Source: The Guardian

Chinese children injured in knife attack outside primary school
Police say villager is in custody after attack in which 23 people were injured in Chengping as children arrived for classes

Associated Press in Beijing
guardian.co.uk, Friday 14 December 2012 02.59 EST

A knife-wielding man injured 22 children and one adult outside a primary school in central China as students were arriving for classes, police say, the latest in a series of attacks at Chinese schools and kindergartens.

The attack in the Henan province village of Chengping happened shortly before 8am local time on Friday, said a police officer from Guangshan county, where the village is located.

. . .

It was not clear how old the injured children were, but Chinese primary school pupils are generally aged between six and 11.

. . .

No motive was given for the stabbings, which echo a string of similar assaults against schoolchildren in 2010 that killed nearly 20 and wounded more than 50. The most recent such attack took place in August, when a knife-wielding man broke into a middle school in the southern city of Nanchang and stabbed two students before fleeing.


Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/dec/14/chinese-children-knife-primary-school

When was the last time joining or forming a union led to lower pay and fewer benefits for the workers?

When was the last time decertifying a union led to more pay and greater benefits for the workers?

When was the last time a nonunion employee doing the same job in a particular business made more than a union employee doing the same job?

My answer is . . . NEVER.

Source: NYTimes

By JODI RUDOREN and ISABEL KERSHNER

GAZA — Health officials said on Friday that a 20-year-old Palestinian was killed and nine others wounded in a clash with Israeli soldiers in the southeast Gaza Strip, testing the cease-fire between Hamas and Israel after wild celebrations here on Thursday.

Gaza City residents celebrated the cease-fire, which ended the eight days of conflict but did not resolve many underlying issues.

The leadership in Gaza has said that the agreement, announced on Wednesday in Cairo to end eight days of ferocious exchanges, includes an Israeli promise to halt “incursions” into a 1,000-foot-wide buffer zone along Gaza’s northern and eastern borders where Palestinians have not been allowed to go.

Maan, the Palestinian news agency, reported that a group of Palestinians went to Abassan, a border area east of the southern town of Khan Younis, on Friday to pray on their land, and ended up throwing stones at soldiers, who responded with gunfire. Ashraf al-Qedra, a spokesman for the Health Ministry, identified the man who was killed as Ahmad Qudih.

It remained unclear whether Hamas would depict the incident as a violation of the still uncertain cease-fire.


Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/24/world/middleeast/israel-gaza-conflict.html?hp

Source: Guardian (Blog)

A doctor at Gaza's Shifa hospital went treat a six-year-old boy who turned out to be his dead son, according to the BBC' Paul Danahar citing Gaza health minister.

He names the boy and the father.

Boys name was Abdul Rahman Naaem.Father is Doctors Majdi at Shifa hospital in #Gaza

— Paul Danahar (@pdanahar) November 21, 2012

AFP said the boy was killed during a strike on its offices.



Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/nov/21/gaza-conflict-fierce-fighting-clinton-seeks-truce

---

AFP is the French news agency, Agence France Presse.

5. The Israeli Lobby (2007)
Best American Political Analysis

Is the pro-Israel lobby so strong, financially and politically, that the U.S. relationship with Israel is taboo and therefore unmentionable? And what happens to those who dare expose the unmentionable? In March 2006 the American political scientists John Mearsheimer (University of Chicago) and Steve Walt (Harvard) published the controversial article 'The Israel Lobby and US foreign policy'.

3. Life in Occupied Palestine (2009)
Best Jewish American perspective

Anna Baltzer, a Jewish American, gives her eyewitness perspectives on average citizens living in occupied Palestine. Baltzer spent 5 months in the West Bank working with the International Women's Peace Service. Her presentation highlights how the Israeli government's policies have drastically and negatively affected normal Palestinian life, and how this perspective has been omitted from most news.


2. Peace, Propaganda And The Promised Land (2004)
Best Mass Media Analysis

Provides a striking comparison of U.S. and international media coverage of the crisis in the Middle East, zeroing in on how structural distortions in U.S. coverage have reinforced false perceptions of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. This pivotal documentary exposes how the foreign policy interests of American political elites--oil, and a need to have a secure military base in the region, among...


1. With God on Our Side (2010)
Best introduction, American Religious Perspective and Hope for Reconciliation

With God On Our Side takes a look at the theology of Christian Zionism, which teaches that because the Jews are God’s chosen people, they have a divine right to the land of Israel. Aspects of this belief system lead some Christians in the West to give uncritical support

http://www.filmsforaction.org/articles/the_top_10_documentaries_about_the_israelpalestine_conflict/

President Obama and Bibi Netanyahu are on the same page when it comes to the justification for Israel's bombardment of Gaza. Netanyahu : "No country in the world would agree to a situation in which its population lives under a constant missile threat." Obama: "There's no country on earth that would tolerate missiles raining down on its citizens from outside its borders."
It's true that if, say, Canada were lobbing missiles into the US, the US wouldn't tolerate it. But here's another thing the US wouldn't tolerate: If Canada imposed a crippling economic blockade, denying America the import of essential goods and hugely restricting American exports. That would be taken as an act of war, and America would if necessary respond with force--by, perhaps, lobbing missiles into Canada.

This is the situation Gaza has faced for years: a crippling economic blockade imposed by Israel. Under international pressure, Israel has relaxed the import restrictions, but even so such basic things as cement, gravel, and steel are prohibited from entering Gaza. The rationale is that these items are "dual use" and could be put to military ends. But this logic doesn't explain the most devastating part of the blockade--the severe restrictions on Gaza's exports.

. . .


So, over the past couple of days, I tried to find out exactly what actions on the part of Hamas would suffice to end the blockade. And, after contacting various experts by email, I discovered that the answer is: nothing would suffice. At least, nothing we know of. Apparently Israel hasn't articulated clear conditions under which the blockade would end.

. . .


http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/11/when-will-the-economic-blockade-of-gaza-end/265452/#.UKr7KT4e1qA.mailto

http://palestinefrommyeyes.wordpress.com/2012/11/17/gazaunderattack-names-and-ages-of-killed-people-who-fell-victim-during-the-past-ongoing-israeli-attacks-on-gaza/

At 1:00 am, an Israeli warplane rocked a car in Rafah killing two people:

76- Saif Al-Deen Sadeq

77- Ahmad Hussein Al-Agha.

78- Emad Abu Hamda, 30 years old, killed after being seriously injured in as a drone fired a rocket at Beach camp, west Gaza.

79- Mohammed Jindiyya, mentally disabled, killed in an attack on Helles roundabout in Shijaiyya, west Gaza.

At 4:10 am, Israel committed another atrocious crime shelling a house belong to Azzam family that is full of children. 3 people were killed in this attack and at least 40 injured. Medics said that more than 15 children have arrived Shifaa hospital, three of them are in a very critical condition.

80- Mohammed Iyad Abu Zour, 5 years old.

81- Nisma Abu Zour, 19 years old.

82- Ahed Al-Qattaty, 38 years old.

83- Al-Abd Mohammed Al-Attar, killed in an attack on Beit-Lahya, northern Gaza at 6:00 am.

84- Rama Al-Shandi, 1 year old, killed as four F16s airstrikes hit former security compound Al-Saraya in Gaza City.

Source: LA Times

Israeli strike kills 9 members of Gaza family

Israel says it was targeting a Hamas militant as part of its campaign to stop the group from firing rockets at its cities. The dead were women and children.

By Edmund Sanders, Los Angeles Times
November 18, 2012, 6:10 p.m.

GAZA CITY — An Israeli airstrike Sunday killed at least nine members of the same family — all women and children — in the deadliest single attack and worst civilian tragedy since the fighting in the Gaza Strip began last week.

. . .

The Israeli missile strike was so strong it destroyed the Dalu family's three-story building, blowing out windows blocks away and sending a charred mattress flying into the street.

For hours panicked neighbors and rescue workers clung to hope of finding survivors. While a bulldozer pulled apart pieces of the collapsed walls, volunteers in orange vests scrambled over the wreckage and searched for signs of life.

In a grim, heart-wrenching scene that played out over 90 minutes, the bodies of four children were pulled out one after another.


Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-israel-gaza-airstrikes-20121119,0,4550759.story

Source: Haaretz

LIVE BLOG: Iron Dome intercepts rocket over Tel Aviv; Netanyahu says Israel will agree to ceasefire if rockets from Gaza stop
Since Operation Pillar of Defense began on Wednesday, Iron Dome system shoots down 243 rockets, with an 88 percent success rate. Some 460 rockets have landed in Israeli territory, 33 of them in built-up areas.
By Barak Ravid, Gili Cohen and Nir Hasson | Nov.18, 2012 | 12:37 AM | 9


As Operation Pillar of Defense entered its fifth day, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke over the weekend with U.S. President Barack Obama and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, saying he had told both that he is prepared for a comprehensive cease-fire if the rocket fire from Gaza will stop.

Jerusalem residents received their first taste of rocket warnings over the weekend as terror groups fired more missiles on the south and at Tel Aviv, and the Israel Defense Forces continued to prepare for a possible ground invasion as Pillar of Defense ended its fourth day.

. . .

Over 60 rockets were fired at Israel on Saturday. While many of them were intercepted by the Iron Dome system, including rockets aimed at Sderot, Netivot, Ashdod, and Be'er Sheva, a 10-story building was hit in Ashdod at midday and a car was damaged during a barrage of rockets on that city.

LIVE BLOG

03:53 A.M. Palestinian media reports two children killed in an IAF strike in the Beit Lahiya area in Gaza (Haaretz)

02:55 A.M. Palestinians news agency Ma'an: Israeli airstrike damages complex of media offices in Gaza City injuring six journalists (Haaretz)

00:11 A.M. Palestinians say number of Gazans killed in operation rises to 45, 17 of them civilians (Haaretz)


Read more: http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/live-blog-iron-dome-intercepts-rocket-over-tel-aviv-netanyahu-says-israel-will-agree-to-ceasefire-if-rockets-from-gaza-stop-1.478624

"Our meetings have become a waste of money and a waste of time," Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani told Arab foreign ministers gathered to draw up a response to Israel's attack on Gaza.

"We are meeting today and we will issue a statement. The statement will mean nothing," he said.

"The whole situation needs a clear and honest review... We can't keep giving hope without delivering," Sheikh Hamad said.

He said money pledged to the Palestinians after previous Israeli attacks had failed to reach the Palestinians.

"They received nothing... Gaza needs to receive the money we have already pledged."

"They need housing, schools, hospitals. This is what we should be offering them. We have been used to pledging things and not carrying them through," Sheikh Hamad said.

. . .

"The peace process is not working, the Quartet (the United Nations, United States, European Union and Russia) is not working... We are not declaring war, we want a peaceful process... I'm not talking about war, I know our capabilities... I'm talking about standing by our Palestinian brothers," he said.

Read more: http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2012/Nov-17/195374-qatar-pm-slams-wasteful-arab-league-meetings.ashx#ixzz2CXO8ScKH
(The Daily Star :: Lebanon News :: http://www.dailystar.com.lb)