AmNote on Jews and Apartheid: Jewish Racism Jews are quick to denounce the persecution of Jews and their enslavement during World War II. However, Jews themselves are just as guilty of enslaving people as any Nazi. Jews used apartheid in South Africa in order to control the mining and production of diamonds using cheap labor. Diamonds have made many American Hasidic Jews and Israeli Jews rich off the sweat and backs of Blacks in South Africa. Israel has used the diamond trade to finance its military aggression and subjugation of Palestinians in the Middle East.
Israeli and South African collaboration in the join testing and development of nuclear weapons and nuclear ballistic missiles is evidence of the strong alliance forged between the Israeli Jews and the South African Jews during their many years of collusion in apartheid and the diamond trade. Why did Anti-Defamation League (ADL) of B'nai B'rith share information about anti-Apartheid groups with the South African government, information that the ADL gathered in America via spying? Simply, the ADL wanted to derail the anti-Apartheid movement in South Africa. If the apartheid government of South Africa was replaced by a Black South African government, not only would the Jews' sweet diamond deal with the South African Jews be in jeopardy, the Israeli-South African joint nuclear weapons program would have ended, also. In other words, the ADL was willing to keep millions of Black South Africans in the bondage of slavery in order to further the military and economic goals of Israel. Obviously, the ADL feels the Blacks in South Africa lacks the importance of the Jews in Israel. Since sharing information with the South African government was in direct violation of the official U.S. foreign policy, i.e. the boycott of South Africa, why weren't the ADL Jews involved charged with espionage and sent to prison? In addition, if it were not for Israel and Jews, like Marc Rich and ADL, lending support to the South African regime, apartheid would not have survived for as long as it did.
More proof of a Jewish racial conspiracy against Blacks is the fact that the Israeli "ethnic bullet" bio-weapons program first developed in apartheid South Africa for use against the Black population there (see Israeli Bio-Weapons Program). Israel's bio-weapons program should be a sobering call for humanity to defend itself against the Jews! It is amazing that Jews think other people should care about the abuse to Jews during WW II, when they are guilty of as much abuse to other races. What a joke! Just because the Nazis were bad doesn't mean that the Jews were good. At least, the Nazis were up-front and in your face, unlike the Jews that are behind your back and up your ass! In fact, if it weren't for the Jews, there wouldn't have been a World War II. Germany had other economic and social problems during the pre-WW II period due to World War I sanctions, but it was the larceny of the Jew working counter to the best interest of the German nation that gave the Nazis the emotional edge to gain power in Germany. The self-serving Jew in an already unstable social and political environment created an explosive combination. The German people saw the Nazis as their salvation from the thievery of the Jew, whose avaricious and criminal activities were ripping Germany apart at a time when national cohesion was critical. It wasn't persecution the Jews were afraid of, it was prosecution. Not only did the Jews bring the Nazis down on themselves by their sociopathic antics, but everyone else in the process. Anyone that has experienced the wickedness of a Jew understands why the German people embraced the Nazis over the Jews. Evil begets evil! Nazi Germany is an example of when Jew lies run out. You can never get the stench of a Jew's cruelty out of your nose. Another word for "Holocaust" is "payback".
The Blacks of South Africa should have no doubt that as soon as Israel perfects their targeted bioweapons against them, the Jews will use the bioweapons to reclaim the diamonds mines that were lost with the end of apartheid. Until then, Jews are using the Aids virus as a bioweapon against the South African Blacks to decimate their population, which explains why South Africa has the largest number of people living with HIV/Aids of any country in the world. American Blacks should also be forewarned about the use of targeted Black bioweapons against them, because of the long history of tension between American Blacks and Israel over Jewish racism in South Africa and the Middle East.
To all people, and not just Blacks, the wearing of diamonds should be seen as a symbol of Jewish enslavement of Blacks and the treachery of Jews. Diamonds are practically worthless and therefore a poor investment. Diamonds are one of the most prevalent substances on earth. If it were not for the Jewish diamond cartels controlling the diamond supply, diamonds would be cheap as glass. Finally, apartheid runs parallel with the Jewish practice of segregating Jews from non-Jews—there are no bigger racist in the world than the Jews. What other race of people are so universally hated? Apartheid is proof, along with child pornography, Asian sweatshops and forced labor camps, that there is nothing too low that a self-serving Jew won't do and there is no evil that Jews cannot justify in their own minds as right. How can Jews do so much evil and maintain such a good opinion of themselves? Arrogance! Jews feel privileged and entitled by God to do whatever rotten thing they want and get away with it. What should people do? Stop buying and wearing diamonds produced and sold by Jews!
It is a shame that the United States walked out on the World Conference on Racism in Durban, South Africa, since the withdrawal of the U.S. delegation showed that the U.S. won't even entertain the notion that Israel is a racist country—something the rest of the world not only knows is true, but has experienced firsthand. The walkout also showed that the United States bases its foreign policy decisions on what Israel wants, since the U.S. walked after the Israelis bolted. Obviously, the U.S. didn't take the U.N. conference seriously, since they sent Congressman Tom Lantos (D-California), a "Holocaust survivor", to the conference. If the U.S. were serious about world racism, they would have sent someone to represent the best interests of America, instead of someone who represented the best interests of Israel and the Jews! Washington had withdrew from the first two U.N. racism conferences in 1978 and 1983 over the same issue involving condemnatory language used against Israel. Therefore, the U.S. knew what was coming and was primed to jump ship when the rats left, and thus they sent Lantos among the U.S. delegation as a lackey to coordinate anti-conference efforts with Israel.
The Jewish members of Congress urged Colin Powell not to attend the U.N. conference, if the language equating Zionism with racism was retained in the conference's resolution, while the members of the Black caucus were pressing him to travel to South Africa, so that the U.S. could take part in discussions of slavery and reparations, top issues of concern to the American Black community. But, Colin Powell didn't even make an effort to visit the conference to represent the Black community, since he knew the Jews were to going to stonewall the conference, so why show up. Powell decided to play ball with the Jews and screw the Blacks, and thus he made his decision to depart the U.N. Conference on Racism from his office in Washington D.C. without firsthand knowledge of what was really going on in Durban—a bad move for an inexperience Secretary of State. There is one thing for certain, Colin Powell has been a disappointment as U.S. Secretary of State, after there were such high hopes for him at the beginning. He's turned out to be a "yes man" for American Zionists and the Israeli Jews, just like his predecessors. What a missed opportunity for Powell to show his stuff—or maybe he did. Powell has demonstrated that there is no political solution to the Jewish threat in America and the Middle East, since he can't even sit in a chair never mind take the lead as an unbiased participate in any discussion concerning worldwide Jewish racism!
 Harry Oppenheimer: Industrial Baron Whose Diamond and Coal Mines Stoked The Economic Engine Driving Apartheid —The Guardian (London)
Harry Oppenheimer, who has died aged 91, was South Africa's foremost industrialist for nearly 40 years, and the last of the latter-day "Randlords". Although by the mid-1980s he had relinquished formal control of the two great strands in his business empire, the Anglo American Corporation and De Beers Consolidated Mines, he continued to exercise a daily influence as the grand old man of South African mining, and remained a De Beers director until 1994. Long feted in the west as a singular beacon of reform, his vast interests in gold, platinum, diamonds and coal nevertheless stoked the economic engine that maintained the ability of the regime to survive and prosper for the white minority. As he himself remarked in 1984, when beginning to disengage from the business: "In a South African context I may seem to be a liberal, but at heart I'm just an old-fashioned conservative." But as a canny and ruthless operator, Oppenheimer was also one of the first South African businessmen to realise in the early 1980s that dialogue with the African National Congress was not only prudent but inevitable. His prescience paid off, for it was those early contacts that contributed to the ANC's long march away from any thought of nationalising the country's mining industry. On a personal level, Oppenheimer was a self-effacing, very private family man with a record of philanthropy that seemed out of place in the hard world of international mining and finance. Despite the miserable conditions and poor wages of the tens of thousands of migrant labourers who worked the mines, he portrayed himself as a gentleman Anglophile, and had an ability to beguile his critics with either dignified silence or pained politeness. This character, together with his enormous financial clout, enabled him to navigate the treacherous waters of apartheid South Africa. Oppenheimer was born in the De Beers company town of Kimberley, the site of the famous diamond "big hole", six years after the death of the De Beers founder and empire-builder Cecil Rhodes. He came from a family of prosperous German Jews who emigrated to London and South Africa in the 1890s to work in the diamond business. [click here to continue]
Harry Oppenheimer, Made Billions In S. African Diamonds —The Gazette (Montreal)
Harry Oppenheimer, the former chairman of Anglo-American Corp. who died Saturday in Johannesburg at age 91, was the last of the Randlords. Born into a huge fortune made by his father in the mines of South Africa, he proceeded to increase to it to such an extent that he was reckoned to be one of the richest men in the world. As a consequence of his leadership of Anglo-American between 1957 and 1982, there was hardly a sizeable business in South Africa, from newspapers to brewing, of which the company did not own a part, and in many cases a large part. Anglo-American was also inextricably interwoven with De Beers which, through its Central Selling Organization, exercised a ruthless monopoly over the sale of diamonds. In consequence, De Beers regulated the production and distribution of more than 80 per cent of the world's diamonds. Oppenheimer's critics pointed to the vast disparity between profits earned and wages paid, and declared that Anglo-American grew fat on the cheap labour provided by apartheid. Oppenheimer, however, saw himself as an impeccable liberal - which in the white South African definition often meant no more than disliking Boer obduracy and being prepared to make such concessions to the blacks as did not imply black majority rule or any serious threat to property. He thought it perfectly natural that Africans should regard the wage economy as a form of slavery; on the other hand, he believed that the demands made by black leaders for higher wages and more responsible jobs were ''quite incompatible with the political demand for complete independence from the white man.'' [click here to continue]
Gold Losing Glitter In South Africa —The Washington Post
The driller is crouched in the stifling heat of a crawl space 1 1/2 miles underground, sweat pouring down his face, his body quaking with the rapid rhythm of the drill as it pounds into the gold-bearing rock. Call him any black man -- the laborer for a nation, a Xhosa, Zulu, Tswana or Sotho man, one of millions of black mine workers who for more than a century have extracted the ore that put South Africa on the map. Financed by diamonds, which were discovered first, the gold industry made South Africa a player in global markets. It produced the fabulously wealthy "Randlords" such as Ernest Oppenheimer and Cecil Rhodes, who founded conglomerates that still control the economy. It built Johannesburg, a place that Zulus call Egoli, the City of Gold. It financed the good life of white South Africans as they benefited from a system of racial repression that was honed in the mines -- long before formal apartheid -- to keep the black work force in check. [click here to continue]
Israel Has A Cutting Edge Over World Diamond Centres —The Straits Times
Diamonds are not only a girl's best friend. Like gold, they are also the best friend of those who may have to flee from persecution. The precious stones are a highly portable form of wealth and in often fleeing with them, Jews became experts at trading in them too. Israel's first diamond polishing workshop was founded in 1936 by two cousins who emigrated from Rumania to the Jewish homeland. All they had was the pioneering spirit of the times and knowledge of the diamond trade which they had picked-up in Belgium. But the diamond industry in Israel started to flourish when traditional European centres fell under German occupation during World War II, and Jewish diamond traders, or diamantaires, fleeing the Nazi holocaust, found their way to the Promised Land. Throughout the war years, Israel was the major supplier of diamonds to the free world. But with the Allied victory, the diamond industries of Belgium and Holland were restored. This led to a near total collapse in the demand for Israeli diamonds. By 1947, more than 80 per cent of the country's polishing plants had closed and almost all diamond workers were unemployed. The establishment of the modern State of Israel in 1948 brought an influx of immigrants. Jobs had to be found for them. The floundering diamond industry was thus given a shot in the arm to absorb some of the unemployed. Locally-developed manufacturing techniques made it possible to train and qualify workers within a matter of months - much less time than it took elsewhere. The main difficulty in the first 20 years of Israel's diamond industry was in obtaining uncut diamonds, called roughs. But in time, the Central Selling Organisation (CSO) -a group of financial and marketing organisations that controls nearly 80 per cent of the world diamond trade -relented to the incessant demands of Israel's diamond manufacturers for more roughs. Today, Israel buys about 25 per cent of all the quality roughs supplied annually by the CSO. Polished diamond has become Israel's number one export, accounting for one-quarter of the country's total exports. Diamonds from Israel now constitute 30 per cent of the diamond content of fine jewellery pieces sold in major jewellery centres around the world. [click here to continue]
Israelis Are Accused Of 'Apartheid' —The Times
President Mandela has been dragged into a potentially damaging diplomatic controversy after Joe Modise, his Defence Minister, indicated that Pretoria might end its ''special relationship'' with Israel after comparing the Jewish state's policies to those of the white minority apartheid regime. Mr Mandela, who according to government sources described the outburst as ''most unfortunate'', reportedly has taken Mr Modise to task after Israeli diplomats, the South African Jewish community and opposition parties accused the minister of insensitivity. Chief Rabbi C.K. Harris, Abe Abrahamson, the Zionist Federation chairman, and Mervyn Smith, chairman of the Jewish Board of Deputies, said comparing Israel's Palestinian policy with the apartheid years in South Africa was ''a deliberately hurtful comparison. Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East''. [click here to continue]
South African Jews: Turning To Racism? —The Washington Post
The Jew in South Africa faces a poignant and wrenching predicament: the painful necessity of choosing between economic security and cultural identity. In the January-February issue of Tikkun, Steven Mufson explores the uneasy passage of South Africa's Jews into the white minority ruling class and wonders how the historically oppressed can make common cause with oppressors. "In the past, Jews perceived their greatest threat to be the Afrikaner anti-Semitism that greeted them in the beloved country as they arrived," Mufson writes. "Jews refrained from openly attacking the ruling National Party for fear of arousing Afrikaner hatred toward them." Now, "the conspiracy of silence about the flaws of the National Party has given way to open enthusiasm for it. The face of the Jews' perceived enemy has undergone a metamorphosis: it is now a black face." Why does the party whose leaders collaborated with Nazis, the party of institutionalized racism, attract so many Jews? Mufson, a former correspondent in Johannesburg, suggests "uncomfortable parallels" between the State of Israel and the second country (after the Soviet Union) to recognize it -- that other nation of settlers, South Africa. "Both are surrounded by hostile neighbors, engaged in what they consider to be struggles for survival," he writes, and "both claim to be chosen people." [click here to continue]
Coming In From The Cold, Jerusalem and Pretoria Must Reassess —The Jerusalem Post
The special relationship forged between South Africa and Israel when they were regarded by some states as international pariahs is coming under strain. "They were never bosom-buddies, but were forced together into a special relationship," said university professor Gordon Freer. "When you're in a lepers' fraternity with no one else to talk to, you speak to your fellow outcasts," said Freer, from the University of Witwatersrand's Department of International Relations. He described remarks to Reuters by South African Defense Minister Joe Modise signaling an end to the special links as a "cold shower" to a previously cozy relationship. Modise on Wednesday compared Israel's policies to apartheid and said it had been an embargo-busting arms supplier to the former white-led government. Despite a speedy attempt by Foreign Minister Alfred Nzo to limit the political and diplomatic fallout caused by Modise's comments, Freer said he believed links would never be as close as they were in the 1970s and '80s when both countries were reviled and publicly shunned by most of their neighbors. "The ANC ( African National Congress) has relations with a number of Israel's historic enemies, including the PLO. "As in the case of choosing between ties with Taiwan or Beijing, the new ANC-led South Africa is walking a very thin tightrope in foreign relations with Israel," said Freer. Geoff Fitchat, senior Middle East manager at the South African Foreign Trade Organization (SAFTO), said he believed the "special relationship" ended in February 1990 when then president F.W. de Klerk lifted a ban on opposition groups and began dismantling apartheid. [click here to continue]
Shadow Minister Accused Of Supplying Apartheid Regime —The Guardian (London)
Alan Duncan has been uncharacteristically reluctant to discuss his six years as an oil trader in the worldwide empire created by the commodity broker Marc Rich which, quite literally, fuelled South Africa's apartheid regime. Mr Duncan says he was employed in a very junior role within the company created and dominated by America's number one white-collar fugitive, and in the 1980s had no involvement in the secretive operation that helped sustain white rule. Documents obtained by the Guardian and the allegations of two fellow oil traders, one of whom was employed by Marc Rich & Co while the other worked for the firm on a casual basis, raise fresh questions about the part played by a current member of the Conservative trade and industry team. [click here to continue]
Israel and SA 'Joined In Nuclear Arms Pact' —The Guardian (London)
Israeli and South Africa are not merely potential nuclear powers, according to a new study of the Israeli armaments industry, but longstanding partners in the development of specialised battlefield nuclear weapons. In a book to be published later this month, the Israeli academic, Benjamin Beit-Hallahmi, claims that the flash seen by an American spy satellite off the coast of South Africa in 1979 was almost certainly the test of a 155mm nuclear shell secretly produced by the two countries under a joint programme. Israel and South Africa share a sense of being political outcasts threatened by their neighbours, Mr Beit-Hallahmi argues, and they both see a military requirement for a 'clean,' low-yield weapon that could be used tactically in a regional war of survival. Technically, the trade-off is between South Africa supplies of enriched uranium and Israeli design expertise in both warheads and delivery systems. 'The world has been watching Israel, and sometimes South Africa, using the old, conventional notions about nuclear weaponry,' Mr Beit-Hallahmi writes. 'What some brilliant minds in Israel have developed is an original Israeli solution to an Israeli problem. South Africa has been the partner and the beneficiary. 'Both countries realised in the 1960s that what they needed was tactical nuclear weaponry. This led to the development of the nuclear shell, fired from the 155mm howitzer, or from a naval gun tested in 1979. 'Such cooperation between two countries in the development of nuclear weapons proves an extremely high level of trust and intimacy in the relations between them. An alliance cemented in plutonium is sealed in blood, and should be taken very seriously. [click here to continue]
MP Drops Bombshell On Knesset Besieged By Nuclear Row; Arab Member Forces Historic Debate On Israel's Nuclear Policy ' —The Guardian (London)
One of the last taboos of modern Israel was shattered yesterday when its nuclear weapons programme was debated for the first time in the country's parliament. Amid noisy protests, Israel was said to have stockpiled up to 300 bombs, developed with the help of the South African apartheid regime, and it planned to adapt submarines recently bought from Germany to carry nuclear missiles. The historic debate was initiated by Issam Mahoul, an Arab member of the Knesset from the leftwing Hadash group. The government reluctantly allowed the debate to proceed after he threatened to appeal to the supreme court. Repeatedly referring to Mordechai Vanunu, the Israeli nuclear technician who was jailed for 18 years in 1986 for revealing Israeli nuclear secrets, Mr Mahoul accused successive governments of 'fraud, lies and deceit', in which the media and academia had collaborated, 'to brainwash and drug the public'. According to experts' estimates, he said, Israel's stock of nuclear weapons had increased to what he called 'the insane amount of 200-300'. He alleged that the purpose of the German-built submarines was 'to cruise deep in the sea and constitute a 'second strike' force in the event that Israel is attacked with nuclear weapons'. He added: 'That means, that not only do the hundreds of nuclear bombs that Israel possesses not pose (as) a defence, they actually caused the military establishment to fear a nuclear early strike, which escalates the spiral of the non-conventional arms race further and further, at the cost of billions of dollars.' The nuclear reactor at Dimona in the Negev desert had produced a huge amount of nuclear waste which, if leaked, would contaminate Israel for centuries, Mr Mahoul said. He referred to reports that Israel had exported nuclear waste to Mauritania, in north-west Africa. [click here to continue]
Anti-Defamation League Settles Spying Lawsuit —Los Angeles Times
Six years after it was accused of illegal spying, the Anti-Defamation League agreed Monday to a federal court settlement preventing it from obtaining information from any state employee or officer when it knows--or should know--the act is unlawful. The long-debated settlement, approved by U.S. District Judge Richard Paez, marks the final chapter in a suit initiated by former San Francisco Dist. Atty. Arlo Smith amid charges that associates of the Jewish civil rights group sold information on anti-apartheid groups to the government of South Africa. Over time, the list of plaintiffs grew to include a number of groups and individuals who said the ADL hired intelligence agents with law enforcement connections to gather secret information about their activities. [click here to continue]
Ex-Officer Sentenced In Spying Case —Los Angeles Times
Former police officer Tom Gerard, who fled to the Philippines after he was accused of spying for the Anti-Defamation League, pleaded no contest Friday to one charge of illegally accessing police computer records. Gerard's plea brings to a close the spying scandal that rocked the prominent Jewish civil rights group last year and outraged thousands of people and activist groups targeted by the league's private intelligence operation. Gerard, a onetime CIA agent who voluntarily returned from self-imposed exile to face charges, is the only person to be prosecuted in the scandal. He will serve 45 days in a work camp and pay a fine of $2,500. Last fall, San Francisco Dist. Atty. Arlo Smith agreed not to bring charges against the Anti-Defamation League after the group promised to pay up to $75,000 to Smith's office to fight hate crimes. Gerard, who at one point was an intelligence officer with the San Francisco Police Department, was accused of tapping into police computers and giving confidential information on hundreds of people to Roy Bullock, an undercover operative for the Anti-Defamation League. Bullock has admitted that the two of them sold some of the information to an agent for the South African government. Bullock, who was never charged, also used data from Gerard in amassing intelligence files for the league on nearly 10,000 people and 950 groups, ranging from the Ku Klux Klan to the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People. [click here to continue]
Report: Israel Has 'Ethnic Bullet'; Bio-Weapon Could Target Arabs —The Jerusalem Post
Israel has Developed "Ethnic Bullets" That Are Tailored To Target Only Arabs, the London-based Foreign Report will suggest today. Quoting an "unconfirmed report" from its South African sources, the newsletter says Israeli scientists may have succeeded in developing a biological weapon that is based on aspects of the Arab genetic system. These elements were reported to have been isolated after years of research on Jews of Arab origin, particularly Iraqi Jews. The South African sources claimed that the "ethnic bullet" program was developed in apartheid South Africa for possible use against blacks. Cooperation between South African and Israeli scientists is said to have been close during that period. "The report reaching us says the Israelis took the project over and directed it against the Arabs," noted the newsletter. "One of the reported conclusions was that there was a genetic difference between Ashkenazi Jews and Jews of Arabic origin, and also between Jews and Arabs." [click here to continue]
Israel Reported Developing 'Ethno Bomb' —The Gazette (Montreal)
Israel is working on a biological weapon that would harm Arabs but not Jews, according to Israeli military and Western intelligence sources. The weapon, targeting victims by ethnic origin, is seen as Israel's response to Iraq's threat of chemical and biological attacks. In developing their "ethno-bomb," Israeli scientists are trying to exploit medical advances by identifying distinctive genes carried by some Arabs, then create a genetically modified bacterium or virus. The intention is to use the ability of viruses and certain bacteria to alter the DNA inside their host's living cells. The scientists are trying to engineer deadly micro-organisms that attack only those bearing the distinctive genes. The program is based at the biological institute in Nes Tziyona, the main research facility for Israel's clandestine arsenal of chemical and biological weapons. A scientist there said the task was hugely complicated because both Arabs and Jews are of semitic origin. But he added: "They have, however, succeeded in pinpointing a particular characteristic in the genetic profile of certain Arab communities, particularly the Iraqi people." The disease could be spread by spraying the organisms into the air or putting them in water supplies. The research mirrors biological studies conducted by South African scientists during the apartheid era and revealed in testimony before the truth and reconciliation commission. The idea of a Jewish state conducting such research has already provoked outrage in some quarters because of parallels with the genetic experiments of Dr. Josef Mengele, the Nazi scientist at Auschwitz. [click here to continue]
Oxfam Attacks Glaxo Over Price Of Aids Drugs —The Independent (London)
The world's biggest drug company, GlaxoSmithKline, has been singled out by Oxfam in a new campaign against the high prices that western pharmaceutical companies charge for medicines in the world's poorest countries. The charity is calling on GSK to withdraw a legal challenge to efforts by the South African government to import medicines from overseas at lower prices than the industry charges within South Africa. The cost factor is particularly urgent for South Africa, a country with a large number of people living with HIV/Aids - about 20 per cent of the adult population. Oxfam says GSK should earmark 0.3 per cent of its sales for an international research fund run by the World Health Organisation and forego its patents in developing countries if they make drugs unaffordable. "This is a wake-up call for GSK," said Justin Forsyth, Oxfam's policy director. "The global pharmaceuticals industry runs a great risk if it continues to protect its profits and drug patents at all costs. "This is the shadowy side of globalisation," he added. [click here to continue]
Blacks, Jews and the Mideast —The Washington Post
Right after a column of mine appeared criticizing the federal government for funding an AIDS program run by the Nation of Islam, an African American woman of my acquaintance called to say she agreed with what I had to say -- "But what about what Israel is doing in Lebanon?" That stunning non sequitur, occasioned by Israel's bombardment of southern Lebanon at the time, may well become a thing of the past. Who says so? Jesse Jackson does. Peace in the Middle East will bring peace here in America -- peace between Jews and African Americans, Jackson says. Denounced, particularly in the American-Jewish community, after his 1979 embrace of PLO leader Yasser Arafat, Jackson called me to say he feels "vindicated" by the events of the last week. Israel and the PLO have not onlyrecognized each other, but the United States has resumed diplomatic relations with the PLO as well. Suddenly, Arafat seems downright cuddly. In our phone conversation, Jackson made two points. In the black community, Israel's traditionally close relations with white-ruled South Africa are quickly becoming a moot point. South Africa is pivoting toward majority rule, and it is only a matter of time until the United States drops its trade embargo. Under those circumstances, Israel's relations with the new South Africa will probably be no different from those of other nations, black African ones included. No longer will critics of Israel be able to single it out as a supporter of a racist regime. As for the Palestinians, here again a difference between American blacks and Jews is fast disappearing. Jackson maintains that support for the Palestinian cause, which some American Jews have taken as an indication of antisemitism, is really nothing of the sort, but empathy for a subjugated people instead. "We live in the West Bank of America," Jackson said of African Americans. "We live under occupation." [click here to continue]
US Should Have Stayed On At Durban —New Straits Times (Malaysia)
Colin Powell was not at the World Conference on Racism in Durban, South Africa last week, attended by 168 government delegations from all over the world, but that did not stop him from taking a major decision from the confines of his air-conditioned room in Washington - pulling the United States out of the meeting. This was not surprising to international observers since he was merely following the example set by his predecessors. Washington withdrew from the first two UN racisim conferences in 1978 and 1983 over the same issue - condemnatory language used against Israel. International observers concur that it would have been a daunting task for the US to continue discussions at the meeting given its handicap - it did not have veto power. Since words such as "compromise", "meeting halfway" and "concede" are seldom in the vocabulary of US delegations attending the UN general assemblies since they can veto anything and everything that they do not agree with, even though the issues may have the support of the majority of UN members - which means most of the nations that make up planet earth. It surely would be difficult for US delegations, without veto power, to comprehend that other nations have their own views, observations and strategies, not to mention that these countries can actually gain common ground and be indignant about the brutal ways of some countries. The withdrawal of the US (and Israel) from the conference was a letdown for many optimists who had expected more from Powell. After all, racism is not something new to the first black US Secretary of State. [click here to continue]
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