Sunday Roundup - May 25, 2014

This is the weekly selection of news and opinion from sources outside the US mainstream corporate media.  Today we look at Israeli-Palestinian relations,  honeybees, the World Cup, and, in brief, Memorial Day, Libya, escalating food prices, and Pope Francis on climate change.

Quote of the Week

“Creation is not a property, which we can rule over at will; or, even less, is the property of only a few: Creation is a gift, it is a wonderful gift that God has given us, so that we care for it and we use it for the benefit of all, always with great respect and gratitude.”

- Pope Francis

Israeli-Palestinian Relations
The "Price Tag" movement has been around since 2008 but has been little covered by the US media.   "Price Tag" attacks "target mosques, churches, Arab and Jewish homes and property, Israeli military bases and vehicles, as well as other Israeli Jews. They involve the desecration of property with anti-Arab and anti-government slogans including the phrase 'price tag', often accompanied by hateful and racist slogans."  The attacks are carried out "by extremist Israeli Jews against Israeli Arabs and Palestinians, often in reprisal for Israeli government action against illegal settlement activity." [Anti-Defamation League, May 7]  Price Tag is getting some attention in the Western press as Pope Francis plans a trip to the Holy Land and a US State Department report has issued a travel warning.  Much to the dismay of Israelis and the powerful Jewish Lobby in Washington DC, the US State Department have even issuing travel warnings now regarding extremist ‘Jewish hate groups’ in Israel [with]... Israelis ...angry that such warnings have been posted on a US government website.  [21st Century Wire, May 11] The attacks have been roundly condemned by the Anti-Defamation League and Peace Now but they continue as enforcement or punishment has been absent or ineffective.  Haaretz reported on May 19 of a demonstration by Israeli Army reservists against ongoing attacks against Palestinians.  Dozens of Israeli reservists staged a protest against what they termed "hate crimes and racism" outside the radical West Bank settlement of Yitzhar on Sunday evening.  Yair Fink, one of the organizers, told the rally: "We regard defending Israel to be the highest value – both against terrorists from the outside and terrorists from within."  

It's a shame that it took the defamation of Christian churches and an upcoming papal visit to get coverage in the Western press of these hate crimes.  But this is no surprise here in the US.  The widespread ignorance of the facts of the Israeli Occupation and the strength of right-wing Israel lobbyists pretty much assure that.  Aaron Mann writes in New Jersey Jewish News on May 15: In March, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie spoke at an RNC fundraiser hosted by extreme right-wing “superdonor” -- and prominent Likud supporter -- Sheldon Adelson. The governor’s comments about Israel were just as uncritically hawkish and hardline as one would expect. Until a bit of uncomfortable truth slipped out when Christie mentioned the “Occupied Territories.”  It mattered little that Christie had referenced a term used by almost the entire world, including previous Republican presidents. Many in the audience were aghast, and the governor subsequently offered a personal apology to Adelson for the supposed affront.  Thus, Christie joined ranks with occupation-deniers...[but] the reality is not that complicated. Israel has never annexed the West Bank or Gaza, and the Palestinians living there are under Israeli control, subject to Israeli military law, and have no political rights in Israel. The occupation exists, and the only way to end it is through a two-state solution that brings an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict...To deny the occupation and oppose a two-state solution might make one pro-Likud, but that’s not the same thing as being pro-Israel. 

Americans for Peace Now's "Price Tag" Escalation Timeline: Jan 2011 - Present [APN website, May 9]


Honeybee Colony Collapse

European honeybee extracting nectar (Wikipedia)

Honeybees pollinate several hundred billion dollars worth of global crops every year.  So when honeybees started dying off in Europe and North America at unprecedented rates in the 2000's, scientists worked to find the cause. Studies have pointed to neonicotinoid pesticides as a contributor to colony collapse disorder.  The EU voted to impose a two-year moratorium on these pesticides last April but the US is still studying the problem.  On May 20, Mother Jones reported on a Harvard study that strengthens the argument against this widely used pesticide class.  Harvard researcher Chensheng Lu and his team treated 12 colonies with tiny levels of neonics and kept six control hives free of the popular chemicals....Come winter,...the bees in six of the treated hives vanished, leaving behind empty colonies—the classic behavior of colony collapse disorder. None of the six control hives experienced a CCD-style disappearing act....What makes the new Harvard study remarkable is that it actually simulated colony collapse disorder—neonic-treated bees suddenly abandoned hives that had been healthy all summer, while untreated bees hung around and repopulated their hives....More research is needed to identify the mechanism by which neonic pesticides trigger the evacuations, they write, but the results point to "impairment of honeybee neurological functions, specifically memory, cognition, or behavior."  There is a bit of good news.  The USDA has released a preliminary report on its nationwide survey asking beekeepers how their hives fared over the winter. The report found that 23.2 percent of hives collapsed—the lowest levels since CCD began in 2005-06, and down from a peak of about 35 percent in the winter of 2007-08. The previous year's losses clocked in 31 percent.  Note that this is an average for the entire country with some areas exhibiting much higher losses.  Ohio, for example, reported losses from 50 to 80 percent.

Link to other posts on honeybee colony collapse

World Cup
The World Cup tournament kicks off in Brazil on Thursday June 12.  Team USA plays its first game against Ghana on June 16.  The Azzurri's opener is against England June 14.  You can find the complete Group Stage schedule here.  The pre-tournament favorite, currently at 3 to 1, is Brazil.  Italy is 28 to 1.  USA is 225 to 1.  Oh well.

The May 21 Sydney Morning Herald carried a story on Pele's thoughts on the preparations for the games: Brazil legend Pele was critical of his country's preparations.  "It's clear that politically speaking, the money spent to build the stadiums was a lot, and in some cases was more than it should have been," Pele said.  He said "some of this money could have been invested in schools, in hospitals.... Brazil needs it. That's clear. On that point, I agree (with the protests)." 4 billion US$ have been spent on stadiums alone.  Several are still incomplete with just 3 weeks to go until the first game.  Pele was particularly critical of the stadium in Sao Paulo, the venue for the opening match between Brazil and Croatia on June 12.  Officials acknowledged last week that a portion of the roof won't be completed until after the World Cup ends on July 13.  

Brazilian star Marta Vieira da Silva (from The Far Post article)

The April 29 article in The Far Post series from Roads & Kingdoms relates the slow development of women's soccer in Brazil.  The article leads with the story of Marta Vieira da Silva (aka "Pele in skirts").  Marta’s game—like Pelé’s—is Brazilian football: quick, explosive, and exhibiting the impeccable ball control that comes from a childhood spent playing in the streets and in the country’s ubiquitous enclosed concrete courts.She also shares the narrative so common to male Brazilian footballers, of rising to stardom from humble origins. ...she played street football as a child but like the neighborhood girls (and most girls in the country), she was discouraged from participating...She would rise through the ranks of the women’s team associated with Rio’s Vasco de Gama club,...has played for numerous professional clubs in her country and abroad, and has starred for the Brazilian women’s national team, becoming a World Cup and Olympic medalist, a five-time FIFA Player of the Year, and an international icon.  As striking as Marta’s story is, her success is even more striking in the context of her country. In the land of the jogo bonito, women still face immense hurdles to simply participating in the sport, let alone achieving recognition for their footballing talent.  The article also relates the story of Aline Pellegrino, another Brazilian woman soccer star, and former American player Caitlin Fisher who played in Brazil and was a co-founder of the Guerreiras Project.  Led by professional female football players, the project ...uses football as the language with which to address gender justice. The group runs workshops...to open discussions about gender norms, it trains young girls to be leaders, and it encourages the creation of more opportunities for girls and women to play.

In Brief
Link to The Left Bank Cafe post "Remembering the Fallen" (Memorial Day 2013)

While House Republicans play politics on Benghazi, Libya is on the verge of imploding.  The Guardian May 22 post describes "Khalifa Haftar: renegade general causing upheaval in Libya".

The price of popular breakfast cereals is set to soar over the next 15 years as a result of climate change...Staples like corn and rice will double in cost by 2030, with half of that increase due to climate change [Mother Jones]

Pope Francis made the religious case for tackling climate change...calling on his fellow Christians to become “Custodians of Creation” and issuing a dire warning about the potentially catastrophic effects of global climate change: “Safeguard Creation,” he said. “Because if we destroy Creation, Creation will destroy us!" [Think Progress/Climate Progress]

Sunday Round-Up - November 17, 2013

This is the weekly selection of news and opinion from outside the US mainstream media.  Today we look at the Republican stranglehold on Congress, the Euro-recession, war spending and the deficit, The Guardian editor's upcoming appearance before Parliament, and bee colony collapse.

In an article posted on its website on November 11, Rolling Stone magazine takes up the lock on Congress that Republicans have in spite of the growing gap between their policies and the wishes of the majority of the electorate.  Tom Dickinson explains how national Republicans have rigged the game by "waging an unrelenting campaign to exploit every weakness and anachronism in our electoral system.  Through a combination of hyperpartisan redistricting of the House, unprecedented obstructionism in the Senate and racist voter suppression in the states, today's GOP has locked in political power that it could never have secured on a level playing field."  The redistricting of Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Michigan is described in some detail.  The vast sum of money spent by Republicans in North Carolina to take over the state legislature in 2010, voter suppression laws, activist judges and the unprecedented use of the filibuster in the Senate are exposed.  And, as Dickinson notes, the Republicans are not done yet.  "In a project with the explicit blessing of Republican National Committee Chairman..., a half-dozen Republican-dominated legislatures in states that swing blue in presidential elections have advanced proposals to abandon the winner-take-all standard in the Electoral College. These states would instead apportion electoral votes by the favored candidate of each congressional district – a method currently practiced by only two, small, homogenous states, Maine and Nebraska. Thanks to the GOP's gerrymandering, such a change would all but guarantee that a Democratic presidential candidate in a big, diverse state like Michigan would lose the split of electoral votes even if he or she won in a popular landslide."

"The EU economy will remain flat in 2013, EU economic affairs commissioner Olli Rehn said on Tuesday (5 November), as he downgraded the bloc's growth forecasts for 2014 and 2015...There was little to cheer for Europe's jobless. Unemployment levels are likely to remain virtually unchanged, although they are forecast to fall from 12.2 percent to 11.8 percent across the eurozone by 2015."   The November 13 EU Observer article should be a reminder to us of how austerity programs implemented to reduce deficits slow recovery from a recession.  The "sequestration" cuts, our own version of misguided austerity, will begin having a greater impact in 2014.  Combine this with the fiscal cliff negotiations and the possibility of another government shutdown and we may be in for an interesting ride leading to the 2014 mid-term elections.

Speaking of the US deficit, a Harvard report out earlier this year put the eventual total monetary cost of the Iraq and Afghan wars as high as 6 trillion dollars - or 35% of the 17 trillion dollars total national debt.  The DNA India website noted that this corresponds to $75,000 for every household in the country.  "There's a sense that we are turning the corner, but unfortunately, the legacy of these wars, because of decision about the way we fought and funded these wars, means we will be paying the costs for a long time to come," [Harvard Professor Linda] Bilmes said in an interview with The Daily Telegraph. "We may be mentally turning the page, but we are certainly not from a budgetary and financial perspective."   As the Congressional budget discussions proceed, it should be helpful to keep in mind this graphic from the National Priorities Project.



 

In the UK, Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger has been asked to appear before Parliament to give evidence regarding the intelligence files leaked by American whistleblower Edward Snowden.  Rusbridger will appear at a meeting of the home affairs select committee amidst rising criticism from British intelligence agencies and Tories.  "Alan has been invited to give evidence to the home affairs select committee and looks forward to appearing next month," a Guardian spokeswoman said.  A New York Times editorial  warns that the freedom of the press so essential to democratic accountability, is being challenged by the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government of Prime Minister David Cameron.



Finally, here's an update on the bee colony collapse that's been occurring around the world and threatening to impact fruit and vegetable production.  Ars Technica reported on October 21 that Italian researchers had cut through the complexity of causes that had surrounded the bee colony collapse.  Infections, insecticides and agricultural practices were all thought to be involved.  "Previous toxicology work in mammals indicated that a specific class of insecticides, the neonicotinoids, could influence the activity of genes involved in the innate immune system."  The researchers started by showing that the same is true in insects. Initially, they worked with everyone's favorite fruit fly, Drosophila, showing that the equivalent genes responded in the same ways in the flies. They then showed that the innate immune response isn't activated when these same flies are exposed to an infection.... Various infections may still be doing the ultimate job of killing the bees, but their virulence could be explained by compromised immune function, caused by a combination of insecticide use and agricultural practices. The results will also provide further support for the European Union's attempt to ban the use of neonicotinoid pesticides."  The relationship between insecticides and colony collapse had been legally challenged by Bayer and Syngenta earlier this year.  

The image of the European honey bee is from Wikipedia.