This is an "app" I made that links directly to Freecycle.org. I made it because I couldn't find one in the app store.
I know it says it's for San Antonio, but it's not. It's the main site - I just couldn't change the name after it was saved.
15 December 2012
Freecycle App for Android phones
05 December 2012
01 December 2012
Hell in Gaza - And You're Paying For It
Washington (CNN) – A majority of Americans say that Israel's current military strikes against Gaza are justified, according to a new national survey.
A CNN/ORC International poll released Monday indicates that 57% of the public says Israel is justified in taking military action in Gaza against Hamas, with one in four saying the attacks are unjustified.
According to the survey, nearly six in ten say their sympathies are with the Israelis, with 13% saying they side more with the Palestinians and 11% saying their sympathies are with neither side in the conflict.
"That's nothing new," added Holland. "The number of Americans who sympathize more with the Palestinians has never been higher than 18% since the question was first asked in 1988. Sympathies for Israel have sometimes dipped below 50%, but have been over that mark for the past eight years."
At the risk of sounding like an asshole, I have to mention my theory on the real reason for peoples need to support Israel. It's the same reason most white people (in the US at least) watch their language around black people. They don't want to seem racist or, in this case, anti-semitic. It's been pushed so deeply into our subconscious, that we don't even realize it most of the time. It's a mixture of fear, pity, and guilt over events in history that many of us weren't alive for and have never participated in. Hitler invaded almost every country in my ancestry, and there's even a chance I have some Jewish in me, but I don't feel the need to support them for doing the same damn thing. 2000 years of persecution is not an excuse to knowingly kill innocent people - many of which are children.
(Since November 8, Israel has killed at least 93 Palestinians in the occupied and besieged Gaza Strip. At least 64 Palestinians killed were civilians, including at least 21 children. (Source: Palestinian Centre for Human Rights) In addition, three Israeli civilians were killed by a Palestinian rocket.)
1. Gaza is under siege: This is not a symmetrical fight. The 1.7 million people in Gaza are living in an open-air prison, denied many of their most basic rights, including the rights to adequate food and clean water, housing, and sanitation, by a military superpower enforcing an illegal blockade that the U.N. has deemed to be illegal. Until the Palestinian people are able to exercise their human rights, we cannot expect to see a lasting ceasefire or peace.
2. U.S. role: American tax-payers are funding Israel’s attacks on Palestinians in Gaza, in violation of the U.S. Arms Export Control Act. We are not funding Hamas. The U.S. must immediately end its complicity in Israel’s gross human rights abuses.
3. Action: Knowing is not enough. We need to do something – to raise our voices and protest U.S. complicity in these brutal attacks. This is a major opportunity to build your local (or national) efforts, as public outrage grows. Make sure to publicize your activist community and how people can get involved, by challenging the Obama administration and through boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) campaigns in response to calls for solidarity from Palestinians.
The Siege & International Law:
All countries and peoples living under military occupation have the right of self-defense. However, international law forbids the targeting of civilians in hostilities. Moreover, Israel is employing disproportionate force to injure and kill Palestinian civilians and destroy Palestinian infrastructure not in self-defense, but in furtherance of its illegal blockade and siege of the Gaza Strip. In 2011, U.N. human rights experts concluded that Israel’s policies toward the Gaza Strip constituted collective punishment and were a “flagrant contravention of international human rights and humanitarian law.” (Source: Reuters.)
Timeline:
* Israel began the violence on November 8, following a two-week period of quiet, when it invaded Gaza. During an exchange of gunfire, Israeli troops shot 13-year-old Ahmed Younis Khader Abu Daqqa in the abdomen while he was playing soccer. Ahmed died later from his wounds. (Source: Institute for Middle East Understanding and Palestinian Centre for Human Rights.)
* On November 12, Palestinian militant groups agreed to a truce if Israel ceased military operations. Israel responded to this offer by engaging in an extrajudicial assassination of Hamas leader Ahmed Jabari on November 14, sparking the current round of violence. An Israeli peace activist was negotiating with Jabari a permanent truce between Israel and Palestinian militant groups when he was assassinated. (Source: Institute for Middle East Understanding and Ha’aretz.)
* On November 18, an Israeli airstrike on the crowded residential neighborhood of Naser in Gaza City killed at least 12 people, including at least 10 members of the Al-Dalu family, many of whom were children and women. (Source: Los Angeles Times.)
Your tax dollars hard at work.......
The U.S. Role:
* The United States is complicit in and responsible for Israel’s grave human rights abuses of Palestinians. The United States provides weapons to Israel at U.S. taxpayer expense. In the 2000s, the United States gave Israel more than 670 million weapons, some of which are being employed now to injure and kill Palestinian civilians. In addition to funding offensive weapons for Israel, the United States is also funding for Israel the Iron Dome anti-missile system. By providing Israel the weapons to both attack Palestinians and shoot down Palestinian rocket fire, the United States is making it virtually cost-free for Israel to escalate its attacks on Palestinians. (Source: US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation, here and here.)
* U.S. diplomacy is contributing to, rather than ending, the violence. The Obama administration is giving Israel a green light to continue its attacks on Palestinians by asserting that Israel is exercising its “right to defend itself.” Rather than arranging for an immediate ceasefire through the U.N., the Obama administration is merely calling for “de-escalating the situation,” which means in effect that Palestinians are being pressured to hold their fire while Israel continues to injure and kill Palestinians at will. (Source: White House.)
* Rather than providing Israel with the weaponry and diplomatic support to enable its vicious attacks on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, the Obama administration should exert diplomatic pressure on Israel for an immediate ceasefire and initiate an investigation into Israel’s misuse of U.S. weapons in violation of U.S. law to injure and kill Palestinian civilians. (Source: US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation.)
Taking Action & Building the Movement:
While our short-term efforts are focused on getting Israel to end its attack on the Gaza Strip and achieving a ceasefire, even after this latest round of violence concludes, Palestinians in the Gaza Strip still will be living under Israel’s illegal siege and blockade, military occupation, and apartheid policies. Therefore, our medium- to long-term efforts require us to engage in campaigns of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel, and corporations and institutions which profit from its human rights abuses of all Palestinians as a strategy to ending these policies. At the same time, we must also continue to pressure the United States to end all of its policies, including military aid and diplomatic protection at the U.N., which enable Israel’s continuing human rights abuses of Palestinians. The Obama administration must change U.S. policy toward Israel and the Palestinians to support human rights, international law and equality. Take advantage of the growing public outrage to direct people to how they can get more involved in local and national organizing efforts challenging the occupation and siege.
This post is a combination of articles found on the following sites:
http://www.endtheoccupation.org/article.php?id=3350
and
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/11/19/cnn-poll-57-of-americans-say-israeli-attacks-in-gaza-are-justified/comment-page-1/
A CNN/ORC International poll released Monday indicates that 57% of the public says Israel is justified in taking military action in Gaza against Hamas, with one in four saying the attacks are unjustified.
According to the survey, nearly six in ten say their sympathies are with the Israelis, with 13% saying they side more with the Palestinians and 11% saying their sympathies are with neither side in the conflict.
"That's nothing new," added Holland. "The number of Americans who sympathize more with the Palestinians has never been higher than 18% since the question was first asked in 1988. Sympathies for Israel have sometimes dipped below 50%, but have been over that mark for the past eight years."
At the risk of sounding like an asshole, I have to mention my theory on the real reason for peoples need to support Israel. It's the same reason most white people (in the US at least) watch their language around black people. They don't want to seem racist or, in this case, anti-semitic. It's been pushed so deeply into our subconscious, that we don't even realize it most of the time. It's a mixture of fear, pity, and guilt over events in history that many of us weren't alive for and have never participated in. Hitler invaded almost every country in my ancestry, and there's even a chance I have some Jewish in me, but I don't feel the need to support them for doing the same damn thing. 2000 years of persecution is not an excuse to knowingly kill innocent people - many of which are children.
(Since November 8, Israel has killed at least 93 Palestinians in the occupied and besieged Gaza Strip. At least 64 Palestinians killed were civilians, including at least 21 children. (Source: Palestinian Centre for Human Rights) In addition, three Israeli civilians were killed by a Palestinian rocket.)
1. Gaza is under siege: This is not a symmetrical fight. The 1.7 million people in Gaza are living in an open-air prison, denied many of their most basic rights, including the rights to adequate food and clean water, housing, and sanitation, by a military superpower enforcing an illegal blockade that the U.N. has deemed to be illegal. Until the Palestinian people are able to exercise their human rights, we cannot expect to see a lasting ceasefire or peace.
2. U.S. role: American tax-payers are funding Israel’s attacks on Palestinians in Gaza, in violation of the U.S. Arms Export Control Act. We are not funding Hamas. The U.S. must immediately end its complicity in Israel’s gross human rights abuses.
3. Action: Knowing is not enough. We need to do something – to raise our voices and protest U.S. complicity in these brutal attacks. This is a major opportunity to build your local (or national) efforts, as public outrage grows. Make sure to publicize your activist community and how people can get involved, by challenging the Obama administration and through boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) campaigns in response to calls for solidarity from Palestinians.
The Siege & International Law:
All countries and peoples living under military occupation have the right of self-defense. However, international law forbids the targeting of civilians in hostilities. Moreover, Israel is employing disproportionate force to injure and kill Palestinian civilians and destroy Palestinian infrastructure not in self-defense, but in furtherance of its illegal blockade and siege of the Gaza Strip. In 2011, U.N. human rights experts concluded that Israel’s policies toward the Gaza Strip constituted collective punishment and were a “flagrant contravention of international human rights and humanitarian law.” (Source: Reuters.)
Timeline:
* Israel began the violence on November 8, following a two-week period of quiet, when it invaded Gaza. During an exchange of gunfire, Israeli troops shot 13-year-old Ahmed Younis Khader Abu Daqqa in the abdomen while he was playing soccer. Ahmed died later from his wounds. (Source: Institute for Middle East Understanding and Palestinian Centre for Human Rights.)
* On November 12, Palestinian militant groups agreed to a truce if Israel ceased military operations. Israel responded to this offer by engaging in an extrajudicial assassination of Hamas leader Ahmed Jabari on November 14, sparking the current round of violence. An Israeli peace activist was negotiating with Jabari a permanent truce between Israel and Palestinian militant groups when he was assassinated. (Source: Institute for Middle East Understanding and Ha’aretz.)
* On November 18, an Israeli airstrike on the crowded residential neighborhood of Naser in Gaza City killed at least 12 people, including at least 10 members of the Al-Dalu family, many of whom were children and women. (Source: Los Angeles Times.)
Your tax dollars hard at work.......
The U.S. Role:
* The United States is complicit in and responsible for Israel’s grave human rights abuses of Palestinians. The United States provides weapons to Israel at U.S. taxpayer expense. In the 2000s, the United States gave Israel more than 670 million weapons, some of which are being employed now to injure and kill Palestinian civilians. In addition to funding offensive weapons for Israel, the United States is also funding for Israel the Iron Dome anti-missile system. By providing Israel the weapons to both attack Palestinians and shoot down Palestinian rocket fire, the United States is making it virtually cost-free for Israel to escalate its attacks on Palestinians. (Source: US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation, here and here.)
* U.S. diplomacy is contributing to, rather than ending, the violence. The Obama administration is giving Israel a green light to continue its attacks on Palestinians by asserting that Israel is exercising its “right to defend itself.” Rather than arranging for an immediate ceasefire through the U.N., the Obama administration is merely calling for “de-escalating the situation,” which means in effect that Palestinians are being pressured to hold their fire while Israel continues to injure and kill Palestinians at will. (Source: White House.)
* Rather than providing Israel with the weaponry and diplomatic support to enable its vicious attacks on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, the Obama administration should exert diplomatic pressure on Israel for an immediate ceasefire and initiate an investigation into Israel’s misuse of U.S. weapons in violation of U.S. law to injure and kill Palestinian civilians. (Source: US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation.)
Taking Action & Building the Movement:
While our short-term efforts are focused on getting Israel to end its attack on the Gaza Strip and achieving a ceasefire, even after this latest round of violence concludes, Palestinians in the Gaza Strip still will be living under Israel’s illegal siege and blockade, military occupation, and apartheid policies. Therefore, our medium- to long-term efforts require us to engage in campaigns of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel, and corporations and institutions which profit from its human rights abuses of all Palestinians as a strategy to ending these policies. At the same time, we must also continue to pressure the United States to end all of its policies, including military aid and diplomatic protection at the U.N., which enable Israel’s continuing human rights abuses of Palestinians. The Obama administration must change U.S. policy toward Israel and the Palestinians to support human rights, international law and equality. Take advantage of the growing public outrage to direct people to how they can get more involved in local and national organizing efforts challenging the occupation and siege.
This post is a combination of articles found on the following sites:
http://www.endtheoccupation.org/article.php?id=3350
and
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/11/19/cnn-poll-57-of-americans-say-israeli-attacks-in-gaza-are-justified/comment-page-1/
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