A Christian Zionist will be our new ambassador to Israel

(RNS) — Mike Huckabee’s theology about the end times may be unclear, but his views on today’s Israel aren’t.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee takes questions from the media, prior to laying a brick at a new housing complex in the West Bank settlement of Efrat, Aug. 1, 2018. President-elect Donald Trump plans to nominate Huckabee as ambassador to Israel. Trump said Tuesday that Huckabee is a staunch defender of Israel and his intended nomination comes as Trump has promised to align U.S. foreign policy more closely with Israel’s interests as it wages wars against Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty, File)

Mark Silk
November 13, 2024
(RNS) — You’ve got to hand it to President-elect Donald Trump.

After cuddling up to Muslims and winning more of their votes than his Democratic rival a week ago, he’s thrown them under the bus with an alacrity remarkable even for him. In a dream come true for Israel’s annexationist right wing, he announced Tuesday (Nov. 12) that his ambassador to Israel will be former Arkansas Gov. and Baptist minister Mike Huckabee.

From the Israeli right: “He’s a great friend to Israel,” said Yishai Fleisher, spokesperson for the Jewish Community of Hebron, on the West Bank. “We’re thrilled to have him.”

From America’s Arab American community: crickets.

It should surprise no one that Trump would send a pro-Israel evangelical Christian to the Jewish state. At the ceremony marking the opening of the American Embassy in Jerusalem in 2018, the clergy speakers comprised one American rabbi and two prominent evangelical ministers: the Rev. Robert Jeffress, senior pastor of First Baptist Church of Dallas, and the Rev. John Hagee, pastor of Cornerstone Church in San Antonio and founder of Christians United for Israel.

Huckabee has connections to this crowd. He made an appearance at Hagee’s church in December 2007, when Huckabee was seeking the Republican presidential nomination. That year, Hagee was dealing with the controversy he had stirred up in the evangelical world with “In Defense of Israel,” a book that rejected what’s known as supersessionism, the idea that “Israel has been rejected and replaced by the church to carry out the work once entrusted to Israel,” as Hagee explained in the book.

But Hagee called this notion that “the Jewish people have ceased to be God’s people, and the church is now spiritual Israel” a “misconception … rooted in the theological anti-Semitism that began in the first century.” It was time, he wrote, “for Christians everywhere to recognize that the nation of Israel will never convert to Christianity.”

So much, evidently, for the widespread evangelical belief that come the end times, Jews will return to Israel and many will convert and be saved.


Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee prays for political leaders at an American Renewal Project pastor luncheon in Henderson, N.C., Sept. 24, 2024. (RNS photo/Yonat Shimron)

What Huckabee himself believes about Judaism is not so easy to determine. Reporters covering his impressive 2008 presidential run — which included a victory in the Iowa caucuses — were able to come up with a tape of just one of the innumerable sermons he recorded during his 12 years as a Baptist pastor. In a 2010 New Yorker piece, he hedged on the question of end times Jewish conversion.

In 2008, he did say that “there’s really no such thing as a Palestinian” and that the notion of a Palestinian state is used as a “political tool to try and force land away from Israel.” Visiting the West Bank seven years ago, he said, “There is no such thing as a West Bank. It’s Judea and Samaria,” adding that “there’s no such thing as an occupation.”

He’s long been an advocate of a one-state solution (i.e., Israel) and, according to the AP, he recently said, “the title deed was given by God to Abraham and to his heirs.” That would be a reference to the 12th chapter of Genesis, where God says to Abraham, “Unto thy seed will I give this land.” Huckabee calls himself a Zionist.

“President-elect Trump has made an inspiring choice,” Hagee said in a statement from CUFI after Huckabee’s appointment was announced.

Speaking on Israeli Army Radio on Wednesday, Huckabee was asked whether Israeli annexation of the West Bank would be a possibility after Trump takes office in January. “Well, of course,” he answered. “I won’t make the policy, I will carry out the policy of the president.”

That policy is best characterized as Christian Zionist.

In Mike Huckabee, Israel will have a longtime friend and true believer as ambassador

(RNS)—The former Arkansas governor and pastor-turned-Fox News host has been a supporter of Israel since his first visit in the 1970s. He sees the growth of Israel as a sign that biblical prophecies are true.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee takes questions from the media, prior to laying a brick at a new housing complex in the West Bank settlement of Efrat, Aug. 1, 2018. President-elect Donald Trump plans to nominate Huckabee as ambassador to Israel. Trump said Tuesday that Huckabee is a staunch defender of Israel and his intended nomination comes as Trump has promised to align U.S. foreign policy more closely with Israel’s interests as it wages wars against Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty, File)

Bob Smietana, Yonat Shimron, and Jack Jenkins
November 14, 2024

(RNS) — Mike Huckabee’s journey to becoming the U.S. ambassador to Israel began 50 years ago.

The former Arkansas governor, presidential candidate and Fox News host first visited Israel with a friend on a tour of the Middle East not long after graduating from high school. “This is a place I’d never been, but I felt at home,” Huckabee said in a podcast interview at the National Religious Broadcasters convention earlier this year, about his experience as a teen.

“I felt an overwhelming spiritual reality of understanding this is the land that God has given to the Jews,” he told Paul Lanier, board chair of the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews, for the “Nourish Your Biblical Roots” podcast.

Huckabee said he began hosting his own tours of Israel in the 1980s and has visited the country more than 100 times. He’s a longtime supporter of pro-Israel groups like IFCJ — a nonprofit that seeks to strengthen ties between Christians and Jews and does humanitarian work in Israel — and has helped raise money for the group.

Huckabee has also long articulated staunchly pro-Israel political views. As a candidate for president in 2008, Huckabee said he believed there is “no such thing as a Palestinian,” according to CNN. He argued that the very concept of Palestinian identity is “a political tool to try and force land away from Israel.”

When he ran for president again in 2015, he held a fundraiser in one of the Israeli settlements in the West Bank, which are considered illegal under international law.

In his conversation with Lanier, Huckabee compared the origin of Israel to the founding of the United States, saying both were started by people who moved to a new land to find peace and security. He also said the growth of Israel since 1948 is like biblical prophecies come true.

“I’ve seen Scripture come to life,” he said. “The desert has bloomed before my eyes.”

If confirmed by the Senate, Huckabee may be the first political appointee — as opposed to interim career foreign service officers — to come to the U.S. Embassy in Israel from a group known as Christian Zionists, who back Israel for theological as well as geopolitical reasons. (The current U.S. ambassador is Jack Lew, an American Jew who served as secretary of the Treasury under Barack Obama.)



Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump talks with former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee during a roundtable at the Drexelbrook Catering & Event Center, Oct. 29, 2024, in Drexel Hill, Pa. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Many Christian Zionists are millenarianists — they view the creation of the modern state of Israel as a necessary precondition for the second coming of Jesus and the apocalyptic purification of the world in the end times. Israel, along with the occupied territories it captured in 1967, is considered given by God to the biblical patriarch Abraham, who is told in the Book of Genesis, “God will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you.”

Huckabee’s own biblical approach to Israel shows up in his habit of referring to the West Bank as “Judea and Samaria” — a way of signaling a belief that the land has always belonged to the Jewish people.

That divine patrimony, believers say, should shape how nations, including the United States, treat Israel and how individual Christians should view the nation. Over the past 30 years, evangelicals, including Southern Baptists like Huckabee, but also growing groups of charismatic nondenominational Christians, have duly formed strong alliances with Israeli leaders and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in particular.

They give more to Israeli causes than Jewish Americans do and have formed strong support groups. With 5 million members, Christians United for Israel, led by San Antonio pastor John Hagee, is thought to be the largest pro-Israel nonprofit in the United States. In 2017, when then-President Donald Trump moved the U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, the move was applauded by Christian Zionist supporters, and Hagee spoke at the dedication of the new embassy.

RELATED: What evangelicals say they want from a second Trump term

Mordechai Inbari, a professor of religion at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke, said Huckabee’s appointment as U.S. ambassador to Israel would be greeted “with open arms” by the Netanyahu government. “Huckabee belongs to the network of supporters of Netanyahu and his government among evangelicals and is considered to be a strong supporter of Israel,” said Inbari.

Huckabee was pressed by Israeli radio Wednesday (Nov. 13) on whether he believed the Trump administration would support annexation by Israel of the occupied territories, principally the West Bank, but also Gaza. He demurred but made it clear that he sees his job as following the decisions made by the president.

“There’s never been an American president,” he added, “that has been more helpful in securing an understanding of the sovereignty of Israel — from the moving of the embassy, recognition of the Golan Heights, and Jerusalem as the capital, no one has done more than president Trump and I fully expect that will continue,” Huckabee said.

Inbari, for one, didn’t think the new Trump administration would rush to see Israel annex the territories. Trump has shown a desire to expand the Mideast peace deal known as the Abraham Accords, inked in his first administration, to include Saudi Arabia. The accords, signed in 2020, normalized Israeli relations with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, and later Sudan and Morocco.

Israel and Saudi Arabia appeared close to a deal in 2023, but the negotiations were derailed by the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel. Saudi Arabia now insists it will only normalize ties with Israel if there is a pathway for a Palestinian state, which the Israeli government currently rejects.

“I think Trump would want peace with Saudi Arabia rather than Israel annexing the West Bank,” said Inbari. “And so I don’t think that this is something that’s going to happen.”

Yael Eckstein, president of the IFCJ, who traveled to Israel with Huckabee earlier this year to deliver humanitarian aid there, said the former governor has the best interests of the United States and Israel at heart and she views his new role as ambassador as a good thing.

“I think it’s wonderful news, not just for Israel, but for America and the entire world,” she said. “Because I think the stronger Israel and America are in their bond and relationship, the stronger the entire world is.”

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee prays for political leaders at an American Renewal Project pastor luncheon in Henderson, N.C., Sept. 24, 2024. (RNS photo/Yonat Shimron)

Luke Moon, executive director of the Philos Project, a pro-Israel group, likewise called Huckabee a good choice. Moon cited Huckabee’s past support for Israel and the fact that as an evangelical, he’s not involved in the internal politics of the American Jewish community.

Moon also said that the Oct. 7 Hamas attack and the war in Gaza — and the campus protests in the U.S. against that war — likely played a role in the 2024 election.

Whether people were voting for Israel or they were opposed to pro-Palestinian protesters on college campuses, said Moon, “either way I’ll take it.”

Brent Leatherwood, president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, said he was encouraged that Huckabee was one of the first ambassadors to be named by Trump.

“That shows that Israel is top of mind for President-elect Trump,” he said. “I think that is a good thing.”

Signature campaign for the freedom of Abdullah Öcalan in Latin America

Many institutions, organisations and individuals in Latin America have launched a signature campaign for the freedom of Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan.


ANF
BUENOS AIRES
Thursday, 14 November 2024

Following the call of several institutions, organisations and movements, including trade unions, feminist movements and political party representatives, a signature campaign was launched at the Latin American continental level within the framework of the ‘Freedom for Abdullah Öcalan, a Political Solution to the Kurdish Question’ campaign launched globally in October 2023. The campaign was announced at a press conference at the CTA-Autonoma Centre in Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina.

Many MPs, representatives of women's movements, social movements and trade unions attended the conference, where all participants expressed their common demand to take action for the freedom of Öcalan



The organisations that attended the conference and presented messages are as follows: PTP-PCR (Partido del Trabajo y del Pueblo y Partido Comunista Revolucionario) – Party of Labour and People and Revolutionary Communist Party; MST (Movimiento Socialista de los Trabajadores) - Socialist Workers’ Movement; PTS (Partido de los Trabajadores Socialistas) - Socialist Workers’ Party; Partido Obrero - Labour Party; Izquierda Socialista - Socialist Left; Gremial de Abogados - Lawyers' Association; Feministas Abya Yala; APDH (Asamblea Permanente de DDHH) - Permanent Assembly for Human Rights; CTA-Autónoma; Liga por los Derechos del Hombre - League for Human Rights; Encuentro Militante Cachito Fukman - Cachito Fukman Militant Meeting; Asociación Americana de Juristas - American Association of Jurists; Poder Popular - People's Power; Pañuelos en Rebeldía- Scarves in Rebellion.

Leandro Albani made a presentation about the genocide policies against Kurds in four parts of Kurdistan and drew attention to the prison policies of the Iranian state and the death sentence against Kurdish activist Warisha Moradi. He also stated that the dirty war policy of the Turkish state continues in Rojava and that genocide policies are being implemented against the people by destroying civilian areas such as hospitals, schools and food stores.

Speaking on behalf of the Kurdish women's movement, Aida emphasised the importance of Abdullah Öcalan to the Kurdish people.

Felipe, who connected to the conference via Zoom on behalf of ADM, drew attention to the third world war in the Middle East and the strategic importance of the Kurdish people and their geography in the middle of this war.

The conference participants emphasised that mere words are not enough and that actions are important for the freedom of Abdullah Öcalan.

82 organisations and 9 individuals from 10 countries participated in the signature campaign on its first day.

Internationalist Youth Communes protest in Berlin: Refuse the Third World War!

Activists of the internationalist youth communes covered the ‘Molecule Man’ sculpture in Berlin with a banner: ‘Refuse the Third World War– no medium-range missiles in Germany – no Eurofighters in Kurdistan’.


ANF
BERLIN
Thursday, 14 November 2024

On Thursday morning in Berlin, activists of the internationalist youth communes climbed the thirty-metre-high sculpture ‘Molecule Man’ in the Spree and hung a banner reading ‘Refuse the Third World War – no medium-range missiles in Germany – no Eurofighters in Kurdistan’.

According to the activists, they are protesting against the German government's war preparations and confrontational course, particularly towards Russia. The German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said at the NATO Summit that US medium-range missiles would be redeployed to Germany. The activists said that the decision would make Germany a target for Russia.

“The rich want war, the youth want a future!” the activists said, reacting to the approval of the sale of Eurofighter fighter jets to Turkey. The activists stated that Germany, with its support to the AKP-MHP regime, is a partner in the ongoing bombardment and occupation in Kurdistan.

‘We will refuse the Third World War!’

“Every day we have to watch as wars become increasingly brutal and human rights are trampled underfoot. The German government is making a profit from death. Whether it's supplying weapons to Israel or selling jets and tanks to Turkey for use in attacks on Kurdistan in violation of international law, Germany is a warmonger. We can no longer stand idly by. We will refuse the Third World War! We are rising up against the wars – worldwide,’ said Marie, a spokeswoman for the internationalist youth communes.



‘The German government is preparing for war’

Mark, an activist, said: “Young people in Germany don't want to end up at the front, riddled with holes like the Molecule Men. To date, almost one million Russian and Ukrainian soldiers have been killed or wounded in the war in Ukraine. The German population is also already feeling the effects of the war, with rising prices and an intensified domestic political situation having become part of everyday life. 100 billion euros have been invested in rearmament, while social benefits continue to be cut.”

“The German government is preparing for war by reintroducing compulsory military service and rearming Germany. This is the wrong approach, because we know that more soldiers and more weapons do not create peace. We need real solutions for the many crises of our time, not blind warmongering,” Mark continued.

Fighter jets for war crimes in Kurdistan

According to the statement, the activists have a clear idea of how solutions might look: “The self-determination of young people and a new democratic culture that goes beyond parliaments and into every school, university and company. In many places around the world, people are standing up to war and trying out new democratic paths through self-government, as in Kurdistan. Erdoğan is trying to destroy this with his illegal invasions of Syria and Iraq. Nevertheless, on Wednesday, Olaf Scholz agreed to the delivery of fighter jets worth four billion dollars to Turkey.”

Azad, an activist from Afrin who had to leave his home because of the Turkish occupation, said: “I fled from the war in Kurdistan and now I see how it is just beginning here in Germany. But whether in Kurdistan or Germany – people don't want war!”

KURD RESISTANCE 

DEM Party MPs protest the usurpation of municipalities in front of the Ministry of Interior

Deputies of the DEM Party protested in front of the Ministry of Interior in Ankara against the removal of Kurdish mayors from Office, warning of increasing lawlessness in Turkey.


ANF
ANKARA
Thursday, 14 November 2024, 15:12

Following the appointment of trustees to the municipalities of Batman, Mardin and Halfeti by the Ministry of Interior on 4 November and removal of the co-mayors elected in the 31 March local elections, protests continue in many cities of Kurdistan.

The Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) members of parliament protested in front of the Ministry of the Interior in Ankara against the removal from office of elected mayors and the appointment of trustees to the municipalities.



DEM Party Group Deputy Chairperson Gülistan Kılıç Koçyiğit stated that the AKP government has been carrying out a ‘coup’ against the will of the people since 2016 and has virtually abolished the right to elect and to be elected, especially for the Kurdish population.

At the last municipal elections on 31 March, the majority of the population showed the government the ‘red card’, said Koçyiğit and continued: “More than 70 percent of the country's population, including in the metropolitan cities, voted out the AKP government at the local level. The government was thus called upon to come to its senses, to return to democracy and the rule of law, and to respect the will of the people. In response to the threat of losing power, the AKP has once again resorted to the method of undermining the will of the electorate and appointing trustees, which has been in use since 2016. It started in Hakkari on 3 June, continued on 31 October in Esenyurt, and on 4 November, the anniversary of the 2016 coup against the HDP, the AKP woke us up with a new coup against the peoples of Turkey.”

Gülistan Kılıç Koçyiğit noted that they had already warned back in 2016 that the illegal removal of mayors from office would not be limited to Kurdistan: “In this country, every lawlessness is first tested in the Kurdish regions. All unlawful acts are first committed against the Kurdish people. But it should be known that the deprivation of rights of the Kurdish population is never limited to this region. Lawlessness spreads from there to all provinces and the whole country.”

The fact that no one in Turkey has taken to the streets to protest against the usurpation of Kurdish municipalities has led to the appointment of a trustee to the CHP-governed district of Esenyurt in Istanbul, said Koçyiğit and added: “Everyone must see this fact. Lawlessness is being practised against all the peoples of Turkey. It is a coup d'état against democracy in Turkey and a threat to us all.”

Appealing to the opposition, Gülistan Kılıç Koçyiğit stated: “Today we must stand side by side against this government, unite and defend democracy together. On the one hand, they say peace, on the other hand, they appoint trustees. The road to peace does not go through trusteeship. If all the peoples of Turkey stand side by side, if we build bridges of fraternity from Esenyurt to Hakkari, then we will defeat this ruling power, this fascism, and build a democratic republic in this country despite the AKP. Let us stand side by side, let us smash fascism hand in hand and shoulder to shoulder. Let us create the peace that the peoples of Turkey long for. Let us find a way to live together in an equal, free and democratic country.”

DEM Party calls on the KDP to end restrictions on their representatives in Kurdistan Region

DEM Party reacted against KDP's repression on its representatives in Hewlêr and said, “There can be no legal, political and moral justification for the expulsion of our representatives from Hewlêr by force and pressure.”


ANF
ANKARA
Thursday, 14 November 202


Hikmet Hatip, Aydın Yalvaç, Sıtkı Vakar, and Nasır Yağız, the spokespersons and officials of the HDP's Kurdistan Region Office in Hewlêr (Erbil), were forcibly placed into vehicles by the KDP's security forces and driven outside the boundaries of Hewlêr on 6 November. Without any official notice, the HDP representatives were taken in two separate vehicles and dropped off near the borders of Sulaymaniyah.

The Central Executive Committee (MYK) of the DEM Party released a written statement denouncing the expulsion of their representatives by the ruling KDP.

“We define the forcible transfer of our representatives from Hewlêr to Sulaymaniyah by the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and its affiliated forces, which holds the powers of the Iraqi Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), as a major setback for the future of Kurdish relations and democratic principles, and we follow this intolerant approach with regret. This dangerous step means sabotaging the ground for inter-party political dialogue and efforts towards national unity, which is the legitimate expectation of tens of millions of Kurds,” said the DEM Party statement, which further included the following:

“The DEM Party advocates the Kurdish people's struggle for freedom, democracy and peace under all circumstances. On this occasion, we need to remind that our predecessor HDP supported the independence referendum held in Southern Kurdistan (Northern Iraq) despite all kinds of pressure and criticism, while the regional states threatened it with starvation. Until just before the end of the resolution process, it was repeatedly stated that Hewlêr, like Amed (Diyarbakır), was the common home of the Kurds. Millions of Kurds do not expect political leaders to further divide and deepen the borders between Kurds as the hegemonic powers of the region want.

Relations between Kurdish political movements, wherever they are, must be based on mutual respect and direct dialogue. This is precisely the reason for the establishment of our office in Hewlêr. Unfortunately, the fact that our office in Hewlêr was made nonfunctional and its representatives were forcibly expelled from the city should be considered as a serious attack on the future of inter-Kurdish relations on the basis of unity.

We are always in favour of dialogue between political forces. On this basis, we call on the KDP to abandon this undemocratic and undiplomatic decision and to respect the political parties defending the democratic rights of the Kurdish people. There can be no legal, political and moral justification for the removal of our representatives from Hewlêr by force and pressure.

At the current stage, there has been no answer to our dialogue attempts with the KDP and KRG authorities for the solution of the problem, and no explanation has been made by those concerned as to why this anti-democratic attitude is preferred.”

The DEM Party listed their demands from the KDP and KRG as follows:

“Ending of the restrictions on our DEM Party and HDP representatives in Hewlêr,

Ensuring and guaranteeing the security of our official representation,

Keeping the channels of dialogue open without interruption on the basis of the principles of mutual respect and equality.”

HDP representatives in the Kurdistan Region expelled by the KDP

The spokespersons and representatives of the HDP's Kurdistan Region Office, who were forcibly expelled by the KDP, reported that the security forces told them, "You can no longer set foot in Hewlêr; go to Sulaymaniyah."


ANF
SULAYMANIYAH
Saturday, 9 November 2024, 08:33


Hikmet Hatip, Aydın Yalvaç, Sıtkı Vakar, and Nasır Yağız, the spokespersons and officials of the HDP's Kurdistan Region Office in Hewlêr (Erbil), were forcibly placed into vehicles by the KDP's security forces and driven outside the boundaries of Hewlêr.

Without any official notice, the HDP representatives were taken in two separate vehicles and dropped off near the borders of Sulaymaniyah.

The expelled representatives held a press conference at Azadî Park in Sulaymaniyah, sharing their experience with the public.

"They forced us into vehicles"

Hikmet Hatip, one of the HDP Kurdistan Region Office's spokespersons, said: "On 6 November, four of us from the HDP Kurdistan Region Office were summoned by the KDP security forces. They took our documents and placed us in two vehicles accompanied by 26 armed security personnel. They dropped two of us at the Simaqol checkpoint and the other two at the Dêgele checkpoint. We were told, 'You have no place in Hewlêr; go to Sulaymaniyah.' When we asked the reason for this treatment, we received no response."

Hatip continued: "The HDP Office was present in South Kurdistan within a legal framework. We have no legal or social problems. We recently had meetings with KDP officials, where we sat together. Even if there are any problems, we prefer to resolve them through dialogue and return to Hewlêr. We have families and have established our lives and businesses in Hewlêr. A delegation from the HDP will come to South Kurdistan to meet with KDP officials regarding this issue."

Rojava: Olive harvest threatened by Turkish attacks

The olive harvest has begun in Northern and Eastern Syria. Farmers in the Firat canton cannot go to their fields due to Turkish attacks, and the olives are in danger of rotting on the trees.


ANF
NEWS DESK
Thursday, 14 November 2024

,

The olive harvest has begun in Northern and Eastern Syria. Olives are harvested in the autumn after the first rain. Farmers in the Firat canton are very worried due to the ongoing attacks by the Turkish army.

Meryem Mihemed, a farmer from the village of Bûban near Kobanê, has already started harvesting in her olive grove. She has 600 olive trees. This plantation is enough to support a family. However, this year's yield is lower, she told ANHA.

Olive trees can be harvested every two years. Therefore, strong and weak harvests always alternate. This year should actually be able to have a good harvest. But due to the storms in the spring, the blossoms of the olive trees were torn off and only a few blossoms survived.

"Because of the attacks, we cannot harvest our olives"

The olive plantations in the Kobanê region are often located near the Turkish border with Northern Kurdistan. Due to the proximity to the border, Turkish soldiers prevent people from entering the plantations. Meryem Mihemed's field is also located in such an area. Mihemed told ANHA that people do not dare to go to their fields for fear of their lives. The constant Turkish artillery shelling is putting massive pressure on farmers and is aimed at forcing them to migrate.

ÖHD Amed Ecology Commission condemns ecocide in Cudi and Gabar Mountains


ANF
AMED
Thursday, 14 November 2024, 

In a written statement, the Association of Lawyers for Freedom (ÖHD) Amed Ecology Assembly condemned the destruction in the Cudi and Gabar Mountains of Şirnak (Şirnex). The statement said that expanding mining and oil drilling operations in the Cudi and Gabar mountains are contributing to escalating environmental degradation. The daily use of explosives for these activities is flattening mountaintops, destroying ecosystems, and threatening endangered species.

Large quantities of dynamite are used each day, resulting in significant damage to both land and water sources. Explosions have polluted underground water reserves, felled trees, and endangered local wildlife, particularly wild goats that rely on these mountains as a habitat.

'We will follow the ecocide'

The statement said that it was no coincidence that these regions, which have been depopulated and are often declared "Special Security Zone" since the 1990s, were subjected to ecocide, added: "The ecocide Qileban, Elkê and other regions and the deforestation of Kurdistan are narrowing down the living spaces of the Kurdish people and the living beings in the nature of Kurdistan. We will closely follow the process against this ecocide taking place in Kurdistan, where there is an intervention in the right to access clean air and clean drinking water, and to live in a healthy and balanced environment."

 

Announcing anarchist journal, "In Tension"

Nov

13

2024

comments

Received via email

Announcing a new anarchist journal from Bloomington, Indiana

The first issue can be found at InTension.noblogs.org

In Tension is a journal acting as a place for anarchist analysis, dialogue, and reflection on activity that extends beyond single subcultures, issues, and social groups. Intended for people beginning to learn what anarchists are fighting and creating as well as people who have identified with anarchism for decades, In Tension is a way for us to talk to each other and report actions, issues, and initiatives that are otherwise under- or un-reported. We are interested in promoting the practice of doing things for ourselves and connecting our struggles locally, regionally, and internationally. In Tension also functions as an archive of sorts, a way to foster collective remembering.

In Tension is published in so-called Bloomington, Indiana each season. We welcome submissions of actions, events, and analysis from different perspectives that hold true to an anti-authoritarian, anti-state, and liberatory lens.

Please keep submissions to a length of ~1500 words or fewer. Check our site for instructions on how to submit anonymously and securely. For other correspondence, reach us at InTension@riseup.net.

 

Militarism of Some Anarchists and Its Disparagies

Nov

14

2024

comments

We bring our thoughts on reformist and militarist tendencies in the Czech anarchist movement from the pen of the membership of the Ostrava Anarchist Federation, with which we agree.

After the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, some anarchists (as well as related left-wingers) have emerged with strange pre-war tendencies. Their defense is that they try to adapt anarchist ideas to the current political context, anarchism based on the original social-anarchist tradition. On the other hand, they accused sectarianism and dogmatism. If we take a closer look at these attitudes (most often promoted by AF) we will find that they contain eye-catching contradictions and are unsustainable for the long term because of ideological inconsistency.

The first of the contradictions is the alleged effort to "listen to the voices of the locals". But this would mean that the vast majority of Ukrainian men are willing to run to the trenches for the sake of the state. However, the reality is different. Millions of Ukrainians are avoiding the mobilization, only 650 000 of them fled abroad. (In Ukraine itself, he dropped a gun and ran away from his troops to 200 000 deserteders - note. TIME). Shouldn't pre-war anarchists listen especially to these voices? And if the goal of these anarchists is to defeat Putin's Empire by methods of conventional warfare, should the deserters not be forced to join the army by force, according to this logic? If so, how to do it? Appear deserters of the organs of state power? If participation in the army should be voluntary, then how can we add enough men to the frontline? Should AF join the government recruitment campaign from the comfort of a keyboard?

The questions we ask are, of course, rhetoric and much exaggerated; however, show that occupying reform posts carries with it unsolvable contradictions. Within the "effectiveness" of the fight against Putin's invasion, then logically, resignations of the social revolution must be followed (this would record Putin), silence about the crimes of the Ukrainian state (this would also record Putin) or a "temporary" stopping of criticism of the hierarchy of power or the exploitation of the working class. After all, any disunity of the "democratic" camp strengthens the enemy's position. Reformist anarchism then knowingly or unknowingly is getting into a false dichotomy "either you are with NATO or with Putin". As if there are no other ways to stop the war machinery.

By doing so we get to the second opposition, which is the way to fight war. Some anarchists believe that when they send money to build war infrastructure, they will help the Ukrainian army to victory, Russia capitulates and the war ends. This attitude makes no sense for several reasons. For example, the AF campaign, whose goal was to deliver an all-terrain vehicle to Ukraine, was spinning the war spiral rather than spilling sand into the war arena. In the solidarity collection they managed to collect 140 000 crowns, which is (in the Czech environment, where anarchism has a problem collecting a few hundred for membership contributions of its own organizations) somewhat suspicious. With the fact that normal operations nowadays have trouble making payments at the end of the month due to inflation, the question is--who sponsored the campaign so generously. However, let's imagine a hypothetical situation - the movement will finance a car, which will transport a few soldiers to the frontline and in a few days, an off-roader will end up shot in a ditch. What's next? Another collection? When we realize that the war industry swallows up several millions of crowns per day on both sides of the conflict, does such make sense at all considering the financial possibilities of the anarchist movement? Couldn't one hundred thousand be used effectively? What should be sent to the Russian association, which due to this financial lever burned down dozens of recruitment centers or derailed hundreds of trains with military material? Or support deserters on both sides of the conflict and show how pointless it is to point a gun at people we've never seen in our lives who have done nothing to us just because someone put us in uniform and told us to? And what about financially supporting anti-government hackers, who will attack Russian or Ukrainian military servers? When asked about which method of anti-war activities is more effective and meaningful, let everyone answer it themselves.

Imagine that a similar reformist proud anarchist movement had existed in 2003. These people would undoubtedly send the US army to Iraq by terrain cars, because Saddam Hussein is a dictator and suppresses human rights, and he invaded sovereign countries. George Bush would certainly be considered a controversial, but at least pro-Western and democratically elected politician. Sound a lot crazy to you ? So how is it possible that we are in an analog situation today?

"I always thought that people supported war until I found out that some don't have to." “
- IN Remark, paraphrased

Ostrava Anarchist Federation, November 2024

link: https://oafed.noblogs.org/post/2024/11/03/militarismus-nekterych-anarchi...

“The high cost of living in Martinique is the consequence of the colonial system”

Interview with Philippe Pierre-Charles

Wednesday 13 November 2024, by Ulysses, Philippe Pierre-Charles

A political, union and community activist from Martinique, he denounces the injustice of the high cost of living and economic practices inherited from colonialism in Martinique. According to him, high prices are due to local monopolies controlled by the béké caste (white Creoles descended from the first slave-owning settlers), which limit local production and impose uncontrolled profit margins. Although the general strike of 2009 made it possible to obtain some gains, such as a wage bonus and price reductions, these advances have been eroded, as large enterprises have resumed their exploitative practices.

Pierre-Charles also criticizes the current repression of social movements in Martinique. The dispatch of the CRS 8 , a special police unit, recalls the colonial history of repression. Police violence during recent demonstrations even led the Martinique Assembly to call for their withdrawal.

As spokesperson for the collective against chlordecone, Pierre-Charles campaigns for the recognition of the health scandal and compensation for the victims [1]. He emphasizes the importance of a reparation law to address the economic, health and environmental consequences of this pollution. For him, a mobilization in France is essential in order to push the state to recognize and repair this lasting poisoning that affects all of Martinique society. Our exclusive interview.

Can you introduce yourself and tell us what are your political commitments in the broad sense, today?

I am Philippe Pierre-Charles, I am a political, union and community activist. Union-wise, I was the general secretary of the Martinique Democratic Workers’ Centre (CDMT), which is one of the country’s major union confederations. Politically, I belong to the Révolution socialiste group. And I am in various associations, including one that is involved in the fight against chlordecone and is called Lyannaj pou depolye Matinik

The high cost of living in Martinique is a legacy of the exclusive system

The high cost of living is a structural problem in Martinique. What are the root causes?

Today, for food, the price differential with France is around 40 per cent. Overall, prices are 17 per cent higher on average.

The causes take us back to the colonial system. The colonial system restricted local production, organized everything around imports and where monopolies reigned supreme.. Local production was restricted because in the system of "exclusivity", the role of the colony was to provide materials that interested the metropolis. These were cane, sugar, cotton, etc.

This made local production very constrained. The colony was not allowed to produce a nail if the metropolis produced nails.

So there remains from this history, a certain number of very strong practices. This is why local production only contributes to 20 per cent of the population’s food. Added to this is the problem of the colonial caste that we call here the békés. They are former colonists, large landowners who reign over import-export. They make the law and set prices by reserving profit margins over which we have absolutely no control. All this combined makes the prices exorbitant.

Added to this are cyclical causes that are linked to the situation in the country. For example, the transition to the euro led to an increase in the cost of living. Then, events such as the war in Ukraine serve as pretexts for huge increases. Same thing for Covid. We end up in a situation where prices are high.

In the 1950s, there was a major strike by civil servants demanding a cost-of-living allowance. This movement resulted in a 40 per cent bonus for "metropolitan" civil servants [2]. but not for the rest of the population. The fight against the high cost of living is therefore an old battle that resurfaces regularly.

In 2009, there was a general strike against the high cost of living that shook Martinique. What did this general strike movement achieve and what are the limits that explain why a new revolt broke out fifteen years later?

The great strike of 2009 that shook Martinique and Guadeloupe was not only a strike against the high cost of living. It was a strike against what we called "profytasion", that is to say against exploitation and outrageous oppression. The demands concerned the high cost of living but also low wages, public services, and a whole series of popular causes. This movement, through its power, had made it possible to win a certain number of things. In Martinique as in Guadeloupe, the social movement had created a powerful negotiating position in the face of economic and political power.

The first victory was a 200 euro increase in salaries up to 1.4 times the minimum wage. Part of it was paid by employers, part by the state and part by local authorities. The second victory was a reduction in the price of basic necessities of around 20 per cent. This concerned 2,586 products, the list of which had been published in the press. Making this reduction effective was a real social struggle. Teams of union activists went to supermarkets to check that they were applying the right prices.

We also obtained price controls for the telephone, banking services, water and electricity. For example, for water and electricity, the first quantities, necessary for life, were cheaper than the following ones. Finally, we won on new principles: such as priority hiring for natives in the civil service, particularly in education, and full recognition of the Martinican trade-union movement.

Once the social movement weakened, we lost our negotiating position. Immediately, the large retailers took advantage of this to start raising prices again. Some employers began to contest the share they had to pay of the 200 euros. Finally, the benefits of this fight were eroded by the fact that the economic actors remained the same, the large retail groups did not change, and so they put the same practices of profytasion back in place.

Lessons from 2009: Victory is possible, but sustainable victory requires structural reforms

The first lesson to be learned from 2009 is that victories are possible when there is strong mobilization. The second is that for these victories to be sustainable, we must aim for structural reforms to give the people the means to influence economic and political power.

This is a very useful lesson for today’s movement . The memorandum of understanding that was signed by a certain number of actors, with the exception of the RPPRAC (Rally for the Protection of Afro-Caribbean Peoples and Resources, editor’s note ), which initiated the struggle, does not contain any sure means to guarantee its application. The protocol contains affirmations of principles.

It stipulates that the state must control the profit margins of large companies, that the territorial institution will set up a price control service. But there is no mechanism for the social movement, unions, and associations to take part in this control, nor any questioning of the principle of business secrecy. It will always be impossible to see what is inside the safes of big capital. It will therefore not be possible to formulate demands for sharing wealth that are in line with the possibilities.

This business secret is a taboo subject. Large-scale distribution permits itself not to submit its accounts as required by law. One of the major demands today for a certain number of bodies such as the CDMT (is the application of the principle of opening account books.

Repression has punctuated all popular struggles in Martinique

In September, faced with this revolt, Bruno Retailleau, the new Minister of the Interior, sent the CRS8, a special unit described as "warmongering" by a prefect. How is this response, mainly repressive, the continuation of a long history of colonial repression in Martinique?

In December 1959, a popular revolt broke out following a trivial traffic accident. The government called in the CRS. There were clashes for three nights. Three young people were killed. Even though they were not even taking part in the clashes. This triggered immense anger. A slogan appeared: "CRS out".

This movement was so powerful that even the general council (elected assembly) demanded that the CRS be re-embarked. And they won their case. Which means that Martinique has been free of CRS since 1959. The return of the CRS to Martinique imposed by Bruno Retailleau is therefore a very strong symbol.

Repression has punctuated all popular struggles in Martinique. From the beginning, the enslaved refused their condition. They revolted and were repressed. There were deaths during the insurrection that led to the abolition of slavery in 1848; when the abolition was imposed by a slave deputy, it was at the cost of blood.
Another insurrection took place in 1870, called the "Southern insurrection ", it ended in a real massacre, not only immediately but also afterwards; there were death sentences, and imprisonment in a penal colony. A real terror was installed which led to burying this revolt in popular memory for a long time.

Later, the workers’ movement, which was born among the agricultural workers, paid a heavy price during strikes. In February 1900, there were eleven victims when the army opened fire on the strikers. And since then, periodically, about every ten years, there have been repressed movements, in 1923, in 1953, in 1961… Each strike of agricultural workers became the occasion for a new massacre. The last one took place in February 1974, during which two strikers were killed.

In addition to the deaths, there were also legal proceedings , also during demonstrations. The colonial system was maintained through repression. Not only that, since the government also sought to lull the population into the assimilationist dream. What we are witnessing today is therefore the continuation of this colonial repression.

The CRS who arrived in September on the orders of Bruno Retailleau did not hesitate to provoke the people manning the roadblocks. We saw gassings and beatings that were out of proportion. In Carbet, even the mayor was gassed. On Friday, October 25, a demonstration was organized by the RPPRAC and the unions of the CGTM (General Confederation of Workers of Martinique) and the CDMT.

The procession was blocked when it arrived from the headquarters of the Bernard Hayot Group (GBH), one of the main companies engaged in mass retail distribution. The demonstration had been taking place peacefully since 1.30 pm. The blocking of the cortege led to a rise in tensions, then to the tear gas and batoning of the demonstrators by the CRS. This is the reality today. This is the reason why even the assembly of the Territorial Collectivity of Martinique demanded in a motion the departure of the CRS.

Chlordecone, a fight for truth, justice and reparation

Finally, you are the spokesperson for the collective to depollute Martinique. The appeal trial for chlordecone poisoning opened on October 22 in Paris. What is the objective of this collective, for which you are the spokesperson? Why is this qualification of poisoning essential in this trial and what are the impacts, the effects of chlordecone poisoning in Martinique?

The fight over the chlordecone issue is a multifaceted fight with three essential objectives. First, the truth. Up until now, there have been grey areas. We need scientific truth, we need research to develop.

Secondly, justice. It is not normal that a series of crimes of this type remain absolutely unpunished, without any penalty, as if there were no perpetrators. Emmanuel Macron once said that there was no state responsibility but a collective responsibility. The fact remains that nothing happened to the people who spread this product that was known to be harmful, dangerous, and probably carcinogenic. They are not even clearly named by the government.

The third part is that of compensation. It concerns the farm workers who are the first victims of this tragedy. But also the population which is largely impacted, with the explosion of cases of prostate cancer, endometriosis, and other diseases that we have not yet documented. But we already know that a series of diseases result from this.

Chlordecone has been recognized as an occupational disease but until now, there are only barely a hundred employees or families of farm workers who are compensated and in a very insufficient way.
We are demanding much broader compensation for all economic victims since the land, the water, the coastal sea, everything is poisoned. So all the jobs that are linked to these areas are affected and what exists as a means of reparation is practically non-existent.

Our collective is fighting for all three of these objectives. On the legal front, a series of associations have managed to file complaints since 2006-2007, even before the existence of Lyannaj pou depolye Matinik. When we saw the risk of dismissal , we launched a campaign to constitute civil parties for the population. Our collective is part of a broader movement, Gaoulé Kont chlordécone.

We managed to bring together 800 people who have joined as civil parties and who are therefore engaged in legal actions today. We are at a particular stage. In order to win their case, the lawyers have asked preliminary questions of constitutionality (QPC) to have it recognized that this constitutes poisoning even if there is no intention to kill.

The purpose of the trial on October 22 was to plead these QPCs. We await the result. If the questions are accepted, this will mean that the case will go before the Court of Cassation, which will decide whether or not to refer it to the Constitutional Council, which will say whether there is reason to review the existing case law on poisoning.

The complaint that was filed against the dismissal will only be examined following this process. It may therefore take time.

October 22 was also an important date in our fight since for the first time, there was a gathering in front of the court that brought together a hundred people. However, we are convinced that it is essential that we are joined by the workers’, democratic and progressive movement in France.
 [3]

As long as the state has the impression that this is a matter that only concerns the "colonial stables", it will always have contempt for our mobilization. We hope that popular mobilization grows throughout the country. We are convinced that this is necessary for us to win our case.

And we will also ultimately need a law that addresses the issue of reparations. Our collective’s demand is for a programme law. That is to say, not something cobbled together but a law that sets up a real reparation plan that takes into account all the economic, social, societal, scientific, medical and health aspects that this chlordecone problem poses.

It is a vast combat. It is rare for Guadeloupe and Martinique to mobilize over such a long period on the same problem. This proves that this problem is serious. All the efforts that have been made to create a diversion have never succeeded. Today, it is an essential fight for all Guadeloupeans and Martinicans.

November 11 , 2024

L’insoumission

Attached documents

• the-high-cost-of-living-in-martinique-is-the-consequence-of_a8738.pdf (PDF - 926.8 KiB)
  Extraction PDF [->article8738]

Footnotes

[1] Chlordecone is a highly toxic pesticide, which has been widely used in agriculture in Martinique and Guadeloupe

[2] “Metropolitan”civil servants are those directly employed by the French state.

[3] https://twitter.com/jlmelenchon/status/1472313740246855683

Martinique

• Martinique: ‘Our economy is based on a colonial model’.
• Martinique and Guadeloupe still in turmoil
• Martinique and Guadeloupe thrown into chaos by the French state
• The colonial nature of pandemic management in Martinique has accentuated the people’s mistrust
• No to the mask of censorship on police violence

• Philippe Pierre-Charles

  Philippe Pierre-Charles is a founder member of

• Ulysses

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