The Iraqi government proclaimed it ‘National Sovereignty Day’ and partied like it was God’s birthday. The manufacturing of national holidays propagated with contrived symbolic meaning is eerily familiar.

Still, if anything, this occasion gives Iraqis something to celebrate. And God knows they need something. Bankrupt American policies such as the crushing sanctions — with United Nations complicity — since 1990, and the heartless invasion, added more misery to the tyrannical governance for the Saddam Hussein regime.

However, it is too soon to celebrate too much. Withdrawal plans ahead, framing it as a full withdrawal by the end of 2011, are less a liberation of Iraq from American control than they are a ‘de-surge,’ a redeployment of less troops, or ‘advisers,’ to maintain control over Iraq. While 130,000 remain now, after the full withdrawal, tens of thousands will likely stay behind (though the government is vague about the number).

While even Defense Secretary Gates expects isolated acts of violence as troops are moved around, the temptation by Americans to keep its hand in Iraq would back-fire over the long-haul. Iraq, unlike Saudi Arabia, will not tolerate an embedded American hand for too long.

With the American right waiting for any hint of policy failure, the Obama administration will likely play it safe by overplaying the American presence of Iraq. While that may give short-term political benefits, it will not survive, as no country can sacrifice its sovereignty for long without major destabilization.

In an update on movement and access in the West Bank released by the UN’s Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) today they report that the infrastructure of several checkpoints continue to exist and some checkpoints continue to be manned by IDF soldiers.

According to the report, in Nablus only one (Asira Ash Shamaliya checkpoint) of the seven checkpoints controlling access to the city is no longer staffed on a permanent basis and only partial infrastructure has been removed. However, two gates near the checkpoint remain in place and Israeli soldiers continue to perform randoms checks there.

In Qalqilya, one of the two checkpoints there was completely dismantled while the other has its infrastructure still in place.  Israeli soldiers occasionally man that checkpoint.

The Atara checkpoint near Ramallah still has most of its infrastructure still in place.  That’s contrary to what the IDF said in the first week of June in which they claimed the checkpoint will be completely dismantled. OCHA reports that random searches continue to occur there “for several hours every week.”

Even with the news today that the Hawara checkpoint will be opened to Palestinian foot traffic, IDF soldiers will continue to man the checkpoint and carry out random searches.

So, there seems to be a pattern involving these “easing of restrictions” that the IDF is carrying out. They’re allowing people and vehicles to move somewhat easily but at the same time they continue to conduct random searches whenever they see fit.

Is this a real improvement? Let’s put these measures in perspective.  According to OCHA, there are currently 613 “closure obstacles” within the West Bank.  This is after the recent changes taken by the IDF.  Of those obstacles, 68 are permanently staffed checkpoints.  522 are “unstaffed obstacles,” which include roadblocks, earthmounds, earth walls, road barriers, road gates and trenches and 23 are “partial checkpoints.”

All of these 614 “obstacles” do not include the checkpoints along the Green Line that also include access to East Jerusalem. They also do not include the additional 84 obstacles in the city of Hebron, the 63 “Barrier gates” and the random “flying” checkpoints that take place all across the West Bank.

These so-called improvements are just a drop in the bucket.  They’ve provided only marginal relief to some parts of the West Bank.  It’s going to take the complete removal of checkpoints and IDF soldiers to seriously improve the lives of Palestinians in the West Bank.  However, I won’t hold my breath.

Applebaum’s piece is problematic for a number of reasons aside from the obvious (which is to say that, while shooting protesters and clamping down on free speech are fundamentally wrong, the elections themselves are still contested).  From the opening paragraph, in which she invokes the all-too-common cliché of non-headscarf wearing Muslims “[not looking] out of place in New York or Paris” to her claims of Morocco entering a new era of democracy, Applebaum demonstrates her total ignorance of the Maghreb and the Arab world on the whole.

Take this sentence, for example:

“…unlike most of its Arab neighbors, the country has over the last decade undergone a slow but profound transformation from traditional monarchy to constitutional monarchy, acquiring along the way real political parties, a relatively free press, new political leaders—the mayor of Marrakesh is a 33-year-old woman—and a set of family laws that strives to be compatible both with sharia and international conventions on human rights.”

Anyone with an iota of knowledge on Moroccan politics can see the flaws in this paragraph; from the recent elections, in which the newly created Modernity and Authenticity Party, or P.A.M. (dubbed the “King’s Party”), closely linked to the royal palace, managed to sweep 22,158 seats to the three journalists arrested and fined for insulting the tyrannical leader of Libya, it doesn’t take a genius to see that Morocco is not a prime example of democracy, nor a model for Iranian reform.

In fact, Morocco’s own human rights record is deeply flawed.  Despite substantial changes from the “Years of Lead,” Morocco continues to oppress Saharawi citizens (be their true nationality Moroccan or Saharawi, it should be relatively undisputed that they are not treated well by the state), suppress Amazigh activists by outlawing their language in schools and requiring their children be given Arab names even abroad, and persecute converts to other religions.  Furthermore, Morocco almost certainly harbors CIA rendition sites, as has been testified by former Guantanamo inmates, and almost always turns the other cheek to Israeli and United States imperialism.

Applebaum also brazenly suggests that perhaps, had the Iranian revolution not occurred, perhaps Iran could have followed a similar path to Morocco, saying, “One thinks wistfully of the shah of Iran and of what might have been.”  It’s as if she forgets, or is completely unaware, of the human rights violations and general atmosphere of oppression under Pahlavi.

Lastly, Applebaum’s assertion that “the Arab world lacks the political will to change” reeks of Obamania.  Doubtless there are a number of Arab countries in which rigged elections, oppression of citizenry, and lack of freedoms are rampant, but the meme that democracy and capitalism are the only way (not to mention the United States’ hypocritical views toward democratic elections in the Middle East) is getting old.  Change, if it is to happen, needs to come from within, and will not occur thanks to Western journalists, nor Twitter users changing their icons green, nor United States imperialism.

The first angered me. It is a tabloid expose about Obama’s supposed “top secret” meeting with “Muslims.” It refers to a “shocking pact with the enemy.” I love how this garbage rag equates “Muslims” with “the enemy.”

I know few people take these publication seriously (I hope), but our grocery lines should not be polluted with such racist trash.

The second amused me in a very juvenile way but then inspired deeper thoughts. “Why Angelina is Hiding the Twins” it reads. Naturally, “twins” evoked the slang term for breasts — yes, I am part ignoramus.

My second thought was why the hell should the public have access to stars’ children? The rapacious voyeurism of such celebrity media is quite disturbing. However, I reasoned, that this is the cost of stardom; there has to be a down-side and this is it. With all the privilege, influence and money they get, celebrities sacrifice their and their families’ privacy; so it’s a trade-off of sorts, and one that reflects poorly on star-stalkers, our celebrity-worship culture, and the celebrities themselves.

The official street signs are trilingual, with the name in large Hebrew letters, followed by smaller Arabic script and then larger English lettering.

Some ultra-nationalists have gone around plastering Hebrew signs over or defacing the Arabic script in order to deny the Arab character of Jerusalem.

Peace activists are re-making the Arabic script by putting placards with the Arabic names over the right-wingers’ blots and political stickers. They call it “Re-Facing Jerusalem.”

The activists declared, “None of us are Arab or Muslim, but we all recognize the importance of shared existence, and are committed to the principle and reality of Jerusalem as a shared city.”

While I applaud this simple and practical activism as an assertion over the exclusionary preferences of the hardcore Zionists, it did strike me as incongruous that the street names they plastered in Arabic were sometimes tributes to the most hardcore Zionists.

For instance, they fixed the Arabic part of Jabotinsky street, which was named after Ze’ev (Vladimir) Jabotinsky, the founder of the terrorist force, the Irgun, and a Zionist revisionist who proposed building a figurative “Iron Wall” between early Zionist settlers and Palestinians — essentially laying the ideological grounds for apartheid Israel. This is perhaps to focus on the symbolic and historical too much, I admit.

If Israelis and Palestinians are to have a shared future, it is clear that cross-cutting activism of this sort is needed, particularly that which undermines the power of Israeli apartheid.  While this project itself may not subvert that completely nor directly, it is one small tactic among many more that are needed; and it’s spirit is to be commended.

[tarboush tip: Carlos]

At the Sha’ar Efraim checkpoint in Tulkarem, the private Israeli security firm that runs the checkpoint (privatizing the occupation) imposes strict limits on the food Palestinians can carry with them when crossing through. The company’s policy bans the following items:

• Large bottles of frozen water and large bottles of soft drinks (they could be used in mentos rockets),
  
• home-cooked food (the hell?),
  
• coffee and tea (payback for any Starbucks boycotting)
  
• zaatar. That shit is indistinguishable from marijuana after all.
  

The security company also dictates the quantity of items allowed:

• Five pitas,
• one container of hummus and canned tuna,
• one small bottle or can of beverage,
• one or two slices of cheese,
  
• a few spoonfuls of sugar,
  
• and 5 to 10 olives. The exact amount depends on the mood of the Israeli guard, but its important that the Palestinian not try to cross with less than 5 olives.
  
• Workers are also not allowed to carry cooking utensils and work tools.This is just cultural sensitivity, because Arabs like to eat with their hands.

Of course, there is an excellent reason for such exclusively Israeli assholishness. According to the company, these insane restrictions are imposed due to ’security and health risks’. Now who on earth saw that coming?

Honestly though, such policies might be good for Palestinians in the long run. Now those in the West Bank can understand some of what their brethren in Gaza have been going through with the Israeli-imposed limits on their food intake. Perhaps such empathy will make national conciliation easier. In the meantime, its definitely making it easier to prove how much of a prick Israel is.

This is the direct outcome of Israel’s continued siege on Gaza — an unjustifiable regime of collective punishment that must be ended immediately.

While the Arab states play with their toes, activists are taking Israel’s crushing embargo on directly. The Free Gaza boat, the “Spirit of Humanity,” departed Cyprus at 7:30am this morning.

Twenty-one human rights and solidarity workers representing eleven different countries were aboard. The passengers include Nobel laureate Mairead Maguire and former U.S. congresswoman Cynthia McKinney. The ship also carries three tons of medical aid, children’s toys, and rehabilitation and reconstruction kits for twenty family homes.

Though the amount of supplies on the boat is far from enough to address the needs of Gazans, it is powerful symbolically. These voyages are a powerful message that Israel’s punitive measures against all the people in Gaza is intolerable.

While other attempts in their seven previous voyages have been successful, including an overland aid convoy from Europe and a previous ship, the Israeli navy rammed one several times and fired upon another, forcing it away.

McKinney challenged the American government to follow suit: “the U.S. should send a message to Israel reiterating the reported White House position that the blockade of Gaza should be eased, and that medical supplies and building materials, including cement, should be allowed in … Will [President Obama] stand by his own words and allow us to provide relief for Gaza or will he back down?”

Such grassroots agitation for the basic human rights of the Palestinians in Gaza can go a long way towards disturbing the institutionalized disregard for their lives in the foreign policies of western capitals. These activists need to be supported and joined by the rest of us. And we must not forget Gaza.

Michael Jackson clearly was a global superstar. In this video, Saudi dancers are set to ‘Smooth Criminal.’ This will change your life…

[tarboush tip: Programmer Buydatti]

The rumors had been floating around since Dennis Ross moved into the White House last week. At the time, officials refused to give any details of his new assignment, but it was clear his role had changed and that he was the latest addition to the National Security Council. He used to report to Secretary Clinton; now he will be reporting directly to Barack Obama. Looking back to last year’s AIPAC convention, one can see why that is not a good thing.

But it’s done – Ross has moved up a notch. Whether or not the former special adviser on Iran was sidelined at the State Department seems irrelevant now – he has arguably become the closest Mideast adviser to the president.

This is bad news for all of us who care about Palestine and the general well-being of the “central region” Ross will be overseeing. Afterall, he is little more than an Israeli henchman, someone who has no business dealing with crucial foreign policy areas like Iran and the Middle East, not now. While various pundits and media outlets have credited him with orchestrating Washington’s new policy on Iran, he really doesn’t seem to have done very much at all. Nevertheless, Ross is well regarded among the political elite in this country. Early on in the transition process, there were concerns that he’d end up with a senior position in the administration. It took some time and some unusual circumstances, but that is what has ultimately happened.

According to certain senior administration officials, Obama has not been satisfied with his National Security Adviser and he wanted “a recognized strategist in the political and diplomatic sphere” with long-term vision. Either the president truly believes Ross is the man for the job, or there is a money trail that leads straight to supporters of Israel. Whatever the truth is, it all seems very sad.

If anyone actually believes that Dennis Ross can have a positive impact on US foreign policy, I’d be very curious to hear why…

I always thought of him as one-part human, one-part entertainer extraordinaire and one-part walking testament to the excessive and cruel social-psychological trauma of our rampant and often masochistic celebrity-worshiping culture.  Today, we definitely lost the human.

It may be inappropriate so soon, but I would like to share with you some of the posts we’ve had in the past about Michael Jackson.

Many of our jokes were cruel, juvenile and unkind. There is something about celebrities — especially in our celebrity-obsessed culture — that makes them seem larger than life, and thus fair game for our worst insults. This list is in that tradition, sadly and admittedly. Much of it seems less clever now, if it ever was. Perhaps he lived to entertain the critics as much of his fans, but in different ways.

I share this list keeping in mind that he was ultimately human and we all were probably fans at one point… and am today, again.

1. Yes, he was mocked incessantly, to the point of cliche, about his pedophilia. I fell victim to this theme’s overuse in a May 26th, 2005 post mocking our spectacle-driven media: “Earlier today, I was seduced by Michael Jackson at a Wendy’s near Neverland.” Not funny, I know.

2. A few months later, I suggested the King of Pop as a potential Supreme Court nominee:

Jacko — Since Michael Jackson has spent so much time in court, he knows as well as anyone what a judge does on the job. Judge Scalia could come by his place for a sleep over. Heck, he could be the new Bubbles.

3. On November 30th, 2005, as rumors circulated that Jackson converted to Islam, I wondered “if this means Jackson will perform for the insurgents in Iraq?” Clearly, he did not.

The post meandered to accusations of Jackson’s anti-Semitism. The best part of the post was a comment left by Master Splinter:

Do you remember that scene in Three Kings when that really pissed of Iraqi dude, Captain Said, tied Mark Wahlberg down to a chair and started pouring petroleum down his throat? Remember what he was saying?

Capt. Said: What is the problem with Michael Jackson?

Then Wahlberg was like, “What do you mean?” And Capt. Said somthing like, “You know King of Bob HEEEWHOO! What kind of society is so sick that it make a black man want to chob ub his face too look white?”

Perhaps Mr. Jackson took a liking to how he was used as a metaphor for the Americanization of other cultures…

4. More on Jackson’s quest for whiteness. Nabeel, a former KABOBer, wrote about the French face transplant surgery in late 2005. In the post, he linked that and Michael Jackson the most famous life-support cases in U.S. history:

It turns out that last year the very same team of French surgeons offered to transplant Terri Schiavo’s face over to Michael Jackson; fulfilling Jackson’s dream of becoming a white-woman, while also satisfying the Right to Lifer’s goal of saving Terri. Kudos to the French. They couldn’t figure out how to ‘transfer’ their ’superior’ French culture into Africa, but they can make Michael Jackson white.

Knowing Nabeel, this was likely as fictionalized as it was sick.

5. More on Jackson’s path to Islam. In a January 25th, 2006 post, Fadi called Jackson the “Sheikha” of Pop in response to a photo of Jackson wearing an abaya in his then-home, Bahrain. He became “a reclusive resident of the Gulf island country since being cleared of child molestation charges.”

6. Laith did not strive “to promote guilt by association,” but asked what “is a worse reflection on a country by an off-kilter American pop star?”

Michael Jackson’s move to Bahrain

or

Whitney Houston’s and Bobby Brown’s interest in Israel

7. Former KABOBer Nadeem pointed out that the King of Pop had ties to another Gulf country on December 28th, 2006:

Heavy tabloid readers may recognize Dubai as one of Michael Jackson’s favorite overseas homes. However, in addition to hosting the itinerant King of Pop, Dubai is also a major business hub in the Mideast, and is world famous for its massive real estate projects like the heavenly aesthetic Palm Islands.

8. In 2008, Kalash wrote “about the latest lawsuit facing Michael Jackson – a Bahraini prince paid him millions of dollars for an album and book that were never produced.” Kalash pointed out that Michael “changed his name to Mikaeel.”

9. The King of Lists, the Hanitizer, found an Arabic singer who out-weirds MJ. He wrote,

I found myself wondering if there is an Arabic singer who can compete with Michael Jackson’s bizarre behavior and spiritual flirtations. I found one.

Dolly Shahine, the half-Lebanese, half-Brazilian hybrid star, may be the closest.

10. The pop singer brought to Kalash’s mind a certain Arab leader. “I have mixed feelings about Muammar Qaddafi. There’s a certain quality about him that reminds me of Michael Jackson…”

11. When King Hamad bin Issa al-Khalifa of Bahrain “officially extended a warm invitation to any expartiate Bahraini Jew to return to the Arab kingdom,” I pondered if it is connected to their government’s falling out with Jacko:

Is it just a coincidence or did this new openness come at about the same time that the royal family had its falling out with previous Bahrain guest, Michael Jackson… Perhaps, they remembered Jackson’s famous lines, “Jew me, Sue me” and “Kick me, Kike me,” in his song, “They Don’t Care About Us.” They thought replacing Jacko with some Jews would be sweet revenge.

12. Most recently, in fact, just on Tuesday, The Hanitizer posted an image of MJ in his critique of the Arab fetish for whitening creams…