News Highlights:
- Israeli airstrike kills 7 in Gaza and a Palestinian suicide bomber kills one person in Dimona, the town where Israel’s nuclear reactor is located.
- Palestinian worker dies of a heart attack at an Israeli army checkpoint near Ramallah.
- Israeli army kills one Lebanese civilian and kidnaps another on Feb. 4th.
- Egypt re-opens the Rafah border crossing after attempts to close it resulted in serious clashes, with one Palestinian killed and over 40 injured.
- Hamas officials say the Rafah border should be under Palestinian-Egyptian control, as Mahmoud Abbas still refuses to open dialogue with Hamas.
- Israeli Apartheid Week, which started in Canada in 2004, is taking place this year in 25 cities around the world, including in Palestine.
Feature:
An in studio conversation with Tom, a volunteer with the International Solidarity Movement – Vancouver, who recently returned from a trip to Palestine. Tom spoke about this trip, his 3rd, and compared it with previous ones and explained why he keeps going back. He noted that the situation was much more desperate for the Palestinian population this time and talked about his experiences in the village of Azzun which was raided several times by Israeli soldiers while he was there. The co-hosts asked about the impact of all of this on the Palestinian children and also how people viewed the visits of western officials, like U.S. President Bush and Canadian FM Bernier.
Focus on Zionism:
Highlights of a February 3rd, 2008 article in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz about how the U.S. Methodist church is continuing its moves for divestment from Israeli occupation.
Here is an audio file of this show: