So the New York Times reported that Israeli Prime Minister has agreed to push for settlement freeze in the Palestinian territories. Whoa, did I hear that right? Read on.. WASHINGTON — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has agreed to push his cabinet to freeze most construction on settlements in the West Bank for 90 days to break an impasse in peace negotiations with the Palestinians, an official briefed on talks between the United States and Israel said Saturday evening. Ah, so Prime Minister Netanyahu only agreed to freeze MOST of their illegal settlements in West Bank. How many settlements are there in the pipeline? Only god knows. Secondly, there is no mention at all about the existing illegal Jewish settlements which has been in existence for decades in West Bank. And in order for America to get the Israeli regime to stop encroaching more Palestinian lands, in return "..the Obama administration has offered Israel a package of security incentives and fighter jets wo...

This is an old write up. First posted in my Facebook Note two weeks ago (16 June 2009). "Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu endorses creation of Palestinian state" - New York Daily Times "Netanyahu Answers 'Yes' on Palestine" - Washington Post In a quick glance, the headlines above does sound a little promising. But read on to understand what kind of Palestinian 'state' is Netanyahu endorsing. “Each will have its flag, each will have its anthem. The Palestinian territory will be without arms, will not control airspace, will not be able to have arms enter.” - Benjamin Netanyahu (15 June 2009, Times Online) Funny that of all things, the Israeli PM has to mention flag and anthem first while ignoring the basic and fundamental attributes of a state: sovereignty, territory, authority and population. A future Palestinian state is not fit to be recognised as a "state" - at least in the context of international politics - IF it does not fulfill the basi...

Some quotable quotes of Obama's inauguration speech taken from the Internet. " President Obama's first call 'was to President Abbas ' President Obama placed the Middle East at the forefront of his first hours in office yesterday as he sought to make good on his promise of “ushering in a new era of peace.” - Haber27.com "United States President Barack Obama is expected to sign an executive order Thursday to close the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba within a year ." - Bernama.com "Mr Obama, who was sworn in using his full name of Barack Hussein Obama, also spoke directly to those of the Islamic faith, seeking to separate Muslim moderates from Islamist extremists. During the election campaign, Mr Obama said he would travel to a Muslim country in the first 100 days of his presidency. Malaysia, Indonesia and Morocco are understood to be under consideration. " - Telegraph.co.uk Read President Obama's Inauguration Speech in full While I do not want t...

Prof. Dr. Chandra Muzaffar has yet again written an excellent piece of article in his NST Saturday column with regard to the Gaza air strikes by the Israeli regime. To understand the issues behind the Israeli onslaught better, Dr. Chandra has outlined at least five key points of the conflict, which according to him, the mainstream media has not highlighted. One, even after the so-called Israeli "withdrawal" from Gaza in August 2005, the Israeli army has conducted numerous raids and air strikes in Gaza in the name of fighting "terrorism" which have killed hundreds of civilians including women and children. These assaults intensified after Hamas captured the Palestinian Legislative Council in a free and fair election in January 2006. When Hamas ousted its rival Fatah from Gaza in June 2007, Israel went all out to destroy Hamas through military and non-military means. Two, in spite of Israeli attacks, Hamas, a few violations notwithstanding, observed its June 2008 truc...

"Change has come to America" - President Barack Obama. Congratulations to the newly elected American President Barack Hussein Obama. So long and goodbye, George Bush. While Bush will go down in history as the worst American President, Obama will be remembered as the first Black (he's actually half-White too) to enter White House. Coming home to Malaysia, if there is one thing that our local politicians could learn from the US Presidential election is that we should immediately close rank and work together for our country after the election is over. I commend John McCain's congratulatory message to Obama, when he said " we must work together to get this country moving again ". But here in Malaysia, what happened was totally the extreme opposite. Right after the 8 March general election, our famous opposition leader was already began planning to topple the elected BN government through undemocratic means - defections from ruling party MPs. Something which is ...

..Lat & Easy: US Presidential hopeful, Barack Obama in Malaysia? In previous blog entry , I missed out another one of the most important feature in the NST; Lat's cartoons. Picture above is one of Lat's weekly cartoon in the NST. It features Democrat presidential candidate, Barack Obama, paying a visit to Malaysia (?) Unlike Lat's other caricatures, this one really took me a while to understand the underlying message behind it. It looks pretty straight forward - Obama entering a Malaysian house with all his supporters holding banners and placards standing outside the door, the Atuk turning on the tv news, one Indian lady shouting, "Eh, Obama..!" and the surprise face from the rest of the people in the house. One character slightly missing here is the Secret Service agent on the far right, wearing sun glasses. Whatever it means, one thing's for sure, it shows that Obama's popularity has reached our shores. He is definitely the more popular candidate co...

I've finally finished reading Jimmy Carter's book (left). It is definitely worth reading I would say. The book is written in an autobiography style based on Carter's experience in propagating peace in the Middle East as President of USA in late 70s to date. As a short review of the book, it is clear that it is the Zionist Israeli government (I shall mention Zionist Israelis here as there are a few minority group of peace loving Israeli citizen and Jewish rabbis who are against the Israel's imperialism policy in Occupied Palestine) who does not want to establish peace in the Holy land, because peace means; withdrawal of Israeli armed forces in the occupied Palestinian territories and the dismantling of the illegal settlement in Arab lands in occupied Palestinian territories. If this were to happen, it would halt the Zionist goal of creating a 'Greater Israel' comprising the current state of Israel plus the West Bank, including the whole of Jerusalem (Baitulmaqdi...

Below is an interesting piece of letter which I'd like to share with here. Thanks to Malaysia-Today columnist, Azly Rahman for sharing this letter in his column. Leading US Presidential candidate, Sen. Barack Obama wrote that letter to clear up the misunderstandings about his family Muslim background. He has been accused of being a Muslim, even though he admitted that he's been attending a local church for the past 20 years. He was also accused that he studied at a fundamentalist Muslim school or madrassa in Indonesia ( a pathetic claim to suggest that he's a Muslim extremist?? ) and all sort of ridiculous accusations made up by some conservative rivals. Regardless of all that, I personally feel that it would be great to have someone with a better understanding of the Muslim worldview to sit in the White House. Let's wait for the Presidential race to be over. Read up.. The Muslim heritage of my family Barack Hussein Obama There has been a lot made in the recent weeks a...