democracy and morality. This tendency pushed us to a stage in which we, the nations who are still living the culture of apes, condemn ourselves as we failed to develop our behavior and awareness to the (expected) level of our master’s desires.

Suddenly, as we watched the flowing blood in Gaza, we awoke from the illusion to discover that we are nothing; we are just numbers in the calculations of those killed and wounded, numbers that have nothing to do with the principles of democracy and human rights.  It is enough that Barak, Olmert, or even Livni declare that we are terrorists in order to utterly mute the European moral teachers.

Suddenly, we discover that democracy has additional connotations in no apparent contradiction to the Israeli occupation. Suddenly we discover that resisting the occupation, whether by leftists or those on the Right, is a type of terrorism for which its practitioners deserve annihilation by F-16s, Apache helicopters and a variety of other destructive machinery. Suddenly we discovered that the women, men, children, and youth in Gaza are marked for death because they resist the Israeli democratic, moral, civilized, and human occupation.

Democratic forces and civil society institutions throughout the world have a crucial role to play in halting Israeli aggression. Here, a demonstration in Toulouse, France against the Israeli attacks on Gaza.

Accepting this logic of occupation means providing political, moral, and practical legitimacy for Israel’s bloody attack on Gaza, leading to the twisting of facts and reinforcement of the systematic delusion on which Israel justifies its aggression. Thus, the equations controlling the reactions to this new aggression will be most flawed; a situation which reflects what is actually now happening. Indeed, this is clearly revealed by the context and level of discourse employed by some Arab and international parties. This discursive approach attempts to create a kind of false balance of power by demanding that both Israel and Palestinians demonstrate “self-restraint,” through framing this aggressive war as a "terrible use of power," or by placing responsibility on the Palestinians by comparing Israeli military forces to the Palestinian resistance factions, or finally even by demanding that Israel be more “careful” during the attacks to avoid Palestinian civilian casualties.  

This seemingly uncontestable logic grants Israel protection and justification, encouraging it to continue its aggression, killing and destruction, assuming that the world perceives the actions as a kind of self defense and consequently, not a gross violation of international law. 

Palestinan women at an anti-Bush protest in Ramallah refuse orders from the Palestinian security forces to leave the protest area.

The 1948 great Palestinian catastrophe (Nakba) and the catastrophes that followed, represent dramatic disconnects between the Palestinian political, social, and cultural structures. However, due to the specificities of the Palestinian social structure and history, the impact has been greatest on the social and psychological situation of Palestinian women. Palestinian women found themselves, both individually and collectively, victims of a disfiguring oppression on various levels, without possessing the appropriate opportunities to adapt. Women suddenly found themselves in the heart of exile, marginalization, and the systematic destruction to which Palestinians in general were subject. From that moment onwards, it has been the struggle of Palestinian women to develop personal, familial, gendered and national strategies to overcome this tragedy and move beyond. 

Surveying Palestinian history since the Nakba up to the present will illustrate how women are an essential part of this history, either directly or indirectly; women are there with their presence, suffering, and their non-stop resistance. 

Last week at the United Nations sponsored NGO Network for a Palestinian-Israeli Peace, the key word was definitely “unity.” That call for unity is coming from the very core of Palestinian society and its national institutions, as an answer to the US-Israeli attempts to provoke splits and divisions. Keeping unity is not only a demand to be addressed to the national leadership and the various political parties, but also a call to preserve the political platform around which a broad Palestinian consensus has been defined throughout the years.