Justice, Incorporated.

Justice Inc Closed

2005-02-23T17:10:00.000+13:00

Justice, Incorporated is now officially closed.

Both authors now have their own blogs.

Visit Asher (AKA Rav. Nachman) at Left & Lefter.

Visit Hik (AKA Dr. Din Rodef) at Sanity Now!.

Thanks for reading!

Why he changed his mind.

2004-09-25T09:26:00.000+12:00

Read this article. It's by a guy called Uri Avneri. Avneri is from an Israeli peace organisation known as Gush Shalom, a name which is a play on words. It literally means Peace Bloc, and it's a far left organisation that generally does some pretty respectable work.

The article is an autobiographical account of Avneri's change from being part of the pre-state Israeli/Jewish extreme right to the present day Israeli far left.

I just had a look at it, and it was pretty profound. As you may understand, a leap from the Irgun, essentially a pre-state Jewish terrorist organisation to a far-left Israeli peace organisation is a big step.

Strangely enough, the extreme right and left among the Jewish presence in Palestine in the pre-1948 days and the early period of the State of Israel had at least one key issue in common. The issue I'm talking about is the recognition of the existence of the Arabs in the Palestine region. Both the far left - Mapam, the Communist-Zionist party and parts of Mapai and the Histadrut (the main labour union) which were both Labour and Socialist-Zionist parties and the far right Herut accepted the reality that Arabs actually existed in Palestine/Israel at that time. This was different to most of the centrist right and left parties which tended to miss that fact for whichever reason, arrogance or ignorance.

The acceptance of the idea that Arabs existed in this land may have somewhat united the two political extremes. That's why a deranged leftist like me can say that Jabotinsky and his revisionist-Zionist clan at least had some remote wisdom between. The difference between the two extremes lay in their response to the "problem" of Arabs living in Palestine.

The left essentially said that something along the lines of the two following statements. The first, the view of the more idealist stream believed in creating a joint Jewish-Arab national movement in Palestine, and forging a state and a movement together as two peoples who both have a love of the land.
The second and slightly more centrist stream behaved more along the lines of cooperating with the Palestinians in the establishment of two states in historical Palestine, one with a Jewish majority and one with an Arab majority.

The right offered a far more sinister "solution" to the "problem." The revisionist-Zionists and their Herut(Freedom) Movement believed in a vision of an Israel along the borders of Greater Canaan (including parts of Lebanon and Syria and most of Jordan) - realised by the removal of as many Arab inhabitants of the region as possible. That's right folks - technically speaking, that's a policy of ethnic cleansing. The killing of the Arab inhabitants of Palestine was not explicitly encouraged, but it definitely wasn't seen as any great loss to the Herut.

Thankfully the Herut never fully achieved their aims, and we continue to strive to make sure that such awful and similar aims are never achieved by anyone, anywhere.

A question to which there is a chilling answer is whether or not the attitude of Herut has any real ideological descendents in power today. I would venture that they don't - although the Mafdal (National Religious Party) and their leader, Effi Eitam, (not to mention many on the religious right in Israel) seem to advocate similar values. What I find truly disturbing is the attitude, and the growing popularity of the extreme right in the settler movement in Israel. There we are likely to find the ideological descendents of the policies of the revisionist-Zionists, and those who attempt to carry out such actions: the Yigal Amirs and the Baruch Goldsteins.

The religious right often uses extremist interpretations of the Jewish Oral Law or Halacha are often used to "justify" terrible deeds that they have done or intend to do. These I hope can be curbed by the alternative interpretations of the Jewish Oral Law in a much more humanistic and (I think) Jewish approach, as provided by organisations like Rabbis For Human Rights.

The kind of fanatical attitude we see in this region and in this world shows us that if we don't refuse to allow violent and hateful religious and political extremism of that type and of any type (be it Jewish, Muslim, Secular, political or any other kind of fanaticism) to take hold of our humanity, and the humanity of others, we could see more and more of these terrible acts perpetrated against more human beings.

Shana Tovah, Chatima Tovah, Kia Ora Koutou, and best wishes to all.

Mind wants food. Eat. Must... eat. Yargh. Mmmm.

2004-09-13T09:44:00.000+12:00

And now, something new for your minds.

I'd like to recommend a book called The Yellow Wind by David Grossman. I found it interesting, and it provided me with a closer view into the lives and minds of some of the Arab and Jewish inhabitants of the Israel/Palestine region. He presented them - despite their political extremes - as human beings, from a reasonably unbiased perspective. Grossman succeeded in a humanization and de-mystification of the "enemy" on either side of the conflict. This, I feel is critical to solving the conflict here, if it's ever to be solved.

Read it. You might appreciate it too.

Unfortunately, we're just voyagers in the Now, and taking part in a reality where the kind of understanding and tolerance that Grossman offers is a rarity... something we should make a real effort to put it out there. From the pages of The Yellow Wind, I found something that, in particular, caught my interest.

Mentioned in his book is the state of the Palestinian/Israeli Arab village of Barta'a.

But why is it an Israeli and Palestinian Arab village?

This is because, thanks to the well-informed engineers of the Green Line, this village has been sliced, politically speaking, in two. One half of the village is on the Palestinian side and one half on the Israeli side of the Line. Families, dynasties, a community is divided by the ever-benevolent Powers That Be.

Okay, so there's an "international" (just try telling that to a settler) border in their backyards, of course nothing could make it worse for the poor residents of Barta'a. But no, of course, as of course is the nature of the universe, everything can and will get worse.

Now, thanks to the Fence of Dubious Reputation (as we'll call it for now, given that every single person reading this will have a different name for it) the residents of East (Palestinian) Barta'a are caught on the Palestinian Authority side of the Green Line while remaining on the Israeli side of the (in this case) Fence.

They have no rights in Israel, but they're stuck here.

It's easier to understand the situation by seeing it yourself. I was able to see the village (from at least the roadside lookout above it) and understand a little more about it earlier this year thanks to a tour there by Givat Haviva - yes, that a cheap plug, but those folks are worth it

As you can imagine, this issue is perhaps a slight problem for the inhabitants of East Barta'a. Yes, there is a checkpoint in the Fence so that the residents of East Barta'a can get to Ramallah to buy their groceries, but one must understand the experience of the inordinate amount of time they have to spend crossing through the Barta'a checkpoint, as well as the inevitable and sporadic closures of that same crossing and of course the ever likely humiliation of those crossing if the soldiers on duty are in a bad mood.

Since the most recent edition of The Yellow Wind was published, many buildings in East Barta'a have been demolished in an operation by the IDF in July this year.

And it was so, that to this very day the residents of Barta'a were royally screwed.

This is Doctor Din Rodef, your correspondent from Israel.

I'm with Tim

2004-09-12T02:06:00.000+12:00

Are you with Tim too?

Timothy O'Brien is standing for Mayor in the Wellington local body elections that are to be conducted via a postal vote at the end of September/start of October.

A cynic would look at his campaign launch/fundraiser coming up tomorrow night, (which the Rav. will be at) see Fat Freddy's Drop and The Scribes Of Ra playing at Sandwiches and cringe, perhaps seeing yet another baseless attempt to capture the "youth vote".

Judging on what I've read, heard and seen of him however, Tim O'Brien is not that type. He seems genuinely down to earth and realistic, knowing the limitations of the mayoralty, but wanting to genuinely push those boundaries in order to make Wellington all it can be. That is, of course, in stark contrast to fellow candidate, Stephen Hay (Anti-Capitalist Alliance) who, quite frankly, comes across as a bit of a nut.

Forget Kerry's "Creative Wellington" crap, when you get your STV voting papers, put 1 for Tim O'Brien.

No, this was not a paid ad, no, I am not affiliated to his campaign. I'm just a Wellington citizen concerned about the direction this city will head in if Kerry is given another term.

Give your number 1 vote to Tim O'Brien. The Rav. has spoken.

"We don't do body counts"

2004-09-10T15:54:00.000+12:00

So said General Tommy Franks, the man who directed the American (oops, sorry, "coalition") invasion of Iraq.

Well, General Franks, Iraq Body Count does, and they say a minimum of 11,793 (and a maximum of 13,802) Iraqis dead at the time of writing.

This week, as we mark the death of the 1000th US soldier, spare a thought for the more than 10 times as many Iraqis that have died in this war.

Don't think of them as a number - Each of them had families, friends, lives. Now, they have nothing.

You don't do body counts, General Franks? Why, does it inconvenience you to see the pain and destruction you've caused?

An introduction.

2004-09-10T05:39:00.000+12:00

As you may have noticed, this little weblog is a forum through which we (Rabbi Nachman and myself) may vent our numerous frustrations, on issues Jewish, New Zealand-ish, Israeli and Palestinian, and pertaining to the Middle-East (by the Middle-East we mean primarily Israel and Palestine) conflict as well as things that other issues that interest or really **** us the **** off. Suffering for want of a truly free and unaffiliated forum in which we can express ourselves, we have decided to establish our own as best we can.

Enjoy and engage, comrades. The world is only seconds from revolution. Watch this space, 'cause it all starts here.

Evacuating settlements a crime against humanity?

2004-09-10T03:35:00.000+12:00

Haaretz today carried this report:

A right wing petition signed by 185 officers, former MKs, scholars and other public figures is calling on police and Israel Defense Forces troops to "listen to the voice of their personal and national conscience" and refuse to take part in the evacuation of settlements, an act they define as a crime against humanity, a national crime and an explicitly illegal act.

The petition states that "in light of the Sharon government's intention to destroy settlements in the land of Israel and hand them over to the enemy, uprooting their residents and violently expelling them, we hereby declare that expulsion and uprooting are a national crime and a crime against humanity, constitute evil, arbitrary, dictatorial behavior, aimed at depriving Jews of their right to live in their country. We declare that the Israel Defense Forces' purpose is to defend against an enemy and not to act against Jewish civilians. The IDF is the people's army and does not belong to any political group."

"Therefore," the petitioners call on "public officials who are called upon to lay out the groundwork for the ethnic cleansing of Jews from their homeland, as well as on all of the officers, troops and policemen, to listen to the voice of their personal and national conscience and refrain from taking part in acts that will cast a mark upon them, and which they will regret for the remainder of their lives."

The petitioners also call on the "future victims of the expulsion not to cooperate with the expulsion machinery, not to receive compensation, to resist the uprooting but to refrain from harming the people of their nation, even though they come to demolish their homes."

Well, at least they didn't incite to violence. I do wonder whether that sentance was only included purely because they didn't want to risk jail time however, it does have rather a token feel about it.

The Rav. has but this to say on the matter. The settlers are there because of a government decision to allow them to be there. They are not living in Israel. Should the Israeli government decide that it no longer wants to have them live in occupied territories, to spend billions of dollars "defending" them, to have 0.75% of the population occupy 16% of the land while the other 99.25% live in squalor, in one of the most densely populated areas on the planet, then only the morally bankrupt would protest, and that is exactly what we are seeing here.

As the petition said:

"The IDF is the people's army and does not belong to any political group."

Long has the IDF been highjacked by those in society who would use it as a tool of oppression and destruction. Allow it this one moral act.

Welcome to Justice, Incorporated.

2004-09-10T03:20:00.000+12:00

We are your hosts, Rav. Nachman and Dr. Din Rodef, and we are here to take you on a ride along the rollercoaster of morality and justice in our crusade against all those who would destroy our freedoms, oppress the minorities (or even the majorities) and pursue this evil goal of corporate greed.

So sit back and enjoy the ride, but most of all, keep your seatbelts fastened and your minds open.