Venturing into the lion's den: Carter to Discuss Book at Brandeis U.

WALTHAM, Mass. (AP) - Venturing into the lion's den, Jimmy Carter headed Tuesday to Brandeis University, a historically Jewish college, to confront the furor over his new book on the Middle East, which has been attacked as slanted against Israel.

The uproar has been going on for several months and recently prompted 14 members of an advisory board at the former president's international-affairs think tank, the Carter Center, to resign in protest over the book, ``Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid.''
{josquote}Closing our eyes to injustice is not a Jewish value{/josquote}
A tightly controlled discussion was planned, with 15 questions selected in advance. Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz had also hoped to debate Carter but was told he would not be allowed inside.

Metal barricades were erected along the road leading to the athletic center, where Carter was to speak, and people entering the place had to go through a metal detector.

Read more: Venturing into the lion's den: Carter to Discuss Book at Brandeis U.

A Freedom Ride

Uri Avnery's Column  

[Uri talks about the recent ruling, now delayed, that would have forbade Israeli drivers from giving a ride to Palestinian passengers.  Uri also talks about the use of the word Apartheid as attached to Israel and the dangers of applying the South African model to the Israel / Palestine situation] 

Mahatma Gandhi would have loved it. Nelson Mandela would have saluted. Martin Luther King would have been the most excited - it would have reminded him of the old days.

Read more: A Freedom Ride

It's the little things that make an occupation.

Those seemingly minor inconveniences that make life hellish

DURING 2006, according to B'tselem, an Israeli human-rights group, Israeli forces killed 660 Palestinians, almost half of them innocent bystanders, among them 141 children. In the same period, Palestinians killed 17 Israeli civilians and six soldiers. It is such figures, as well as events like shellings, house demolitions, arrest raids and land expropriations, that make the headlines in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. What rarely get into the media but make up the staple of Palestinian daily conversation are the countless little restrictions that slow down most people's lives, strangle the economy and provide constant fuel for extremists.

Read more: It's the little things that make an occupation.

Israel's 'invisible hand' in Gaza

Although Israel withdrew from Gaza more than a year ago, its control over the lives of Palestinians there is in some ways even tighter than before, a new report by an Israeli human rights organisation says.

In the days after Israeli troops and settlers pulled out of the territory, the then Israeli leader, Ariel Sharon addressed the United Nations.

He declared "the end of Israeli control over and responsibility for the Gaza Strip".

But a study by Gisha challenges that claim. The organisation says it aims to "protect the fundamental rights of Palestinians living in the Occupied Territories by imposing human rights law as a limitation on the behaviour of Israel's military".

"Israel continues to control Gaza through an 'invisible hand'," the organisation says, in a detailed, 100-page report.

Read more: Israel's 'invisible hand' in Gaza

A Flag Blacker than Black

Palestinians are forbidden to travel in cars with Israelis.

Read more: A Flag Blacker than Black

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