Eid Mubarak and Hajj Mabruk!

*
The Boston Globe is at it again with their pictorial coverage of Islam’s most celebrated rituals! The traditional prerequisite shots of pilgrims circling the Kaaba creating a blurred photo-effect are augmented with plentiful photos of Muslims climbing to and praying at Mount Arafat, Noor Mountain Zamzam water collection systems, modernized campsite accommodations, Saudi military parade stills, and an inside view into a new light-rail metro line.

John Dugard: Apartheid and Occupation under International Law

Today, John Dugard, Former U.N. Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, spoke at the Palestine Center in Washington, DC. He delivered the Hisham B. Sharabi Memorial Lecture. It was titled, “Apartheid and Occupation under International Law.” Watch the video. Professor John Dugard made a strong case for applying the international convention [...]

South African Dock Workers Refuse to Offload Israeli Goods

COSATU and PSC launch Week of Action for Palestinesupported by YCL and other progressive organisations COSATU House, 3 February 2009 In a historic development for South Africa, South African dock workers have announced their determination not to offload a ship from Israel that is scheduled to dock in Durban on Sunday, 8 February 2009. This [...]

Separate Is Never Equal: Stories of Apartheid from South Africa to Palestine

The US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation toured two speakers, Diana Buttu and Rev. Eddie Makue, to discuss the Apartheid analogy. They presented on the similarities and differences between Israel and Apartheid South Africa. To watch videos of their talks, click Buttu presented an analysis of Israel’s facts on the ground using maps. Rev. [...]

Happy 90th, habibi!

LIVNI LA VIDA LOCA: Spitfire-side Chat

Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, seen here raising a finger during her April visit to Qatar, may have used her visit to stick up for Shimon Peres’ hurt feelings. (What kind of a weird flicking-off that is, and more significantly why the AFP posted this as their main closeup of Livni is beyond me.) There [...]

Racism, History and Video Tape in South Africa

A video of white students at South Africa’s University of Free State forcing black employees to eat food that contains urine raises questions about the current state of racial affairs in South Africa. BBC featured part of the video on its website and had a picture of it with the caption:The alleged victims vomited after [...]

Apartheid South Africa and Israel Today

All this talk about Desmond Tutu’s speech at St. Thomas University — which he was disinvited, then re-invited to — got me thinking about South African voices on the Israel apartheid debate. Here is another anti-apartheid campaigner, professor Farid Esack, drawing the parallels. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lGWFnsqLPVE]Farid Esack, a visiting professor at Harvard Divinity School, is the author [...]

KABOBfest EXCLUSIVE: Desmond Tutu is a Nazi, Terrorist, Baathist anti-Semite

As mentioned by Will in this post, St. Thomas University administrators cancelled a talk scheduled for this Spring by Nobel Laureate and Archbishop Desmond Tutu. The anti-free-flow-of-information administrators banned Tutu because he has made some statements “against Israeli policy.” In particular, Doug Hennes, St. Thomas’s vice president for university and government relations, lambasted Tutu for [...]

Today In History

1964: South Africa banned from Olympics And more than four decades later, the IOC stands in far lower moral grounds: It seems uncritical of next years host’s, China, human rights record, and continues to allow an apartheid regime, Israel, to partake in the games. Humans lack of perspective and inability to learn from history is [...]