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December 24, 2001
Michael
Chisari
War
as Diversionary Tactic
Cockburn/St. Clair
Enron
and the Green Seal
December 21, 2001
Tom Turnipseed
War
Good for Bush
John Chuckman
The
First Victim in the
War on Terror
December 20, 2001
Lawrence
McGuire
Killing
Other People's Children
Miriam Rozen
Foundation
Without Representation?
Kenneth
Roth
A
Letter to Rumsfeld on
Military Tribunals
William Blum
Casualties:
Theirs and Ours
December 19, 2001
Marjorie
Cohn
Don't
Pre-Judge John Walker
Sam Bahour
Palestine
and You
December 18, 2001
Shahid
Alam
Clash
of Civilizations?
Carl Estabrook
Who
Opposes This War?
December 17, 2001
Edward
Said
Mahfouz
and the Cruelty
of Memory
December 16, 2001
Amira Howeidy
Dangerous By
Definition?
Bahour
and Dahan
Zinni's
Doomed Mission
December 15, 2001
John Isaacs
Bush's 12
Lumps of Coal
for Christmas
Dana Cook
The
Execution of bin Laden
Yusuf Agha
Tale of the
Tape:
Osama Gump?
December 14, 2001
Don Atapattu
A Conversation with
Norman
Finkelstein
December 13, 2001
Trojanow and Hoskote:
Nonsense
Mantras of Our Times
Dr. A.
Tajudeen
Afghanistan
and Zaire
Michael Williams
Prohibit
Prohibition
December 12, 2001
Jack McCarthy
Hitchens,
Walker
and Osama's Tape
Laura W. Murphy
Ashcroft's
Jihad
Shahid
Alam
Race
and Visibility
December 11, 2001
Joshua Orton
University
of Wisconsin
Won't Aid FBI Interviews
Philip
Farruggio
Cleansing
the Nation's Soul
Robert Fisk
Why I Was
Beaten
A Photographic Journal of Life
in an Afghan Refugee Camp
By Judith Mann
Resources:
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About 9/11
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Five
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Shook The World:
Seattle and Beyond
By Alexander
Cockburn
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8-Page Special Issue
War Diary
CIA's Assassination Plan a History of
Torture in US Prisons
bin Laden and Bush
Business Connections
Aisha Ikramuddin on the Hidden Hype
of US Food Bombs
Peter Linebaugh on
Pakistan
Christopher Hitchens' Love for Mrs. Thatcher
Jiang Zemin Tells Bush:
Nuke 'Em
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and Osama bin Laden
Whiteout:
CIA, Drugs & the
Press
by Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The Memphis Blues Again:
Six Decades of Memphis Music Photographs
Photos by Ernest Withers
Text by Daniel Wolff
The New Intifada:
Resisting Israel's Apartheid
Edited by Roane Carey
A Pocket Guide to
Environmental Bad Guys
by James Ridgeway
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The
Phoenix Program
by Douglas Valentine
Al Gore:
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by Cockburn
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December 24,
2001
Why I Resisted Being Drafted
into the Israeli Army
By Yair Khilou
[Yair Khilou, is a young activist in
several radical left-wing groups, and one of the organisers behind
the "letter of the twelfth-graders" (a letter to Israeli
Prime Minister Sharon, signed by 62 youths, announcing their
refusal to cooperate with the Israeli army's actions. Click
here to read the text of that letter. Yair announced his
conscientious objection to military service at the age of 16
and has refused to go through preliminary military medical and
psychometric examinations (which most Israelis are obliged to
go through at the age of 16 or 17). As a result, the military
Conscience Committee refused to examine his case (they insisted
that they need to have the results of his medical tests before
they can decide on his case!) Two and a half weeks ago he reported
at the Tel-Hashomer military compound, where he expected to be
arrested for refusing to be enlisted. However, for bureaucratic
reasons, he was only arrested yesterday.]
My name is Yair Khilou and I am 18 years old.
I have refused to enlist in the army, and will soon be sent to
military prison for that. I decided to write this statement before
I am imprisoned because I believe that the reasons motivating
me in my refusal to enlist in the army are shared by many people.
When I am asked to become part of a large
and violent body such as the Israeli army, I should ask in what
activities this body is engaged and whom does it serve. My parents,
teachers and peers might answer that the army of the state is
necessary to preserve my own security and the security of the
citizens of the State of Israel. I desire very much that there
will be security for the citizens of Israel and for me.
And still, I find this answer to be unsatisfactory.
I fail to understand how does that pure Jewish space, which the
State of Israel persistently tries to create by force since its
establishment increases our security. I fail to understand how
the repression of the Palestinian resistance to Israel by means
of state terror--more cruel and of wider scale even than the
counter terror which it provokes--serves the society that I am
part of. How does the activity of the state, implemented through
the army, can benefit me and those I care for?
The 'sterile' Jewish space created by
the State of Israel is a ghetto for its Jewish residents as well.
It prevents them from integrating into the Middle East. Nobody
is safe in this space--neither Jews nor Arabs. Still, my opponents
might claim, the State of Israel is a democracy and its army
is the people's army. I wonder where these people live. I have
no ability to affect the actions of the army, although my friends
and I definitely try. I am unable to stop war, unemployment,
inequalities.
The vast majority of Israeli citizens
wish to change this state of affairs. And still, the state does
everything to block peace, welfare and equality. Mysteriously,
everything ends up serving the interests of capitalists and generals.
The Israeli military men and capitalists,
together with their Palestinian peers, do everything they can
to remain in power. Their mass media and educational system spread
vicious nationalistic propaganda, hatred and fear. Thus they
divide and rule us. They incite against each other Arabs and
Jews, East and West, while they continue to reign. These are
our real enemies, preventing us from attaining physical and economical
security. Against them Arabs and Jews should stand together.
I am not willing to accept such a reality.
I am all the more unwilling to contribute to its continuation
and fortification by serving in the Israeli army or in any other
terrorist organisation.
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