David McReynolds, anti-warrior, professional pacifist and sometime Socialist Party candidate for President sent along this moving meditation on Gaza & Israel. It’s long, somewhat painful, but, in my view, worth reading.

Shiv'a in Gaza: December 2008
By Deb Reich

"My heart has been broken so many times", writes Alice Walker somewhere, "that it feels like an open suitcase with the wind blowing through it…" But maybe, she muses, hearts are made to be broken, and what is required of us is simply a steadfast acknowledgment: Open up and let the wind blow through; that's what hearts are for.

If so, Gaza 2008 is good cardiac training.

I am an American-Israeli Jewish woman of 60 living now in an Arab town in Israel and working for Jewish-Palestinian-Arab-Israeli reconciliation. I have two friends in Gaza and I will tell you how we came to be acquainted.

The first step was simply refusing to be enemies.

It is easy to feel horrifed at the images of Israeli planes hitting Gaza. But the context behind the attacks is that Gaza has been attacking Israeli civillians almost constantly since Israel withdrew from Gaza.

(House in Sderot hit by Qassem rocket, image from Bokertov.com)

(Injured woman in Sderot, image from BBC news)

I supported the withdrawal from Gaza. The dismatling of the illegal settlements in Gaza was a controversial move in Israel, but a necessary move. The withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza was also controversial, but necessary. Likud, the far right wing nut jobs of Israel, predicted that Israeli withdrawal from Gaza would result in increased attacks on Israel from Gaza.

Updated Dec. 6, with video link post jump.

Envy, we’re told, is a sin. I’m full of it. I lust for recognition as an enemy of the right. When, many years ago, Mr. Nixon’s enemies list came out, I and many of my cohort were were enraged. We were omitted from the list and we envied those who made it.

Recently events conspired to bring me back into touch with a former girlfriend. Catching up, complaining of the wear that time and children had worked upon us, she found something important to brag about.

Her brother – also a Jewish lawyer named Danny – active in favor of peace between Israelis and Palestinians, had been placed on a list of Self-Hating or Israel Threatening Jews (you can work out the acronym without help from me).

This is a quite wonderful video for several reasons. One, it should lay to rest some of the febrile racist idiocy oozing from the republican side of the aisle regarding candidate Obama; and two, it demonstrates that, even if we've spent the last eight years trying to convince the world that America is merely the sum of Gitmo and Abu Ghraib, the world still has hope for us.

No Sweat Apparel is a company I have plugged before and which I purchase clothes from. I have shoes, flip flops, shirts and pants from them. Their products are all fair trade and/or union made. Most of their stuff is good quality (though occasionally shoes wear out fast) and their flip flops are really cool, designed by Indonesian children with some of the proceeds going to fund the education of that child. All in all, a good company with cool products that are fair to workers.

It's the 40th Aniversary of more than Sgt. Pepper. The six-day war, which resulted in the Israeli occupation of East Jerusalem, the West Bank, the Golan Heights and the Gaza Strip, also took place 40 years ago this week. For me, cursed with an irrational affection for Israel, the war has been a source of pride (we win) and the occupation a source of shame (we act oppressively). After the jump, info on an interesting, related, event.

There's retrospecting. See a transcript of the start of a huge NPR series here . Al Jazeera features "in the street" interviews.

Ha'aretz writers are getting an especially tough workout. Slate's article is by Shemul Rosner and features a photo slide show. Tom Segev, also of Ha'aretz, was on the op ed page of the NY Times Tuesday.
As it happens, Segev's book on the 6-day war, was the subject of a really smart, thoughtful New Yorker review by editor David Remnick. (More Segev? See The Nation's Jon Weiner) Also interesting, in my view, is a re-analysis of the events leading up to the war by Sandy Tolan in Salon.

But is it good for Israel?...The now seemingly age-old refrain of American Jews whose support for Israel sometimes affects their reason. Now despite some anti-Semitic accusations, I don't know a single American Jew whose support for Israel EVER interferes with their loyalty and patriotism as American citizens. But sometimes American Jews are willing to make what seem to me to be idiotic alliances in the name of Israel.

[UPDATE: Saw on Current TV this morning a report that the Palestinian government wanted the Hamas Mouse axed and said that the strategy of indoctrinating Children with political messages was unacceptable. Of course the Current TV host interpreted this to mean, "Okay, guys, you caught us so we will have to stop." It is unclear whether Hamas will comply...after all they are not known for their sensitivity. I wonder if it was political pressure or threats from the Disney Imperial Lawyers that led to the Palestinian government's statement...]

Hamas has a new spokesmouse. Yes...spokesmouse. Hamas is using a mouse to encourage Palestinians to deliver its message calling for the complete destruction of Israel. Problem is, the mouse, named Farfur, is a dead ringer for a certain Disney icon:

Image from Palestinian Media Watch (an Israeli organization)