Deir Yassin massacre remembered 69 years later .

Today the Palestinian people mark the time on April 9, 1948 when Commanders of  the Ergun (headed by future Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin,) and the Stern Gang attacked in the early hours of the morning Deir Yassin, a village at the western entrance of Jerusalem containing 750 Palestinian residents. By the time  the villagers realized the intensity of the terrorist attack, hundreds were already dead, the Zionist militia  murdered over 250 - 360 Palestinian villagers in cold blood wounding  many others. Many of the bodies were tossed  in the village well,  and 159 captured women and children  were paraded  through the Jewish sectors of Jerusalem.
What happened in Deir Yassin prepared the ground for the ethnic cleansing of 70% of the Palestinian people. The same ethnic cleansing that occurred then is unfortunately going on today. In 1948 they used direct massacres, but today they use airstrikes in Gaza and shoot innocent young Palestinians in the West Bank.
Deir Yassin was not an isolated incident; such a heartbreaking tragedy was flagrantly carried out in conjunction with “Plan Dalet.” Based on a policy of ethnic cleansing and terror, “Plan Dalet” was implemented by the Haganah to force Palestinians to flee their homes and to destroy their villages with the deliberate intent of establishing the State of Israel on Palestinian soil.
For Palestinians and their supporters, the massacre is a symbol. that marks  their deep sense  of dispossession.It is remembered as the pivotal onset of the 1948 Nabka. Deir Yassin is the "other shoe that fell," sparking over 750,000 to flee from their homes, 80 percent of the population at that time, from their homes so that Israel, a colonialist settler state, could be created on their land.Over two million scattered in a far-flung diaspora today, in what remains at the heart of the Israel/Palestine conflict.
The village  lay outside of the area assigned by the United Nations to the 'Jewish State'. It had a peaceful reputation, the Deir Yassin villagers had signed a non aggression pact with the leaders of the adjacent Jewish Quarter, Giv'at Shaul and had even refused military personnel from the Arab Liberation Army from using the village as a base.An Israeli psychiatric hospital now lies on the ruins of Deir Yassin, the remainder of which was bulldozed in the 1980s to make way for new settlements  and incorporated as a neighbourhood of Jerusalem. These streets shamefully carry the names of the Irgun militiamen who carried out the massacre.
Sixty nine years later the Deir Yassin massacre still remains an important reminder of Israel’s systematic measures of displacement, destruction, dispossession, and dehumanization.In keeping with Simon Wiesenthal's observation that "Hope lives when people remember," the suffering of the Jews has been rightly acknowledged and memorialised. But there are few memorials for Palestinians who died in 1948 and since. Their history, in which the massacre at Deir Yassin is a very significant event, has been largely buried and forgotten. And yet, like the descendants of the victims in Armenia (1915-17), in the Soviet Union (1929-53), in Nazi Germany (1933-45), in China (1949-52, 1957-60, and 1966-76), and in Cambodia (1975-79), the descendants of Palestinians want the world to remember what they suffered, what they lost and why they died. The calculated efforts by Israel to completely erase the history, narrative and physical presence of the Palestinian people will not be simply ignored or forgotten. It also serves to ask ourselves the question what  turns a victim into an abuser,a bully that keeps blaming its victims? And over the years we've been taught many things, that invasion was not invasion, occupation was not occupation, apartheid was not apartheid,ethnic cleansing was not ethnic cleansing,and that land theft was not land theft and Palestine was not Palestine.
But many years later the Palestinian peoples collective voice can still be heard from the refugee camps of Lebanon, Jordan and Syria, to the towns of the West Bank and Gaza, to the ghettos inside the Israeli green line. This determination and resilience has earned them respect and support of an increasing number of people around the world. Despite the humiliation and pain of their  occupation, you can't kill their  indomitable spirit and struggle.

Phil Monsour featuring Rafeef Ziadah - Ghosts of Deir Yassin

The writing on the hands are the names of the original villages in Palestine that these people were ethnically cleansed

Ghosts of Deir Yassin
They pretend that it’s forgotten
But somewhere small flowers grow
On the weathered stones of destroyed homes
Somewhere the light’s still in the window
You see that we are rising our day is surely coming
No longer in the shadows
Of the ghosts of Deir Yassin
They change the names on the signs
But it’s in our hearts these words are written
Of the children who don’t know their homes
They will walk the streets from which they are forbidden
You see that we are rising our day is surely coming
No longer in the shadows
Of the ghosts of Deir Yassin

After an echo

                                         
The following poem dedicated to the memory of my beloved Jane Elizabeth Husband ( 9/5/ 60 - 8/1/17)  today marks 3 months since her passing.

After an echo

Last night, I heard an owl hooting 
from not that far away, 
releasing its comforting call 
I sipped calmly from a glass, 
before the time of sleep beckoned me
to paddle on the waves of dream, 
in the names of yesterday
and the chords of tomorrow,
in undulating scrawls, put pen to paper 
life is a memory, I thought, of days gone past,
songs in the sunshine,dances in the rain 
the smell of alcohol and smouldering devotion,
converging through darkness in sweet seduction
constructing sentences that flowed with wine.

But I don't believe in miracles any more 
because luck seems to run out all the time, 
yet outside the moonlight guided
and as thoughts got crowded and perplexed,
released some sense of power
carried me drifting, along meandering streams, 
swimming again with lullabies
and untethered emotions,
against the currents, thought of sunrise
as head went dizzy, I plunged under, closed my eyes,
let visions call that took me again, to a place of safety. 

Rejoicing in old image of the past, the magic released
allowed me to catch breathe, to look up to the the sky, 
and sigh as the beauty of an echo called 
sailing on another horizon, but still by my side, 
filled my soul with gladness, chased away the sadness
made my face glow, my heart to beat,
allowed me to listen once more
to the tranquillity of a deep blue sea,
the trees blowing gently in the breeze and clouds
faraway spirit, floating freely across a satin sky, 
in the distance there is a rainbow
a prism of colour, ever so wonderful,
as I row on into the world shining bright
with enough comfort and grace left to bestow.

Now is the time for diplomacy and restraint, not the time to be escalating the War in Syria.

Last Tuesday, images  of scores of Syrians whose bodies had been  ravaged by a chemical attack in the  Khan Shaykun area of Idlib, naturally horrified the world.Around 60 people were reported dead, many of whom were children and there were hundreds of further casualties. The use of weapons like this is obviously unacceptable to any right minded person. If  this was carried out by the Assad's  government, it would be an act of  brazen  impunity, coming during a major international meeting in Brussels where officials are debating whether the European Union and other countries will contribute billions of dollars for reconstructing Syria if it is presided over by a government run by Mr. Assad.
But while  fingers  pointed this way and that with who to blame for the use of chemical weapons, no one is absolutely certain, ( Both Syria and Russia vehemently deny that the Syrian military used chemical weapons, maintaining that the casualties were caused by gases released after an al-Qaeda-affiliated ammunitions depot was hit by conventional munitions in a government air raid. ) however this tragedy made people of  conscience respond with sadness and anger, yet with  little time for reflection or consultation with either Congress or the international community. the United States Government chose the way of war in response. Donald Trump  unilaterally ordered airstrikes on April 6, sending  59 Tomahawk cruise missiles into a Syrian government airbase which have reportedly killed nine civilians, including  four children to date. I agree with the President that " no child  of God should ever suffer such horror.” I disagree that the way to prevent  such horror is add more violence to violence and remember that only a couple of months ago he clearly demonstrated how much he cared about the plight of Syrian children when he attempted to introduce a totally unconstitutional ban on Syrian refugee children travelling to America, and now he's crying crocodile tears about their plight in order to justify lobbing even more bombs into Syria. He .had also ordered previously an airstrike on a mosque in Al-Jineh Syria March 16, killing 46 civilians.
The logic that  military strikes, like these,will deter and quell  the aggression taking place in Syria is a deeply flawed one. The situation in Syria is a deeply tragic one, a conflict which has been raging now for  six years, in what began as a citizen uprising in the spirit of the Arab Spring, and then  morphed into a complex proxy war involving foreign fighters, multiple regional powers, ISIS, Al Quada and Russia, which has resulted  in so much devastation, chaos and harm.According to United Nations reports, over 400,000 persons  have died due  to the conflict and millions have become displaced or fled Syria.Too many reports of horrors to mention. The U.S airstrikes though without any recourse to international law, without a proper investigation into what actually happened and in  violation  of the Chemical Weapons Convention,  according to the United Nations  simply adds fuel to the fire and any further unilateral action will only  escalate an already dire situation and inflame the terrible war that has already caused untold misery for the people of Syria country,threatening to widen the war even further.The long-term prospects for peace in Syria remain as grim as ever. While a ceasefire has technically been in place across Syria since the end of December between the moderate opposition and the government, both sides have continued to launch attacks, and a fifth round of peace talks in Geneva ended at an impasse at the end of last month.Tensions with Russia are already rising  as US says Assad must abide by deal not to use chemical weapons but fails to outline objectives Whatever happens next, now is the time for a level of diplomacy and to insist on a coordinated and global humanitarian  aid, food, shelter, medical care and assistance for refugees and displaced persons and search for avenues to end this conflict peacefully, rather than  rash decisions that could escalate this already tragic situation.
The UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, has also urged restraint to avoid any escalation of the situation in Syria, in the wake of the U.S. airstrikes, he: “I continue to follow the situation in Syria closely and with grave concern.“Mindful of the risk of escalation, I appeal for restraint to avoid any acts that could deepen the suffering of the Syrian people.“These events underscore my belief that there is no other way to solve the conflict than through a political solution”, Guterres said in a statement.The UN chief called on the parties to urgently renew their commitment to making progress in the Geneva intra-Syrian talks.“The Security Council has the primary responsibility for international peace and security”, Mr. Feltman  he added. He also urged the 15-member body to unite and exercise that responsibility to investigate the alleged use of chemical weapons in Khan Shaykun.“Security Council resolution 2254 (2015) and the 2012 Geneva Communiqué remain the foundation of, and contain the core principles for, United Nations mediation efforts and ultimately a solution in this regard”, he said.
I do not support either Assad, Trump, Russia, or  ISIS, and  have been in unsettled by the amount of human rights abuses that have taken place across Syria, but I simply do not want to  hear of more death, bombs or destruction.The whole country is destroyed , there is no side to take, there is simply no winner. Civilians are paying the price in this deadly game of thrones. We must continue to show mercy on the people of Syria. We can't ignore there suffering  but we must also  concentrate on the world armourers and dealers who keep peddling and spreading their deadly trade, these profiteers of pain, misery, suffering, chaos and destruction,welcomed by all the leaders of the so called free world. Also the military industrial complex has to be fed with wars that never end , remember war is monstrous, its very nature is one of tragedy and suffering, oh  please , when will this perpetual madness cease.  

Bob Dylan - Masters of War - Lyrics

The Work Capability Assessment

The Work Capability Assessment (WCA) which was introduced in 2008 is the primary assessment for Employment and Support Allowance, the main social security payment for ill and disabled people. In the above documentary advocates, lawyers and claimants outline the fundamental problems with the (WCA), and the adverse effects it has on claimants. They show how the WCA fails the disabled and fails on the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) terms; it can worsen people’s health and does not help them return to work. The WCA is carried out by private companies (initially Atos now Maximus). Although some assessments can be carried out smoothly and professionally, others are in buildings that do not have disabled access, require people in pain to sit for hours on hard chairs, and are carried out by cold or even cruel assessors.
The film director Ken Loach  made a film "I Daniel Blake'  to show the harsh reality of applying for benefits .This month  the government plans to cut the new Employment Support Allowance (ESA) for ill or disabled claimants who are judged to be able to work in the future.The allowance will be reduced by a third to £73.10 per week, the same as Jobseekers Allowance (JSA) and is designed to give an incentive to disabled people to find work.
Ken Loach says the most vulnerable are being targeted by the new 'benefit reform'.His film "I Daniel Blake' followed two benefits claimants plunged into poverty.The Department of Work and Pensions says, "Our welfare reforms are increasing the support and incentives for people who move into work, while keeping an important safety net in place for those who need it." yet many people who rely on it, in their time of need find it degrading and cruel, and reducing disabled and vulnerable peoples incomes even further is only going to make life harder.
Legal advocates say the assessment system for benefits is getting to many decisions wrong, forcing thousands of claimants to go to court.More than 1,600 complaints have been made against nurses carrying out fit-for-work assessments in the last five years.Read more at http://thirdforcenews.org.uk/tfn-news/new-information-reveals-huge-number-of-complaints-against-pip-fit-for-work
These crude tests have caused horrifying suffering and led to homelessness, ill health , despair and tragically even suicides as people with serious health conditions are found fit for work and left without enough money to eat or keep the heating. There is also evidence that these tests have caused relapses in  claimants who also happen to be patients with serious mental health conditions. People witl long term mental health issues get very distressed about being assessed, because they don’t feel they are being listened to in their interviews or treated as  even as human, just as another tick on a box.There are also cases  of claimants who can barely leave their homes due to anxiety, depression, PTSD [post-traumatic stress disorder] or obsessive compulsive disorder being deemed fit for work and therefore having their benefits cut or removed, as a result there have been many reported cases of people relapsing as a consequence of getting distressed
Debbie Abrahams, the Shadow Work and Pensions Minister says 'it's a punitive system designed to get people off benefits, even if it has the effect of making people feel they have no choice but to take their own life'.The Work Capability Assessment is totally inhumane for people with invisible, but well documented mental health issues, especially for people with a factual  history recognised by their Consultants and General Practitioners.
It’s important to acknowledge that there are many people  who simply cannot work, and to force them through degrading assessments is simply appalling.I personally live in a state of fear and anxiety , just waiting to see if a brown  letter will  arrive, ordering me for re-asseesment. It is of many peoples opinion that  the Work Capability Assessment (WCA), no matter how much it may have been rejigged and  re-designed, is deeply flawed and  is simply not fit for purpose, and that no-one has any faith in it because of the appalling damage already inflicted on so many vulnerable claimants across the land. Many also  believe it needs to be scrapped, but the Tory's with no soul would never agree to this, and will probably as I write be thinking up more draconian measures, in which to inflict their brand of conscious cruelty.
The people who made the above video would like to thank everyone who their time to talk about the WCA. Some people have requested anonymity, therefore they have either used their voice only or got actors to record what they said (a lot of claimants are scared of the DWP).

(Music:http://www.bensound.com/ )

Here is a link to Disabled People Against Cuts Website ( a very valuable resource ):-

http://dpac.uk.net/ 

This post is dedicated to all those who are suffering , have suffered and those who have died whilst going through this inhumane process. 

Strength to Love - A poem for Martin Luther King Jr ( 15/1/29 - 4/4/68)

Just after 6 p.m. on April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King Jr was  fatally shot while standing on the balcony outside his second-story room at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennesse. The civil rights leader was in Memphis to support a sanitation workers’ strike and was on his way to dinner when a bullet struck him in the jaw and severed his spinal cord. King was pronounced dead after his arrival at a Memphis hospital. He was 39 years old.
 For his entire adult life, until the very day he was assassinated in 1968, he was under constant surveillance from the federal government, under constant threat from millions of people who actually hated the causes and ideals he stood for, and, in his last days on earth, seemed to frequently suggest to his closest friends that he was aware he wouldn't make it much longer.
King also  fought against police brutality and actually even mentioned it by name in his celebrated speech. Dr. King did not just vaguely fight against the idea of poverty, he fought for equal pay, he fought for better work conditions in cities across America, he fought to protect workers who were regularly abused by corporations.
He did not just vaguely fight for peace in the world; he stood up and spoke out against the Vietnam War when it was still tremendously unpopular for a man of his stature to do so. He did not, in fact, fight for integration, as much as he fought against segregation.
 In  the months before his assassination, Martin Luther King became increasingly concerned with the problem of economic inequality in America. He organized a Poor People’s Campaign to focus on the issue, including an interracial poor people’s march on Wahington and in March 1968 traveled to Memphis in support of poorly treated African-American sanitation workers. On March 28, a workers’ protest march led by King ended in violence and the death of an African-American teenager. King left the city but vowed to return in early April to lead another demonstration. On April 3, back in Memphis, King gave his last sermon, saying, “We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn’t matter with me now, because I’ve been to the mountaintop…And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over, and I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will get to the promised land.”
One day after speaking those words, Dr. King was shot and killed by a sniper. As word of the assassination spread, riots broke out in cities all across the United States and National Guard troops were deployed in Memphis and Washington D.C On April 9, King was laid to rest in his hometown of Atlanta, Georgia. Tens of thousands of people lined the streets to pay tribute to King’s casket as it passed by in a wooden farm cart drawn by two mules.Martin Luther King  is now best  remembered  for his ' I have a dream ' speech,but we owe him more than that,  this man  of great  purpose, humility and wisdom was also a radical and revolutionary by both deed and action. As injustice continues in this world of ours , we can still find the courage to stand up and say enough.

 " Power without love is reckless and abusive, and love  without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is  love implementing the demands of justice,  and justice at its best is power
correcting everything that stands against love.”- Martin Luther King Jr

Strength to Love

Martin Luther King had a dream
That still today stirs our conscience,
He rejected violence to oppose racial injustice
Spread a message of peace, love and understanding,
His only weapons were his words and faith
As he marched in protest with his fellow man,
A force for good, but radical with intention
Pursued civil disobedience  but was not afraid
                                            of confrontation
We are all born equal under skin
This noble struggle never stops within,
The causes of division must still be eradicated
There is so much more room for change,
As fresh iniquities call, lets keep hope alive
Standing firm let our voices ring out,
Keep sharing deeds of deep principle
In the name of pride and in the name of love,
We are all still citizens of the world
Let's stand up for the voiceless all around us
As Martin Luther carries on reminding
His words echoing down the corridors of time
“Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever.
The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself.”
We must continue to resist and overcome,
One day soon, all our dreams will be realised.

One Hour of Spanish Republican Music

In 1931, Spanish King Alfonso XIII approved elections to decide the government of Spain, and voters overwhelmingly chose to abolish the monarchy in favor of a liberal republic. Alfonso subsequently went into exile, and the Second Republic, was proclaimed. During the first five years of the Republic, organized labor and leftist radicals forced widespread liberal reforms, and the independence-minded Spanish regions of Catalonia and the Basque provinces achieved virtual autonomy.
The landed aristocracy, the church, and a large military clique increasingly employed violence in their opposition to the Second Republic, and in July 1936 General Francisco Franco led a right-wing army revolt in Morocco, which prompted the division of Spain into two key camps: the fascists and the Republicans. Franco’s  fascist forces rapidly overran much of the Republican-controlled areas in central and northern Spain, but Catalonia became a key Republican stronghold.
During 1937, Franco unified his  forces under the command of the Falange, Spain’s fascist party, with the aid  of Nazi Germany and Italy who supplied them with  an abundance of planes, tanks, and arms, while radical men and women  took up arms to defend Spanish democracy against the right-wing uprising, rallying to the Republican cause forming what is known as the International Brigades.The most significant contribution of these foreign units was the successful defense of Madrid until the end of the war.
In June 1938, however the fascists managed to cut  the Republican territory in two, and later in the year, Franco mounted a major offensive against Catalonia. In January 1939, its capital, Barcelona, was captured, and soon after the rest of Catalonia fell. With the Republican cause all but lost, its leaders attempted to negotiate a peace, but Franco refused. On March 28, 1939, the fascists entered Madrid in triumph, and the Spanish Civil War came to an end. Sadly many  members of the International Brigades were lost  fighting for the noble cause they believed in.
The  music above though is not lost and hopefully still inspires and resonates deeply within, still capable of igniting passion, enduring flames in our continuous battle against the dark forces of fascism. A companion piece to a few earlier posts, that are also sources  of constant inspiration.To this day, generations later, these songs of the Spanish Civil War are still sung across the world, and are no less urgent, as we continue to follow liberty's breath and stand up to the enemies of freedom that are no less dangerous. 

http://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/one-hour-of-iww-music.html

 http://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/one-hour-of-yiddish-communist-music.html

Seeking Nirvana- Jane Elizabeth Husband (9/5/60 - 8/1/17)

The following poem is the only piece of writing that I have left of my beloved faithful departed, and reminds me that she had a deep creative bent  and a rather cynical sense of humor, this was written back in the day, before i'd encountered her, after she herself  had come to Wales seeking something, ironically she discovered me, a Welshman who never escaped, who had somewhat dropped out myself, adrift in  a haze of dope and brew, before she helped me move slightly in another direction, well she certainly awakened my senses . I miss her incredibly. Cheers mighty furbster x.

Seeking Nirvana

They came from the East in their Buses and Vans
Seeking fate in the bottom of stale Beer cans,
Over the border belching woodsmoke and pot
This place is cool man, here we must stop,
Pagans, witches and God knows what
Long hair and beards all in a knot,

The great unwashed clad in Rainbow hues
The Welsh very wisely took to their pews,
For 30 odd years and it's still not over,
The hippy invasion still trampling Welsh clover,
"Hey man it's heavy, that rat race at home,
Here's hill and coast where we might roam,
Let's move to Wales the New Age Eldorado
The Welsh have considered a complete embargo,
"Seal the borders! No more must come here
Stoned out of their heads and reeking of beer,
The hippies pursued by personal fear
Many of them shedding the occasional tear,
A different problem chasing each one
Their grip on humanity almost gone,
They came to forget and sort out their heads
Now they just spend all day in their beds,
Passing their time sloshed or stoned out their mind
Nothing gets done, not a brain cell to find,
It only takes 2 minutes to have a wash
And now they're all complaining they've got no dosh,
They're not happy here and trying to move on
Can't raise the money, motivation gone,
Because they're all followed by personal ghosts
And now the Welsh are sick of playing the host,
The Benefit agency have had enough
Of all this New Age Hippy stuff,
The problems they will never solve
Because their world will always revolve,
Around blotting out their troublesome pasts
And still they haven't found a solution that lasts,
If they'd just stay sober and face their Karma
They'd have no need for Eden and feel a lot calmer. .