Last night WikiLeaks began releasing tens of thousands more U.S. diplomatic cables, bringing the total number of WikiLeaked cables to nearly 100,000. Among the findings revealed in the latest release is evidence that the Obama administration has worked with the Egyptian government to keep the Gaza border with Egypt closed. As the Washington Post describes, WikiLeaks is relying on twitter followers (hashtag: #wlfind) to pull out important pieces of information from the newly released cables.

Just hours before the release, federal prosecutors issued an order to Dynadot, a California Internet registrar that had hosted WikiLeaks, demanding that Dynadot produce “information on Julian Assange.” A few weeks earlier, the same prosecutors approached Twitter seeking records of accounts held by Assange, WikiLeaks, and Bradley Manning.

CODEPINK Kansas Coordinator Priti Gulati Cox highlights how Manning’s treatment and ongoing pre-trial detention serve as a troubling barometer for democracy in her insightful new article Parallel Lines of Dissent. Her critique compares the case of Manning, currently imprisoned in the author’s home state of Kansas, to that of Dr. Binayak Sen, a pediatrician and civil liberties activist who blew the whistle on government arming of militia groups in her birth country of India. Gulati Cox points out that like Manning, Sen faced life in prison for his alleged crime of doing service to his country – a sentence he was spared only due to international public outcry on his behalf.

In anticipation of the release of Dick Cheney’s new book, In My Time, CODEPINK has launched a two-sided Free Bradley/Arrest Cheney bookmark highlighting why war criminal Cheney should be “Doin’ Time” and Bradley Manning should be free. CODEPINK is also holding a photo contest to encourage activists to move Cheney’s book to the crime or other appropriate section of local bookstores.

An investigation by the Associated Press revealed on Thursday that after 9/11, the NYPD collaborated with the CIA to secretly monitor mosques and target ethnic communities. The Muslim American Civil Liberties Coalition has issued a statement condemning and demanding accountability for the NYPD’s spying on Muslim American Communities.

The FBI’s post-9/11 counter-terrorism tactics are also under scrutiny in the wake of an investigation released by Mother Jones magazine this week. The report found that nearly half of terrorism-related prosecutions after 9/11 have involved the use of informants, many of whom were given large cash incentives to produce victories for the FBI’s War on Terror.

In “How Washington lost faith in America’s courts,” Karen Greenberg laments another post-9/11 trend: the use of executive intervention to bypass the judicial system and due process. Greenberg draws parallels between the pre-trial punishment of NSA whistleblower Thomas Drake and that of alleged WikiLeaks source Bradley Manning, noting

“Like bin Laden’s killing, both cases reflect an unspoken worry in Washington that our courts will prove insufficiently ruthless and so incapable of giving the “obviously guilty” what they “obviously” deserve.”

In his first solo op-ed, Thomas Drake describes in his own words how he was attacked for blowing the whistle on illegal activity and waste within the National Security Agency. Like Greenberg, he sees his case as a troubling sign of how constitutional rights have been subverted in the name of security post-9/11:

“The government’s penchant since Sept. 11, 2001, for operating in secrecy and hiding behind an executive branch “state secrets” doctrine has damaged our long-term national security and national character. It has, by sacrificing Americans’ general welfare and civil liberties, given rise to a persistent military-industrial-intelligence ­con­gressional surveillance complex.”

The campaign to seek an international arrest warrant for former Bush CIA General Counsel John Rizzo continues to make headlines. Reports show that lawyers from Pakistan and human rights organization Reprieve are looking into waging cases against other individuals including British officials.

A court in Washington DC has refused to re-open a Blackwater case of the shooting deaths of Iraqi civilians in 2007.  Blackwater was securing a convoy through Nisour Square in Baghdad where the incident took place bringing international outrage. Blackwater’s license to operate in Iraq was revoked by the government.

Criticism of President Barack Obama’s handling of Bush administration torture cases continues to mount. The Department of Justice announced it would close 99 out of 101 torture cases which took place after 9/11 under the Bush administration. Attorney General Holder has indicated he would not prosecute anyone who acted in “good faith”.

Activists held a protest outside the National Committee On US-China Relations in New York City where Henry Kissinger was giving a talk about his new book, Prescription on China.

Groups at the protest  included members of the East Timor and Indonesia Action Network, known as ETAN and CODEPINK Women for Peace.

Finally, reports show that Ehud Olmert and Tzipi Livni may face war crimes charges in Norway in their role in the Gaza offensive.

On Monday, 11 July 2011, the Israeli Knesset passed new legislation outlawing the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement; a non-partisan grassroots initiative that seeks to pressure Israel to comply with international law and recognize fundamental Palestinian rights.

The bill bans all advocacy and action to boycott any Israeli companies, within Israel and the occupied Palestinian West Bank, Gaza and Jerusalem. Furthermore, any company can be awarded compensation without even having to prove direct damage. The law is so broad that it could potentially be used not only against citizens of Israel, but also against Palestinians living under military occupation in the West Bank and Gaza. The legislation leaves Palestinian and Israeli solidarity groups who promote the boycott of any Israeli company liable to be sued and the vagueness of the bill opens all activists to arbitrary persecution.

We, Palestine solidarity and social justice groups based in the United States, reiterate our support and endorsement of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement. We stand by our friends who will be legally subject to this draconian bill, which seeks to further deligitimize the non-violent struggle against Israeli apartheid.

This latest escalation in Israeli repression tactics aims to stifle the BDS movement. The call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, endorsed by over 170 Palestinian civil society groups in 2005, has been adopted by hundreds of solidarity organizations worldwide that seek to put pressure on Israel until it complies with international law.

Not only do Palestinian and Israeli groups actively organize campaigns within Israel and occupied Palestine; but projects like Who Profits? also educate the international community by researching the true dealings of Israeli companies and enable many campaigns in the justice for Palestine movement.

This bill follows upon the ‘Nakba law’, which defunded any institution that acknowledged the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948. Such repressive legislation particularly targets Palestinians inside Israel, who are already subject to apartheid and extensive institutionalized racism as well as political persecution.

Israel has maintained such discrimination against Palestinian citizens of Israel, alongside its illegal siege of Gaza, its brutal military occupation of the West Bank, its de facto annexation of East Jerusalem, its ongoing denial of the Right of Return for Palestinian refugees and its policies of ethnic cleansing since before 1948.

Additionally, Israel recently suppressed other non-violent initiatives; pressuring foreign governments to obstruct the Freedom Flotilla II, which was organized to challenge the illegal blockade and siege of the Gaza Strip and the “Flytilla” which brought to light that Palestinians cannot even receive visitors.

The global BDS Movement will not be stopped, intimidated or harmed by this latest Israeli attempt to repress the legitimate struggle for Palestinian rights. We will heed the Palestinian call to escalate our BDS campaigns. We stand side by side with our sisters and brothers in this struggle for rights and justice.

The US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel
Al-Awda New York, the Palestine Right to Return Coalition
CODEPINK Women for Peace
International Solidarity Movement -USA
Free Gaza Movement -USA
Siege Busters Working Group
Labor for Palestine
New York City Labor Against the War
Miami-Dade Green Party
Boston University Students for Justice in Palestine
US Palestinian Community Network
WESPAC Foundation
SURLA at the University of Western Ontario
American Jews for a Just Peace
Coalition for Peace and Justice – UNM
Austin Coalition for Palestine
Humanitarian Relief Foundation
Occupied Palestine Weblog for Human Rights for Palestine

Between June 14 and June 23, 2011, a delegation of 11 scholars, activists, and artists visited occupied Palestine. As indigenous and women of color feminists involved in multiple social justice struggles, we sought to affirm our association with the growing international movement for a free Palestine. We wanted to see for ourselves the conditions under which Palestinian people live and struggle against what we can now confidently name as the Israeli project of apartheid and ethnic cleansing. Each and every one of us—including those members of our delegation who grew up in the Jim Crow South, in apartheid South Africa, and on Indian reservations in the U.S.—was shocked by what we saw. In this statement we describe some of our experiences and issue an urgent call to others who share our commitment to racial justice, equality, and freedom.

During our short stay in Palestine, we met with academics, students, youth, leaders of civic organizations, elected officials, trade unionists, political leaders, artists, and civil society activists, as well as residents of refugee camps and villages that have been recently attacked by Israeli soldiers and settlers. Everyone we encountered—in Nablus, Awarta, Balata, Jerusalem, Hebron, Dheisheh, Bethlehem, Birzeit, Ramallah, Um el-Fahem, and Haifa—asked us to tell the truth about life under occupation and about their unwavering commitment to a free Palestine. We were deeply impressed by people’s insistence on the linkages between the movement for a free Palestine and struggles for justice throughout the world; as Martin Luther King, Jr. insisted throughout his life, “Justice is indivisible. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

Traveling by bus throughout the country, we saw vast numbers of Israeli settlements ominously perched in the hills, bearing witness to the systematic confiscation of Palestinian land in flagrant violation of international law and United Nations resolutions. We met with refugees across the country whose families had been evicted from their homes by Zionist forces, their land confiscated, their villages and olive groves razed. As a consequence of this ongoing displacement, Palestinians comprise the largest refugee population in the world (over five million), the majority living within 100 kilometers of their natal homes, villages, and farmlands. In defiance of United Nations Resolution 194, Israel has an active policy of opposing the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their ancestral homes and lands on the grounds that they are not entitled to exercise the Israeli Law of Return, which is reserved for Jews.

In Sheikh Jarrah, a neighborhood in eastern occupied Jerusalem, we met an 88-year-old woman who was forcibly evicted in the middle of the night; she watched as the Israeli military moved settlers into her house a mere two hours later. Now living in the small back rooms of what was once her large family residence, she defiantly asserted that neither Israel’s courts nor its military could ever force her from her home. In the city of Hebron, we were stunned by the conspicuous presence of Israeli soldiers, who maintain veritable conditions of apartheid for the city’s Palestinian population of almost 200,000, as against its 700 Jewish settlers. We crossed several Israeli checkpoints designed to control Palestinian movement on West Bank roads and along the Green Line. Throughout our stay, we met Palestinians who, because of Israel’s annexation of Jerusalem and plans to remove its native population, have been denied entry to the Holy City. We spoke to a man who lives ten minutes away from Jerusalem but who has not been able to enter the city for twenty-seven years. The Israeli government thus continues to wage a demographic war for Jewish dominance over the Palestinian population.

We were never able to escape the jarring sight of the ubiquitous apartheid wall, which stands in contempt of international law and human rights principles. Constructed of twenty-five-foot-high concrete slabs, electrified cyclone fencing, and winding razor wire, it almost completely encloses the West Bank and extends well east of the Green Line marking Israel’s pre-1967 borders. It snakes its way through ancient olive groves, destroying the beauty of the landscape, dividing communities and families, severing farmers from their fields and depriving them of their livelihood. In Abu Dis, the wall cuts across the campus of Al Quds University through the soccer field. In Qalqiliya, we saw massive gates built to control the entry and access of Palestinians to their lands and homes, including a gated corridor through which Palestinians with increasingly rare Israeli-issued permits are processed as they enter Israel for work, sustaining the very state that has displaced them. Palestinian children are forced through similar corridors, lining-up for hours twice each day to attend school. As one Palestinian colleague put it, “Occupied Palestine is the largest prison in the world.”

An extensive prison system bolsters the occupation and suppresses resistance. Everywhere we went we met people who had either been imprisoned themselves or had relatives who had been incarcerated. Twenty thousand Palestinians are locked inside Israeli prisons, at least 8,000 of them are political prisoners and more than 300 are children. In Jerusalem, we met with members of the Palestinian Legislative Council who are being protected from arrest by the International Committee of the Red Cross. In Um el-Fahem, we met with an Islamist leader just after his release from prison and heard a riveting account of his experience on the Mavi Marmara and the 2010 Gaza Flotilla. The criminalization of their political activity, and that of the many Palestinians we met, was a constant and harrowing theme.

We also came to understand how overt repression is buttressed by deceptive representations of the state of Israel as the most developed social democracy in the region. As feminists, we deplore the Israeli practice of “pink-washing,” the state’s use of ostensible support for gender and sexual equality to dress-up its occupation. In Palestine, we consistently found evidence and analyses of a more substantive approach to an indivisible justice. We met the President and the leadership of the Arab Feminist Union and several other women’s groups in Nablus who spoke about the role and struggles of Palestinian women on several fronts. We visited one of the oldest women’s empowerment centers in Palestine, In’ash al-Usra, and learned about various income-generating cultural projects. We also spoke with Palestinian Queers for BDS [Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions], young organizers who frame the struggle for gender and sexual justice as part and parcel of a comprehensive framework for self-determination and liberation. Feminist colleagues at Birzeit University, An-Najah University, and Mada al-Carmel spoke to us about the organic linkage of anti-colonial resistance with gender and sexual equality, as well as about the transformative role Palestinian institutions of higher education play in these struggles.

We were continually inspired by the deep and abiding spirit of resistance in the stories people told us, in the murals inside buildings such as Ibdaa Center in Dheisheh Refugee Camp, in slogans painted on the apartheid wall in Qalqiliya, Bethlehem, and Abu Dis, in the education of young children, and in the commitment to emancipatory knowledge production. At our meeting with the Boycott National Committee—an umbrella alliance of over 200 Palestinian civil society organizations, including the General Union of Palestinian Women, the General Union of Palestinian Workers, the Palestinian Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel [PACBI], and the Palestinian Network of NGOs—we were humbled by their appeal: “We are not asking you for heroic action or to form freedom brigades. We are simply asking you not to be complicit in perpetuating the crimes of the Israeli state.”

Therefore, we unequivocally endorse the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions Campaign. The purpose of this campaign is to pressure Israeli state-sponsored institutions to adhere to international law, basic human rights, and democratic principles as a condition for just and equitable social relations. We reject the argument that to criticize the State of Israel is anti-Semitic. We stand with Palestinians, an increasing number of Jews, and other human rights activists all over the world in condemning the flagrant injustices of the Israeli occupation.

We call upon all of our academic and activist colleagues in the U.S. and elsewhere to join us by endorsing the BDS campaign and by working to end U.S. financial support, at $8.2 million daily, for the Israeli state and its occupation. We call upon all people of conscience to engage in serious dialogue about Palestine and to acknowledge connections between the Palestinian cause and other struggles for justice. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

Rabab Abdulhadi, San Francisco State University*
Ayoka Chenzira, artist and filmmaker, Atlanta, GA
Angela Y. Davis, University of California, Santa Cruz*
Gina Dent, University of California, Santa Cruz*
G. Melissa Garcia, Ph.D. Candidate, Yale University*
Anna Romina Guevarra, author and sociologist, Chicago, IL
Beverly Guy-Sheftall, author, Atlanta, GA
Premilla Nadasen, author, New York, NY
Barbara Ransby, author and historian, Chicago, IL
Chandra Talpade Mohanty, Syracuse University*
Waziyatawin, University of Victoria*
*For identification purposes only

For press inquiries, please contact feministdelegation@gmail.com.

Last year, when the Israeli military killed nine aboard the Turkish ship, the incident made waves around the world. But in previous years, the same international coalition had sent boats to Gaza five times, successfully reaching their destination with a symbolic shipment of humanitarian aid. No blood, no military interception, no story. That’s why the advice of many of Israel’s best buddies, including the lobby group AIPAC, was to just ignore the flotilla.

But no, the Israeli government refused to listen and instead announced with great bravado that it was prepared to stop the flotilla with lethal force–including snipers and attack dogs. Smelling blood, the media frenzy began. Before even leaving home, passengers were besieged with press calls inquiring why we were willing to risk our lives and giving us a chance to talk about the plight of the people of Gaza. Worse yet from the Israeli government perspective, mainstream media began bombarding us with requests to come along. With space for only ten media on our boat, we ended up choosing reps from CNN, CBS, Al Jazeera, AP, The Nation and Democracy Now. Other boats in the flotilla also started scrambling to accommodate more press. Thanks to Israel, we were guaranteed that no matter what happened, the whole world would be watching.

The Israeli government’s next blunder was a doozy. It sent a letter to foreign journalists warning them that if they participated in the flotilla, they would be denied entry into Israel for ten years and their equipment would be impounded. The outcry from journalists and media organizations worldwide was immediate. Israel’s Foreign Press Association said the threat “sends a chilling message to the international media and raises serious questions about Israel’s commitment to freedom of the press.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was forced to rescind the decision, blaming it on his underlings.

But the blunders continued. A YouTube video of a “gay rights activist” who claimed he was not allowed to join the flotilla because he was gay and linked the flotilla to Hamas was exposed as a hoax disseminated by employees of the Israeli Government Press Office and the Israeli Foreign Ministry.

Senior Israeli defense officials told journalists that flotilla activists were intending to dump bags of sulfer on Israeli soldiers to paralyze them and/or light them on fire “like a torch.” We countered by holding an open house on the boat, inviting the media to inspect every nook and cranny and meet with nurses, lawyers, musicians, writers, grandmothers and other “terrorists” on board. The Israeli government looked so silly that even cabinet ministers criticized Netanyahu’s “media spin” and “public relations hysteria.”

Then there was the sabotage of the Irish and Swedish boats, the frivolous lawsuits and legal complaints by the Israeli Law Center (Shurat HaDin), the strong arming of the Greek government to issue a ban on all boats traveling to Gaza, and undoubtedly more dirty tricks that will be exposed in the future.

Through it all, the Israelis helped us turn a potential non-story into a media blitz that has not ended. The passengers are now returning home to the local public spotlight. Rather than being depressed by Israeli maneuvers to prevent the flotilla from reaching its destination, they are more motivated to speak out about the siege of Gaza and bullying tactics of the Israelis. Flotilla organizers are still fighting to get their boats released by the Greek government and vow to try again.

Our modest and peaceful initiative has exposed, for the world to see, the lengths the Israeli government will go to to stop nonviolent international initiatives. We have put the plight of Gaza and the illegality of the siege once again on the radar where it was previously ignored. We have exposed the sad but ultimately unsustainable fact that the Israelis have managed to extend their vindictive siege of Gaza to the shores of Europe and have widened the gulf between the Greek government and Greek popular sentiment with regard to Palestine.

Most importantly, we have given a boost to the larger, massive, multicultural, multinational movement for Palestinian rights. This Friday, hundreds of international activists are flying to Ben Gurion airport where they plan to tell border control agents of their intent to visit Palestine. This “flytilla,” as it has been dubbed, has also aroused a hysterical response from the Netanyahu government. Here again, the world’s attention will be focused on Israel’s control and blockade of movement in and out of the West Bank. The Knesset is on the verge of passing a bill that will effectively outlaw boycotts, a law that will likely only strengthen the resolve and increase the size of the international Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) Movement. And then there will be the showdown at the United Nations, when Palestinians will be calling for recognition as a state.

The Israeli government can only continue its egregious violations of human rights and torpedoing nonviolence initiatives for so long. Eventually, justice will prevail and Palestine will be free. And initiatives like the flotilla will be remembered as part of a continuous wave of resistance that helped turned the tide.”

Medea Benjamin (medea@globalexchange.org) is cofounder of Global Exchange (www.globalexchange.org) and CODEPINK: Women for Peace (www.codepinkalert.org). She was a passenger on The Audacity of Hope.

Nine passengers on the U.S. Boat to Gaza began an open-ended fast in front of the U.S. Embassy on the evening of July 3, calling on the U.S. government to pressure Greece to release our Captain and ship. We staked out a little area across the street from the Embassy entrance, decorating it with Free Gaza/Free Our Boat signs and two American flags placed upside down as a distress signal.

At 10pm, several hundred flotilla supporters, most of them from Greece, marched to the Embassy to show solidarity with us. The Greek police blocked off the street to keep the two groups apart, but the fasters linked arms and marched down the road to meet them in a joyous reunion. After singing and chanting together (separated by a police line), the marchers moved on.

The fasters were then harassed by police, who insisted that we could not spend the night in front of the Embassy. The police were very apologetic, not anxious to arrest a group of fasting Americans on the 4^th of July. But they were getting pressure from their officers to move us, as all embassies have secure areas around them. They said that if our embassy gave us permission to stay, then we could. We tried for hours to get in touch with a representative from the embassy. One wonders what happens in a real emergency! Finally the Duty Officer said that the Embassy did not authorize our stay.

At midnight, the police reluctantly lifted us up and put us into police cars. The nine people detained are Linda Durham, Ken Mayers, Carol Murry, Paki Wieland, Ray McGovern, Brad Taylor, Kit Kitteridge, Kathy Kelly and myself. They took us to the police station, where we had to give them our passports and other details. After detaining us for three hours, we were released at 3am.

Undeterred, the fasters are back at the Embassy today, continuing the vigil.

Once again, our embassy has proven to be deaf to our cries, working hand-in-glove with the Israelis to thwart are mission. How shameful, especially on the 4^th of July! It’s time for the U.S. to declare its independence from Israel!

Make sure to watch the video of our reunion with the Greek supporters!

Let’s keep the pressure on Washington. They need to tell the Greek government to release our captain and our boat.

Here are some other numbers and email addresses:

• State Department general number:  202-647-4000 - ask for the Overseas U.S. Citizen Services Duty Officer and you’ll get a live State Dept. official who has to hear you out.

• You can email the U.S. Embassy in Athens at:  athensamemb@state.gov or you can send an email to them at: athensamericancitizenservices@state.gov

• If you can place an international phone call, the number for the U.S. Embassy in Athens is 011-30-210-721-2951.

Please also try to call, fax or email your members of Congress as well.

More information is on our website: ustogaza.org

Help us keep the pressure up. Thanks for all the support!