News Highlights:

• U.S. officials condemn Israeli settlement building in East Jerusalem, announced as U.S. VP Joe Biden is visiting the area.
• 3 Palestinian boys are detained and harassed by Israeli soldiers as they were gathering herbs near Hebron Al/Khalil.
• The siege on Gaza entered its 1000th day and Gazan officials comment on the increasing unemployment and lack of medical services.
• UN special rapporteur Richard Falk says the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah is trying to get him to resign and is impeding his reports critical of Israeli policies.

Feature:

A live interview with Jewish Canadian activist Ben Saifer, from Students against Israeli Apartheid at Carleton University in Ottawa. Ben explained first how he had personally become involved with supporting Palestinian human rights and then detailed the growth of SAIA as a student group on campuses. He talked about the Israeli Apartheid Week that had just happened, the response of some politicians to the event, and also emphasized how he felt open debate was the best strategy. Ben concluded by detailing the SAIA campaign underway to pressure Carleton University Pension Fund to divest from companies supporting Israeli occupation and militarism.

Focus on Zionism:

A March 9th, 2010 press release from the International Solidarity Movement about Israeli settler vandalism at the Palestinian village of Qarawat Bani Hassan.

Here is an audio file of this show:

News Highlights:

• Israeli Apartheid Week starts on university campuses in over 40 countries, as some Canadian politicians try to use their office to silence debate.
• Israeli forces storm the Al Aqsa compound in occupied Jerusalem, as tensions continue over Israeli demolitions of homes and expansion of settlements in East Jerusalem.
• Dubai’s police chief says suspects in the assassination of a Palestinian leader are hiding out in Israel.
• Israeli High Court will hear a challenge to a law that restricts Palestinian Israelis from bringing in their spouses.

Feature:

A live interview with Jewish American documentary filmmaker and activist Adam Shapiro about his new film series, “Chronicles of a Refugee” and his tour across N. America with the film. The series, which includes six parts, gives a voice to Palestinian refugees and their experiences globally over the last 61 years. The film is being shown on several university campuses as part of Israeli Apartheid Week and there was discussion about the Zionist attempts in Canada to shut down any public debate and criticism over Israeli policies.

Focus on Zionism:

Highlights of a February 25th, 2010 statement by 500 Montreal artists speaking out against Israeli apartheid and in support of the global Boycott Israel movement.

Here is an audio file of this show:

The Voice of Palestine was pre-empted this week and there was no show scheduled.

News Highlights:

• Israeli military forces increase checkpoint measures between Nablus and Ramallah, and near Bethlehem.
• Israeli authorities issue demolition orders to Palestinian shops in occupied East Jerusalem.
• Suspected Israeli Mossad hit squad used British and other European passports to assassinate Hamas leader in Dubai.
• U.S. Secretary of State Hilary Clinton recognizes “subsequent developments”, a move seen as allowing the Israeli government to hold on to major settlement blocs in the occupied West Bank.

Feature:

A live interview with Anna Baltzer, a Jewish American author and activist, who will be speaking at UBC the first week of March. Anna detailed the journey she had taken intellectually and personally that had shaped her political views on the oppression of the Palestinians. She also talked about her time with the International Womens Peace Service (IWPS) in Hares in the occupied West Bank and detailed her own personal campaign of encouraging Jewish people globally to renounce the Israeli Law of Return that automatically grants citizenship to any Jew who comes to Israel. Anna is coming to UBC at the invitation of SPHR to be part of the Israeli Apartheid Week there and will be bringing her book Witness in Palestine: A Jewish American Woman in the Occupied Territories.

Focus on Zionism:

Highlights of the February 16th, 2010 press release about efforts by the Israel lobby to shut down the Human Drama In Gaza Photo Exhibit in Montreal.

Here is an audio file of this show:

News Highlights:

• Dozens of Palestinians, including journalists, are injured as clashes continue with Israeli forces in and around Shufat refugee camp in occupied East Jerusalem.
• Palestinian farmers and internationals try to challenge the Israeli “exclusion zone” in northern Gaza, and reclaim 300 metres of private farmland.
• Israeli courts free two foreign nationals nabbed by Israeli military in Ramallah, as Israel increases its arrest campaign against both Palestinian and international activists.
• Palestinian ex-president Mahmoud Abbas agrees to the “proximity talks” being pushed by U.S. envoy George Mitchell.

Feature:

A live interview with Dr. Mads Gilbert from Norway, who had just recently returned home from a North American tour talking about his experiences in Gaza a year ago during Israel’s attacks. Dr. Gilbert explained that he and other colleagues had been supporting the Palestinian people for a long time and been active in Gaza with medical projects for several years. He detailed the horrific scenes he witnessed during Israel’s military invasion and the civilian injuries and deaths he and other doctors had to deal with. He also talked about his new book Eyes in Gaza, which should be out in English in May of this year, and said how pleased he had been with the response to his recent tour.

Focus on Zionism:

Highlights of a February 9th, 2010 statement from Students Against Israeli Apartheid SAIA at York Univ. about the racist intimidation of its activists by pro-Israeli groups, in particular the JDL.

Here is an audio file of this show:

News Highlights:

• Israeli attacks on Gaza last year have left a legacy of birth defects, possibly from exposure to white phosphorous according to doctors.
• Contrary to official Israeli denials, a huge bomb dropped by the Israeli airforce was defused at the Gaza flour mill last year as documented in the Goldstone Report.
• Israeli settler in occupied East Jerusalem threatens Palestinian family with M16.
• Israeli peace groups condemn right wing attacks on the New Israel Fund, which has been criticized for supporting human rights groups.

Feature:

A live interview with Jared Malsin, the English editor of the independent Palestinian news agency Maan, who was recently detained and deported by Israeli authorities. Jared, a Jewish American citizen, explained how Israeli officials grabbed him at the airport in Tel Aviv and then a week later deported him, after claiming “security concerns” had arisen. Many journalists feel that the Israeli actions were a pretext to retaliate for Jared’s reporting on Palestine, a move the Committee to Protect Journalists called “unacceptable”.

Focus on Zionism:

Highlights of a February 1st, 2010 Open Letter from Palestinian, Israeli and International Human Rights NGOs about the recent moves by the new leadership of Canada’s Rights and Democracy organization to de-fund and attack Palestinian human rights groups.

Here is an audio file of this show: