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Follow Us on TwitterDora McPhee (VIC) responds to Lyons’ “Israelis unsettled as Elvis Costello leaves the building”, The Australian, 22May10 May 22, 2010
The Australian: “Israelis unsettled as Elvis Costello leaves the building” by John Lyons, 22 May 2010
In John Lyons report regarding the decision by Elvis Costello to boycott Israel because of its 62 year oppression of the Palestinian people he misleadingly gives the impression that the overriding consideration was the occupation of the West Bank. This shows a misconception of what the Palestinian struggle and the calls for boycotting Israel are all about. It is not just the occupation and colonisation that is in question but the 62 years of state violence and oppressive control over the Palestinians to achieve a Jewish-only state in what was historic Palestine that has systematically denied Palestinians their right to self-determination, their most basic human rights and continues to this day to ethnically cleanse them from their land.
This disinformation is glaringly evident in Lyons quoting without correction an Israeli soldier who sees the central problem as being “: a situation in which a sovereign state (Gaza under Hamas) is engaged in combat against (Israeli) civilians. Gaza is not a sovereign state and remains under Israeli
occupation. The population is largely made up of refugees that were ethnically cleansed from their homes and land, which became the state of Israel. The people have suffered numerous Israeli assaults even before Hamas took over the Gaza Strip and Israel hermetically sealed it with a punishing siege and blockade that is a war crime against the civilian population now in its fourth year – a daily violence the effects of which goes unreported by the mainstream media.
Thank You.
