Former Israeli Air Force Captain Calls For Sanctions On Israeli Govt.

[samhsarah]

From Democracy Now! Amy Goodman interviews:

Combatants For Peace: Former Israeli and Palestinian Fighters Talk About Why Dialogue, Not War, Will Solve the Middle East Crisis

These are some snippets taken only from the first part of the interview with Yonatan Shapira.
For entire transcript go to : http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/07/24/1439247
To listen to the interview: http://play.rbn.com/?url=demnow/demnow/demand/2006/july/audio/dn20060724.ra&proto=rtsp&start=

* Yonatan Shapira-Former Captain in the Israeli Air Force Reserves. In 2003 Yonatan initiated the group of Israeli Air Force pilots who refused to fly attack missions on Palestinian territories. He is the co-founder of Combatants for Peace.

* Bassam Aramim-Former member of Fatah, who served a 7 year prison sentence after being arrested in Hebron when he was 17 years old. He is currently a member of Combatants for Peace.


Yonatan Shapira - "And that's why I’m here today talking to the American people, talking to the Jewish community, trying to convince them that it's us who have to lead these demonstrations around the world. It's us Jewish people and Israelis and former fighters, former combatants that took part in these wars, to lead these demonstrations who call for international pressure, who call for sanctions against the Israeli government who is doing these cruel things and brutal things in Lebanon. It will harm us Israelis, it will harm us Jewish people, if you will not wake up now, because it will not continue forever, and someone has to put an end to this."

<snip>

Yonatan Shapira - "You know, it's insanity, and it's a lie because my government now is refusing to cease fire. How can you in one hand cry about missiles that are attacking yourself, you, your family in Haifa, in Afula, in Kiryat Shmona, and at the same time refuse to cease fire? The same aspiration, the same idea that you can just kill and annihilate all of Hezbollah is the same logic of Nasrallah, that will kill all Israel or this kind of nonsense. And there is a lot of mental disorder issues here. And that's why I don't think that the solution for this situation will come from within the Israeli politics. That's why we have to work both from external pressure and internal pressure. The external pressure will be led by Israelis and Jewish people around the world with all the other human rights activists, and the internal pressure will be led by soldiers who refuse to participate in these war crimes."

<snip>

Yonatan Shapira - "And as a Jewish person who is also from a family that suffered lots and lost a lot in the Holocaust, and I was raised to be aware and not to follow any kind of racist leaders, I think that now it's very important to be mentioned that these leaders, this guy, this specific commander, is so dangerous for us, and Jewish people from all around the world must wake up and understand that in order to support Israel, in order to make sure that Israel will continue to exist, we must stop these guys. We must stop them, because now they continue to lead soldiers.

Young soldiers are being recruited today, and I saw just in the news how the commander, the same commander, is receiving them and hugging them, and sometimes I feel like it's something like sacrifying some , some kind of worshiping, and in some way -- if I can say just last thing about the Jewish community here in the United States, some people say that instead of worshiping God, the Jewish God, the Jewish community here -- not all of them, but some of them -- are worshiping Israel, and this is very dangerous."

[USA_1]

1. step one in the way to peace ....

http://www.stop-us-military-aid-to-israel.net/



please sign the petition

[samhsarah]

2. Will do.....

Thanks for the link.

[Douglas Carpenter]

3. I just listened to the interview an hour ago...very moving

also the interview with a former Palestinian Fatah fighter

[Lindacooks]

4. K&R

That's the point I was trying to get across on one of my (locked) posts. The 'Israel, right or wrong' crowd is worshiping Israel, and that is wrong.

[samhsarah]

6. When you look at the past of the region

you can understand why people would get so defensive. But as you said, that doesn't make it right. Maybe the fact that he is also saying it will be able to get through to some people, since he is obviously not an anti-semite.

[Pepper32]

5. I tried to sign it and this is the message I received.

"The petition has been shut down by hackers. We hope to have it back up shortly."

[samhsarah]

7. That happened to me too....

I'll try again tomorrow.

[mom cat]

8. Blessed are the Peacemakers. They carry a heavy load!

[God Almighty]

9. A lot of Israelis oppose their government and want sanctions

Only those who don't care about humanity support what Israel is currently doing.

[Zhade]

10. Kick and Rec

The Israeli refuseniks are also heroes.

[leesa]

11. Good for them. Israel has to stop this insanity or they will be destroyed

It's a no-brainer.

[Karenina]

12. Indeed, it is.

:SIGH: