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‘Peace is a way of traveling. It is both a destination and a path’. Compare Rice

ecology action | 26.07.2006 03:59 | Anti-militarism | Ecology | Repression | World

I have a sign which reads:"Peace is a way of travelling. It is both a destination and a path." obtained from a NSW based Phoenician, read Lebanese Australian, a seafaring trader people, whose family has been here for generations, Franklin Scarf of Earth Repair Foundation with a logo gun transforming to a tree as here. It's the kind of message we need not more military madness:

Compare Rice/Howard blind Israel policy
Compare Rice/Howard blind Israel policy


Peace is a way of traveling. It is both a destination and a path’. Compare Rice/Howard blind Israel policy.

The slogan encapsulates precisely the inadequacy of USA Secretary of State Rice and PM Howard about a “sustainable” peace, by wrong means.

It’s a horrendous time as the Israel military go about their determined killing of the eyes of the world at a critical UN observer post on the border of Lebanon in all the news today. Our media apparently are reporting what most Arabs have known for a long time even as various Big Media still squeamishly avoid actually saying the truth: Knowingly killing of children by this dominant military. Not simply ‘damaged’ or ‘burnt’ children.

The truth is apparent: Far from being a surrounded victim people, Israel is the supreme military in the region with the arrogance of a nuclear super power. Not a proxy for the USA but a fearsome independent power with a standing reserve army of some 450,000. The idea their existence is at risk is so far from the truth it is fantasy. Their existence is in nuclear lock step with the world itself. All our pokers chips on their aspirations and decisions whether we like it or not.

Confidence from this nuke trump has created a vengeful reckless indeed rogue nationalism. Will the Israeli state show compassion to the Arabs or the world or repeat the Nazi way of thinking of murderous destruction? Not just disproportionate revenge against Arabs but any body or group vaguely responsible, UN, European, no matter how indirect for the horrific Holocaust 60 plus years prior. Indeed this younger IDF generation appear to be venerating the memory of their murdered WW2 ancestors in the blood of anyone unlucky enough to get in their way, and perhaps appeasing their own older survivor generation. An odd violent kind of love for a past spreading absolute misery.

The blood of the Holocaust on the hands of the West is now being visited back on us in a nuclear standoff with Iran over the million Palestinian Diaspora.

Sharing the spirit … of Holocaust. A little one so far to be sure but just as final for hundreds and likely thousands of victims. Meanwhile down at the Jewish Museum in East Sydney I noticed the fit looking secular Australian Jews striding in to some meeting or other safe in our lucky democracy. Who are they most loyal to? World stability and peace, indeed Australian foreign policy interests or Israel’s military extremism? The squatter movement perhaps? Or maybe humanism after all? I remind myself it’s not any one person, one ethnicity, one religion. It’s an illness of violence.

Meanwhile Cioran Orielly is acquitted just now over in Ireland where my spirit belongs for helping cause millions of dollars of damage to a USA military transport plane compromising Ireland’s neutrality. God bless him too. I met Cioran and his uncompromising Christian activism in the Darwin anti Jabiluka uranium mine protest campaign and found him a challenging, impressive man.

Yesterday I chided some anti Muslim stereotyping in a café across from News Ltd, mentioning USA in Chile 1973, power, oil etc, and these middle aged businessmen were frozen, not annoyed, just empty, nothing to say. To her credit the female in the group announced she wasn’t listening to them and left which gave me the opening.

Disconcerting silence. Are they sheep, scared, amoral? Mostly the latter I would say. Good John Howard voters I expect. I mentioned indymedia to the guy at the counter and the eyes of these verbal wimps widened. Disconcerting silence I thought. Maybe they were hacks after all.

I wept this morning to know how wicked Israel’s power is now beyond all accounting really killing those UN observers, bombing red cross ambulances without impunity. To hear the inadequacy in Rice’s voice, of defeat of even her awesome intellect. She will save no one in this war.

A surreal experience seeing a rogue ‘ally’ destabilise the world around us as callers on MMM discuss Holden cars. How pathetic. (Everyone knows a V6 is a joke proposition.) I had a good go at the joke SpoonMan last night with heaps cutting analysis. He even sounded a bit nervous but to his credit he gave me time too. He was an apologist for the Israeli smear of Hisbollah, but maybe not so cocky after the front pages today. And it was good he respected my democratic criticism.

In Howard’s Australia that is an increasingly precious and threatened space: Beaming John Howard, The King, is 67 today embraced by private school rowers and an ambitious power walker. Nothing exceeds like success, but the fall is even harder too.

Will John Howard support the rebuilding of the UN observer post immediately? In fact defence of humanitarian law? Pigs don’t fly. Israel has already requested an apology on the World Today show ABC radio. Get it? Nuke weapon State Israel wants an apology for being accused of targeting by coordinated ground and air strikes which killed 4 UN observers in a long established post.

As I said quite precisely rogue nuclear Israel.

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