Denmark to ban labeling West Bank products as ‘Made in Israel’, report says

In 2006, former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told Germany's Sat. 1 channel:

"Iran, openly, explicitly and publicly, threatens to wipe Israel off the map. Can you say that this is the same level, when they are aspiring to have nuclear weapons, as America, France, Israel and Russia?"

Later he denied what viewers clearly heard him say. Calls for him to step down followed. So did accusations of ineptitude for acknowledging Israeli nuclear weapons publicly.

The House bill basically provides Israel with a blank check drawn on the U.S. taxpayer to maintain its “qualitative military edge” over all of its neighbors combined. It requires the White House to prepare an annual report on how that superiority is being maintained. The resolution passed on May 9 by a vote of 411–2 on a “suspension of the rules,” which is intended for non-controversial legislation requiring little debate and a quick vote.

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev warned Thursday military intervention in the affairs of sovereign states could lead to war, even nuclear war.

One of the Israeli attackers shouts, amid flashes, flame and smoke: "I want to open these gates and take care of these little sons of whores." Other Israelis shout vulgar Arabic insults at the prisoners regarding their mothers.

Prisoners writhe in agony and fear. One can be seen – in images reminiscent of Abu Ghraib – lying on the ground as an Israeli points a gun at him shouting "lie on your stomach!"

Others are shot without apparent reason.

These are scenes from a video that was shown in April 2011 by the investigative program Ovda on Israel’s Channel 2 television station. The violent attack it records against the Palestinian prisoners on 22 October 2007 was real, but it was carried out as a "training exercise" for Israeli security personnel at Ketziot Prison to boost their "morale" and "motivation."

U.S. "aid to Israel is, by far, the largest chunk of our foreign aid budget. That portion of the budget is increased (an extra billion in this year's budget) while real aid programs to the sick, hungry and impoverished in Africa, Asia, and Latin America is always on the budget cutters' chopping block. (Mitt Romney says China should provide non-military foreign aid, not us -- the wealthiest nation on earth).

It's no secret why Israel's gifts from the U.S. are immune. The Israel lobby uses its power to direct campaign contributions to ensure that no Member of Congress, or president for that matter, ever dares suggests that Israel take a hit as Americans do.

You have to wonder why Israel, at least for propaganda purposes, does not offer to accept a cut given that so many Americans are hurting so badly. I suppose the Netanyahu government does not want to establish any precedent by which Israel aid goes any direction but up, regardless of how badly the U.S. economy is doing.

The House bill basically provides Israel with a blank check drawn on the U.S. taxpayer to maintain its “qualitative military edge” over all of its neighbors combined.

But the objective is to provide Israel with the resources to attack Iran, if it chooses to do so, while tying the U.S. and Israel so closely together that whatever Benjamin Netanyahu does, the U.S. “will always be there,” as our president has so aptly put it.

But the scariest bit of the bill is its call for “an expanded role for Israel within the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), including an enhanced presence at NATO headquarters and exercises.” If Israel becomes part of NATO, which is clearly Congress’s intent, the U.S. and other members will be obligated to come to the aid of a nation that is expanding its borders and is currently engaged in hostilities with three of its neighbors.

74% of Spanish respondents (an increase of 8% from last year) and 56% of French respondents (an increase of 9%), see Israel in a negative light.

For decades, Arabs have been lectured to and hectored. They were told that no sympathy for their causes is possible without adherence to non-violence by the Palestinians and their supporters. They were told that the reason why Western governments and media don’t sympathize with their cause is because Western public sentiments run counter to any violent practices.

Of course, such claims were bogus because Israel has never wavered in its consistent and regular resort to war crimes and massacres without ever disappointing its supporters (conservative and liberal alike) in Western countries.

On Tuesday afternoon, the U.S. House of Representatives debated H.Res. 568, an AIPAC-sponsored bill designed to outlaw diplomacy with Iran and take the United States Congress one step closer to authorizing an illegal, unprovoked and premeditated military attack on Iran.

Israeli NGO: Police beat handcuffed detainees in Palestinian solidarity protest

A more likely explanation for the “activity” around the Parchin site involves the creation of nanodiamonds, which have medical applications in the treatment of cancer. Indeed, if you look at the so-called “nuclear explosives containment chamber” drawn by our anonymous spy, and a photo of an explosives chamber used for the creation of nanodiamonds, they are very similar if not quite identical.

Indeed, the specialty of the “former Soviet scientist” the IAEA and ISIS accuse of helping the Iranians weaponize their nuclear technology – Vyacheslav Danilenko – isn’t nuclear weaponry but the creation of nanodiamonds using just such a method.

Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri urged people in Saudi Arabia to follow the example set by popular revolutions in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia and rise up.

Once again the image of the horny goats, which piss all over themselves, prior to coitus, raises its hoary head. It's not sex that has the cannibals all in a fever. It's the smell of blood. They want it so bad that they literally can taste it; these prehistoric sharks in the water, these bipedal piranha. Tearing, rending and burning, yes precious, that's what they likes.

Iran's crown prince and the late Shah’s older son, Reza Pahlavi, urged Israel to help the Iranian people topple their regime instead of threatening to strike the country to stop its nuclear program, Al Arabiya reported.

“If Israel wages war against Iran now, this will cause a kind of tension with the Jewish people that had not existed since the time of Cyrus the Great,” he told Al Arabiya on Friday, adding that military strikes would not annihilate Iran’s nuclear development program, but would only slow it down.

Iran and the UN nuclear watchdog are making headway towards a framework deal on how to tackle concerns about its atomic activity, diplomats said on Friday, a potential bargaining chip for Tehran in next week's negotiations with world powers.

Since the 1979 Iranian revolution and the downfall of the US Puppet Ruler the Shah, Iran has been an Islamic state. In that interval of time, 1979 to the present, Iran has not invaded anyone. Not once. People of all religions live in peace in Iran, even Jews, who find life so comfortable in Iran they refused an offer by the government of Israel to emigrate!

In the same period of time, Israel, a self-declared Jewish state, attacked Iraq in 1981, bombing the power station at Osirik, claiming it was a clandestine weapons factory. Subsequent examination of the ruins following the 2003 invasion proved Israel had lied. In 1982, Israel invaded Lebanon. This led to the Massacres at Sabra and Shatilla. In February 2003 Israel staged incursions into Gaza and Nablus. In September 2007 Israel bombed Syria, again insisting they were destroying a clandestine weapons laboratory. Again there was no evidence to support Israel's claims.

The corporate media have been given their orders to throw the focus back on to Iran.
Here is a recap of what they are trying to make you forget.
1. Last Spring, Rose Gottemoeller, an assistant secretary of state and Washington's chief nuclear arms negotiator, asked Israel to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Israel refused.
2. The United Nations passed a resolution calling on Israel to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and to submit to inspections. Israel refused.

3. The IAEA asked Israel to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and to submit to inspections. Israel refused.

We are thrilled to announce the Gaza’s Ark project and the participation of those in the United States who support the people of Gaza and the West Bank.

If you would like to know more about Gaza’s Ark and how you can support the project, join us on a conference call,

Tuesday, May 22 at 11pm Eastern. Please call

712-432-3900, access code 481417#.

Ann Wright and Jane Hirschmann are the US points of contact on the international steering committee.

Please email Ann if you are planning on calling in for the conference call– gazaarkus@gmail.com

Gaza’s Ark

J Street founder and President Jeremy Ben-Ami stated that many congressmen and senators refuse to criticize Israel because they "live in fear" of retribution from pro-Israel groups, Haaretz reports.

Despite what Israeli Jews believe, on Nakba Day, this country’s Arab citizens aren’t mourning Israel’s creation, but rather what it cost them.

From Union Square, the Nakba group walked to the OWS General Assembly which was massed at Times Square. There they addressed the Assembly about the Palestine, Gaza and the Nakba.

The former Secretary of Defense to the George W. Bush and Obama administrations Robert Gates said in an interview on CBS aired this morning that getting Iran to give up any potential ambitions to nuclear weapons was the “only good option” for dealing with the nuclear standoff with the West. He warned that an Israeli attack on Iran could spark a regional war.

Joining Piers Morgan face to face, the former Prime Minster shares his philosophy on Iran, in terms of the country's nuclear potential:

"It's about a real challenge to the whole world, not just Israel. I think a nuclear Iran will change the whole landscape of the Middle East. We have to do something to block it from happening."

Former United Nations’ American ambassador John Bolton continued his campaign to have the country of Iran bombed Tuesday evening, feeling that Israel should have accomplished the task several years ago.

Thousands gather in Tel Aviv for first social rally of summer, demonstrators hold up signs calling for 'sane housing prices,' greater equality. More rallies held nationwide.

With the global war against terrorism, it is now incumbent on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Yasir Arafat to clamp down on Palestinian extremists that have perpetuated violence and to restart a peace process that has collapsed.

Israel is ranked third among nations perceived as having a negative influence on the world, the BBC's annual poll shows, indicating further decline in the Jewish state's global image.

Israel informs US of the trip, which was approved by the Defense Ministry; ban on arms sales to China still in place.

The written agreement contained five main provisions:

the prisoners would end their hunger strike following the signing of the agreement;
There will be an end to the use of long-term isolation of prisoners for "security" reasons, and the 19 prisoners will be moved out of isolation within 72 hours;
Family visits for first degree relatives to prisoners from the Gaza Strip and for families from the West Bank who have been denied visit based on vague "security reasons" will be reinstated within one month;
The Israeli intelligence agency guarantees that there will be a committee formed to facilitate meetings between the IPS and prisoners in order to improve their daily conditions;
There will be no new administrative detention orders or renewals of administrative detention orders for the 308 Palestinians currently in administrative detention, unless the secret files, upon which administrative detention is based, contains "very serious" information.

TÁNAISTE EAMON Gilmore has said Ireland may push for the EU to ban goods from Israeli settlements if Israel does not quickly change its settlements policy in Palestinian territories.

Mr Gilmore has also said the Government may seek to have certain extremist settlers banned from the EU if they do not stop their violence in settlement areas.

Twenty percent of the population of Israel could be affected by a court ruling in Haifa on Tuesday in which a judge ordered that only Jews should be allowed to have Israeli citizenship, and non-Jews, even those born and raised in what is now Israel, should not be allowed to claim Israeli citizenship.

Sacha Baron Cohen's claim to fame is deceiving and mocking individuals and ethnicities for laughs; videotaping interviews where the subject is made to look foolish. He refuses to say how these oftentimes high-profile interviews are arranged. In 2009, Sky News documented that Baron Cohen deceived a Palestinian Christian into an interview and deceived his viewers to believe that the subject was a hostile Muslim terrorist. The man filed a defamation lawsuit. The 'Anti-Defamation' League of B'nai B'rith was nowhere to be found, however. There's a reason for that.*

On the 15th of May of every year, Palestinians and the whole world remember how it all started. How the Israelis’ ethnic cleansing of a people and the destruction of a society – the Nakba – was met with global indifference.

Seven days before the opening of the next round of Iran nuclear talks, the pressure is on, as the media spins every trickle of information leaked about Iran. Troubled by a possible deal between Iran and the world powers, Israel views the talks, set to take place on May 23 in Baghdad, with some bitterness, perhaps even with hopes that they will fail completely.

These are the depths to which propaganda about the Iranian nuclear program have sunk. It’s not even clever anymore, it’s just stupid.

The real revolution in Israel can’t happen until the occupation ends, you can’t have social justice if you don’t end the brutal repression of Palestine and the government’s ethnic cleansing policies.
*
There is some reason for optimism. One of the reasons Likud tried to get early elections is the trends in Israel are toward the labor party. Unfortunately Bebe with his new carte blanche is a virtual guarantee of war, and lots of it. The best we can hope for is it blows back in his face and destroys the Likud party, and Aipac along with it. i’m an American and i’m ashamed of how we support this lunatic.

Documents submitted to High Court show that residents of Beit El neighborhood in West Bank say did not know their home was built on private Palestinian land; purchasers were told by developer that tract was bought by WZO.

A unique way of life in the West Bank is under threat after Israel renewed a legal bid to evict more than 1,600 cave-dwelling Palestinian farmers from their land in the desert hills near the Biblical city of Hebron.

A person who understands that an Arab citizen should not be forced to sing 'a Jewish soul still yearns' should be expected to let that citizen commemorate the Nakba without having to pay for it.

Iran has hanged a man it said was an agent for Israeli intelligence agency Mossad whom it convicted of killing one of its nuclear scientists in 2010, Iranian state media reported on Tuesday.

As Ilan Pappe has said, most Israeli Jews have no idea of what they did to the Palestinians in 1948. (He also said that those who do know don't think that what was done was wrong). But that's only the tip of an iceberg of ignorance.

“The Israeli forces used [taser guns] and I have bruises on my arms and legs. I saw them open a protester’s mouth by force and spit in it, and they spit in my face as well. They beat us and used massive verbal violence. They did a full body search. While being under custody, a police officer of Ramle district addressed both me and another female activist while being cuffed with verbal sexual harassment, threatening to rape us. I have to admit I burst in tears.”

US, Israeli, and Saudi-funded terrorists destabilizing Syria now under fire in Lebanon.

The truth is that far from being the poor victim it likes to portray itself as, Israel is in fact the most aggressive and belligerent nation in the region, having invaded pretty much everyone it shares a border with.

The following maps show just who is wiping who off of the map!

Thousands of Palestinians are marching in the West Bank to mark the anniversary of their uprooting during the war over Israel's creation.

Palestinians are marking on Tuesday 64 years since predominantly European Jewish colonizers wiped their country off the map, cleansed the land of their villages, and brutally installed the state of Israel.

Nakba Day – meaning “catastrophe” – commemorates the 750,000 to 800,000 native Palestinians that were either driven from their lands by force or fled as Jewish colonizers violently swept the territory to proclaim a state of their own.

Dozens of Palestinians sustained injuries and 10 citizens at least were detained on Tuesday when the Israeli occupation forces (IOF) attacked marches and events marking the 64th Nakba anniversary in the occupied territories of Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Al-Khalil and Ramallah.

A leading Islamist candidate in Egypt's presidential election has branded Israel a "racist state" and said a shared 1979 peace treaty was "a national security threat" that should be revised.

Iran warned Western powers on Sunday that applying pressure on Tehran could jeopardize talks on its nuclear program, state television reported.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak is headed to Washington DC on Monday, with plans for him and his US counterpart Leon Panetta to officially announce $680 million in additional US military aid to Israel.

The Pentagon initially cooked up this most recent plan to increase aid to Israel, pushing for the House Armed Services Committee to authorize the funding for the “Iron Dome” missile defense program in late March. The committee quickly did so.

Egypt has brokered a deal aimed at ending a hunger strike by 1,600 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, a Palestinian source close to the negotiations said on Monday.

One in three of the 4,800 Palestinians serving time in Israeli jails began refusing food on April 17 in protest against detention without trial and to demand better conditions like an increase in family visits and ending solitary confinement.

The scope of the hunger strike has posed a new challenge to Israel, which has come under international criticism over detention without trial and could face a violent Palestinian backlash if any of the protesters die.

“Egypt has concluded a deal to resolve the prisoner crisis that included Israel’s acceptance of prisoners’ demands in exchange for ending the hunger strike,” said the Palestinian source who is close to the talks in Cairo.

Jerusalem: The US is expected to announce the allocation of USD 680 million for Israel's Iron Dome anti-missile defence system, a media report said.

Citing the Israel Hayom daily report, Xinhua said the fund will enable Israel to procure 10 batteries for the system, which will join the four it already deploys against intermittent rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip.

The fund is part of a USD 947-million aid package the US is slated to provide for bolstering Israel's missile and rocket defence in 2012.

US Congressman Steve Rothman, a member of the House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee, announced last week that the aid package has been approved in principle.

"This funding level is the highest ever appropriated in a single year for these life-saving systems and shows how vitally important they are for our nation's national security and that of our key ally -- Israel," Xinhua quoted Rothman as saying in a statement.

The House "urges the President to reaffirm the unacceptability of an Iran with nuclear-weapons capability and opposition to any policy that would rely on containment as an option in response to the Iranian nuclear threat."

Think about that.

The resolution, which almost surely will pass on Tuesday, is telling the president that he may not "rely on containment" in response to "the Iranian nuclear threat."

Since the resolution, and U.S. policy itself defines Iranian possession of nuclear weapons as, ipso facto, a threat, Congress would be telling the president that any U.S. response to that threat other than war is unacceptable. In fact, it goes farther than that, not only ruling out containment of a nuclear armed Iran but also containment of an Iran that has a "nuclear weapons capability."

That means that the only acceptable response to a nuclear armed or nuclear capable Iran is not containment but its opposite: war.

It will be a long, hot summer for New Yorkers as Canada plans on pulling the plug on their only source of electricity. Ontario’s environment minister says Canada should consider cutting its power supply to New York State this summer if it finds itself experiencing power shortages.

Makes sense, no? Why should Canadians suffer whilst Americans sit in comfort ….

Of course the above doesn’t make any sense because it’s not true….

BUT …. the following is;

On May 15, 1948 the unilateral proclamation of the State of Israel which erupted into the brutal Palestinian Nakba or Catastrophe was also catastrophic for United Nations (UN) ringing the death knell for its stature and authority.

EU foreign ministers have issued a harsh critique of Israel, saying the gathering pace of settlement-building, settler extremism, and ill-treatment of Palestinians threaten a two-state solution.

In the Hindu on May 8, we catch Hillary Clinton putting too fine a distinction on the Israel-Iran rivalry.

Drawing a distinction between Iran, which has violated provisions of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), and Israel, which hasn't signed it, United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said here on Monday that the latter has “made numerous overtures to try to have a peaceful resolution” to the situation in the Middle-East.

The computer-generated drawing was provided to The Associated Press by an official of a country tracking Iran's nuclear program who said it proves the structure exists.

MK Alex Miller: Commemorating the state's establishment as a catastrophe on the grounds of an institution funded by the state is unacceptable • The Association for Civil Rights in Israel says they are concerned about the efforts to restrict freedom of political expression because they represent opinions and views that are inconsistent with the current majority position.

Declassified files from long-running investigations of the Nuclear Materials and Equipment Corporation (NUMEC) over alleged illegal diversions of US government-owned weapons-grade uranium to Israel are now available online at http://www.IRmep.org/ila/numec

The 733 pages of information obtained under the Freedom of Information Act for the new book Divert! NUMEC, Zalman Shapiro and the diversion of US weapons-grade uranium into the Israeli nuclear weapons program include:

A 1980 FBI interview of an eyewitness (PDF) of NUMEC executives stuffing U-235 canisters into sealed equipment shipped to Israel.

"The content of (Netanyahu's) letter did not represent grounds for returning to negotiations," stated Hanan Ashrawi, a member of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization. However on receipt of the letter the Palestinian and Israeli’s released a joint statement saying that both sides were “committed to achieving peace”

It has been suggested that both sides had not expected any significant progress ahead of the US presidential election in November despite the new national unity government that was formed last week between Netanyahu’s Likud party and the main opposition group, the centrist Kadima Party.

The head of Kadima, Shaul Mofaz, has long blamed Netanyahu for the failure of the peace talks and told reporters last week that entering new negotiations "was an iron condition for forming the unity government".

Mitt Romney should visit Israel soon, Republican lawmakers say, claiming that such a trip would highlight the fact that President Obama has not been there during his first term.

Four protesters were wounded, and hundreds more suffered the effects of tear gas and chemical water sprayed by Israeli forces on non-violent prisoner solidarity protests in six West Bank villages on Friday.

One Palestinian was injured in the village of Aboud near Ramallah during clashes with stone-throwing youth and Israeli troops who attempted to prevent a nonviolent protest held in solidarity with Palestinian prisoners.

Local sources said that Majed Barghouti 18 years old was hit with a rubber bullet in his eye. Barghouti was moved to the hospital for treatment in Ramallah and wound was described as serious.

Other activists pointed to anti-government protests this week as an example of the new police crackdown. Less than 24 hours after Netanyahu announced he had successfully created the largest coalition government Israel has seen since 1984, more than 1,000 protesters took to the streets in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

Holding signs saying “Bibi’s new government is not what we voted for” and “Bibi = undemocratic,” the protesters demanded new elections.

“I voted for the Kadima party because it represented the anti-Bibi. Now they sit in the same coalition as him?” said Ben Mazor, a 26-year-old law student. “It just goes to show that politicians are all liars and it doesn’t matter who you vote for, they’ll go and join any government that suits them.”

Since last week, Israel has been governed by an oligarchy. These are self-styled lords of the manor who have power over civil and military sectors, and share the spoils of rule between themselves. The subjects can talk, but have no influence. Israel has been transformed from the only democracy in the region, to a democracy where power is held by only a few. Nothing will change during the next national elections, which have been postponed.

Four shows by French comedian Dieudonne M'bala M'bala in Montreal have been canceled after Jewish groups protested his reputation for anti-Semitic statements.

Once again, to show to the world what both hypocracy and ignorance are, zionism and its supporters have called for a boycott of an American based company.

Israel screams anti-Semitism, even goes as far as to outlaw boycotts against its products … but it’s OK to call for one against an American company that made a financial donation to the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) .

Presidents of both parties, over the past several decades, have shown a willingness to interpret Senate resolutions in the broadest imaginable way when it comes to war, whether it’s to launch a 10-year land-war in Southeast Asia or Afghanistan, to torture detainees picked up in foreign countries or to eavesdrop without a warrant on American citizens.

This time around, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) wants to make sure there are no misunderstandings.

Editor’s Note: “Is the Holocaust a suitable subject for satire?” I asked myself seriously, before deciding to accept this new article from satirical spoof writer Pandora Pushkin. In view of the fact that Christianity appears to be fair game for blaspheming Jews — “Christ sucks” (pornographer Al Goldstein) and “I hope the Jews DID kill Christ! I’d fucking do it again in a second!“ (comedienne Sarah Silverman) — I saw no reason why Holocaustianity, the new world religion, should be exempt from criticism or satirical treatment. Provided it’s done with good taste, of course.

In a day where we finally see the 99% rising up against the1% on an international scale, including with positions condemning Israel’s occupation and ethnic cleansing. We see the International BDS Movement growing by leaps and bounds… not to mention the growing number of demonstrations and walkouts that follow every spokesman for zionism on every US Campus (including himself). All of the above include scores of non zionist Jews as well…

Thousands of Palestinian Authority Arabs marched in Hevron, Shechem and Gaza on Friday, in solidarity with terrorist prisoners in Israeli jails who have been holding a mass hunger strike.

According to a report on Kol Yisrael radio, PA security forces tried to prevent the protesters in Hevron from clashing with IDF soldiers.

Some 1,500 terrorist prisoners launched a mass hunger strike on April 17, in protest of their being in administrative detention. Two of the prisoners, both active members of the Islamic Jihad terror organization, have been fasting for more than 70 days. One received medical care in a hospital and was returned to prison. The Supreme Court this week rejected an appeal by both to be set free.

In a tactic for United Nations sympathy, the PA has said that the prisoners' hunger strike is a humanitarian disaster.

The U.S. Treasury Department’s claim of a "secret deal" between Iran and al-Qaeda, which had become a key argument by right-wing activists who support war against Iran, has been discredited by former intelligence officials in the wake of publication of documents from Osama bin Laden’s files revealing a high level of antagonism between al-Qaeda and Iran.

Not only does the article carry the authority of the AP, but the book in question bears the authority of none other than President Harry Truman’s own daughter, Margaret. It is her biography of her father, entitled simply Harry S. Truman, and at the time the article was written, the book had just been published. The passage in question—a long paragraph that begins on page 489 and ends on page 490 (pp. 533-534 of the paperback edition)—is in a section on threats and attempts on President Truman’s life.

Seventeen activists, including a minor, were brutally arrested during a permitted demonstration on 3 May in support of the Palestinian hunger strikers near Ramle prison, where some strikers are being held in the Israeli Prison Service medical center.

On 6 May, the Palestinian human rights group Adalah submitted an urgent complaint to the head of the police investigation unit at the Israeli ministry of justice, demanding an investigation into the arrest and abuse of the 17 protesters.

According to a 7 May press release issued by Adalah, "At approximately 6:45pm, after the demonstration ended and most participants had left, several individuals attempted to continue protesting by forming a picket line, which does not require a permit under Israeli law. However, the police violently attacked the group, beating them and using tasers, even after the people were handcuffed."

Israel will not be invited to NATO's May 20-21 summit in Chicago, the alliance's top official said Friday. But he denied that alliance member Turkey had blocked Israel's participation.

Instead, NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said the reason is because Israel does not participate in NATO's main military missions.

News reports have claimed that Turkey blocked Israel's participation because of the raid in 2010 by Israeli troops on ships heading to Gaza in which eight Turks and a Turkish-American died.

A few years ago, I was discussing religion with a prominent rabbi in the southern West Bank. I was dumbfounded when the otherwise bland rabbi referred to Jesus as "Hitler of Bethlehem."

Mr. Speaker: I rise in opposition to HR 4133, the United States-Israel Enhanced Security Cooperation Act, which unfortunately is another piece of one-sided and counter-productive foreign policy legislation. This bill's real intent seems to be more saber-rattling against Iran and Syria, and it undermines US diplomatic efforts by making clear that the US is not an honest broker seeking peace for the Middle East.

The simple irrigation system used today is as it was in ancient times. Water is shared between Battir's eight main extended families. A simple system of manually diverting water via sluice gates means that fruit and vegetables from the small plots on the lower slopes are renowned for their freshness and quality.

Built on the side of a steep hill just to the south of Jerusalem in the occupied West Bank, Battir also boasts land arranged as traditional terrace agriculture. But this is a system and a landscape that is under threat from Israel's controversial barrier.

The exact route of this section of the barrier has yet to be finalised. But if, as thought, it is built along the valley floor below the village it will cut off Battir and its terraces from much of its ancestral lands. And, because of the unique irrigation system, villagers say those lands will be lost forever.