Here We Stand, Stand With Us!!
Voice of Palestine collective is issuing this second position paper to explain why we feel supporting Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel is so crucial and urgent. Our motion calling for our station Vancouver Coop Radio to support the BDS movement until the Israeli state complies with international law was regrettably defeated at the Nov. 27/11 AGM. However, given the format and atmosphere of the AGM debate, we feel that both the basics of the BDS call and its significance for alternative media like …

Dear Friends and Supporters of Vancouver Cooperative Radio:
The Voice of Palestine Collective (VOP) is issuing this position paper on the first motion we introduced at the Coop Radio AGM on Nov. 27/11 regarding the formation of a committee to investigate the process around Coop Radio’s recent “frequency swap” deal. The second motion called on Coop Radio to support the Boycott Divestment and Sanctions campaign against Israel and we will issue a second position paper on that motion at a later date. We were disappointed that both of these draft resolutions …

The report today by Mark Kelley on CBC Newsworld was misleading and serves the interests of the Mubarak dictatorship.

In response to the Ottawa Citizen’s attack on NDP MP Libby Davies
By Hanna Kawas
The Ottawa Citizen “Haters’ test” http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Haters+test/3139300/story.html, published June 11, 2010 is misleading, lacking in historic facts and crudely apologizes for Israeli occupation and discrimination. I am going to burden you with some documentation and references the Ottawa Citizen editors did not want to bother with.
Before 1948, there was no state of Israel. It came about as many historians (Jewish and otherwise) have now recognized – on the tragedy of the ethnic cleansing of Palestine from its indigenous …

The following letter was sent to the Georgia Straight on Feb. 15, 2008.
It might interest your readers to know that the “new-generation Israeli wines” that Jurgen Gothe was promoting (Feb. 14/08) are literally fruit from the vines of Israeli occupation. We recently sent a letter to the BC Liquor Distribution Branch on this very subject which they have responded to claiming this matter is not under their “jurisdiction” and they offer products on a commercial demand basis. Here are some excerpts of our originial letter.
“The Golan Heights Winery (of which …

By Gary Keenan
Dear editor:
Barbara Hodgson’s excellent letter (More than a Memory, Oct. 8) regarding renowned British Arabist Gertrude Bell brings to mind the fact that the Middle East may well have been spared several decades of violence, death, and destruction if British Prime Minister Lloyd George had heeded her wise words regarding the 1917 Balfour Declaration.
While serving with British intelligence in Cairo, Ms. Bell advised the cabinet that “an independent Jewish Palestine” was impractical because “[Palestine]…is not Jewish;” the native population would not “accept Jewish authority…. Jerusalem, is equally sacred …

The following letter was sent to Sarah Efron, a freelance journalist, regarding reporting about the “Peace It Together” camp held this summer in Vancouver. The camp brought Israeli and Palestinian teenagers to Vancouver from the Middle East and received alot of attention in the local media as a step towards reconciliation in the region. It was also well received by local Zionists. Our letter explains why most of the local Palestinian community had reservations about this camp and similar initiatives.
Dear Sarah:
Thank you for the report you did for CBC Radio …

By Gary Keenan
Letters editor, The Vancouver Sun
Dear editor:
Re: Guest Editorial, “In the global war, Islam isn’t the enemy; Islamism is,” Sept. 3.
The Ottawa Citizen guest editorial’s contention that al-Qaida hates the U.S. “because of what it is – namely, a capitalist democracy that embraces religious freedom, women’s rights and MTV” rather than “because of its foreign policy” was rejected by the U.S.
Senate’s 9/11 Commission.
In its recently released report the commission declares that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was the “mastermind of the 9/11 attacks” and concludes that his “animus toward the United …

By Hanna Kawas
Dear Mr. Holota:
In an editorial on April 23, 2003 in the Surrey/North Delta Leader, under the title ‘What didn’t happen’, you wrote: “Well, there it is then. Nothing left to do in Iraq but rebuild the country, unify diametrically opposed sects of Muslims, create a democracy instead of a fundamentalist theocracy, convince the Kurds they don’t want their own country, convince Syria to show Hezbollah the door, and make peace between Israel and Palestine.” … “If one still believes the anti-American peaceniks and bad-news-is-best television pundits, it’ll never …

By Gary Keenan
Dear editor,
Kudos to columnist Brian Peterson for his insightful and much needed column regarding Israel’s construction of an apartheid fence or wall around the occupied Palestinian West Bank.
Apart from inspiring increased armed resistance, including terrorism, by illegally encroaching on more Palestinian land and water resources, the fence also demonstrates the utter bankruptcy of Zionism.
It is now 107 years since Theodor Herzl et al. held the first Zionist Congress in Basel, Switzerland and 55 years since the first mass expulsion of Palestinians and the creation of Israel. After all …