972mag posted:Jordan Valley fence would finalize the West Bank's complete enclosureIn what might be a shot to the heart of current peace negotiations, Netanyahu is reviving plans to build a ‘security fence’ in the Jordan Valley. If the fence follows the original route it will enclose any future Palestinian state, cement impossible Bantustan borders and give birth to a new map of Israel’s borders.
Ten years after international pressure led Israel to scrap construction plans for the Jordan Valley section of the security/separation fence, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is on track to revive them. Two Ma’ariv – Makor Rishon correspondents on Sunday reported that several government ministries are already making preparations for the project and that Netanyahu himself will order the commencement of construction once the Egyptian border fence is completed. According to Ma’ariv, the official excuse for constructing the new segment is the fear that Syrian refugees now staying in Jordan might infiltrate — although there are no known reports of Syrians trying to make it to the West Bank from the Hashemite Kingdom — and “closing the Israeli border.”
However, the correspondents also mention the un-coincidental timing in which Netanyahu made his plans known: just as negotiations with Palestinians seem to be hitting a dead end, with the question of sovereignty in the Jordan Valley reportedly being one of the central obstacles. Just last week Netanyahu made clear at a Likud conference that he considers Israeli control of the Jordan Valley a key strategic issue and a red line for all future agreements.
It is still unclear where exactly Netanyahu plans to build his fence. When West Bank separation barrier maps were originally drawn about 11 years ago, however, they included plans for a fence that would separate most of mountain area, where the vast majority of Palestinians live, from the vast expenses of the Jordan Valley. American objections to that route led to its cancelation as early as 2003, as well as to the halt of construction of whole segments of the fence/wall east of Jerusalem and in the south Bethlehem/Gush Etzion areas, leaving large gaps in the planned route of the barrier to this day.
Considering the implications of political annexation in the existing fence and Netanyahu’s desire to ensure Israeli control over the Jordanian border, it wouldn’t be outlandish to presume Netanyahu wishes to build his fence along the original route. The result would be completely surrounding the Palestinian territories in the West Bank with Israeli fences, removing any and all land borders it might share with another state (aside from Israel) and finalizing the process of Bantustan-ization of any future Palestinian state/autonomy.
The Jordan Valley has long been one of the most central but least-considered and rarely discussed problems of the occupation. Ehud Barak’s plan for maintaining Israeli control in the Jordan Valley was one of the reasons Yasser Arafat rejected his “generous offer” in 2000.
In the decade since, Palestinian freedom of movement has been increasingly and extremely limited in the Jordan Valley, all while Israeli settlements and agricultural land grabs continued growing. At the same time — and increasingly so in recent years — Israel has been demolishing large numbers of Palestinian villages in the Valley, claiming they are located in the middle of military training grounds. In addition, the state has been trying to push Jordan Valley Bedouin communities into other areas of the West Bank. Haaretz‘s Amira Hass keeps track of these demolitions and describes them as a process of ethnic cleansing. Building the fence might be the final step in turning the area into a Jewish-only strip of frontier land, which large parts of the political leadership consider essential for Israel’s security.
The Ma’ariv story also mentions that Netanyahu is pushing to finalize border fortifications in the Golan Heights. Putting all these pieces together – the new anti-African asylum seeker fence on the Egyptian border, the Syrian border fence and now the Jordan Valley barrier – it looks like Netanyahu is making a final push at guaranteeing his place in Israeli history as the prime minister who surrounded the entire country with fences and walls, not only for security and demographic reasons but also to demarcate what territory the Jewish state will hold on to in the long run, regardless of peace talks or international criticism.
this mostly seems to be about stealing the Jordan Valley.
it also would give Israel even more control over the movement of people and goods through the Jordan/West Bank border.
getfiscal posted:
how times change (o they dont?)
guidoanselmi posted:getfiscal posted:
how times change (o they dont?)
88888 posted:
MadMedico posted:guidoanselmi posted:getfiscal posted:
how times change (o they dont?)
holy shit
Left-wing activist and filmmaker Michael Malone (Kevin Farley), a parody of Michael Moore, campaigns to end the celebration of the Fourth of July holiday. Malone holds pronounced anti-American views and truculently argues that America's past and present are both offensive, and therefore should not be celebrated.
On the evening of July 3, Malone watches a speech from President John F. Kennedy and mistakenly interprets the speech to mean avoiding war at any cost. President Kennedy rises out of the television set, corrects Malone regarding the intent of the speech, and informs him that he will be visited by three spirits.
The following morning, Malone is visited by General George S. Patton (Kelsey Grammer), who shows him an alternate United States where slavery still exists because Abraham Lincoln chose not to fight the Civil War. Shaken but still unmoved, Malone is visited by the angel of death (Trace Adkins), who takes him to a future Los Angeles completely taken over by radical Islamists. He is then taken to the ruins of his hometown in Michigan, which has been destroyed by a nuclear bomb planted by Al Qaeda. In a mortuary, Malone learns that he will be killed in this attack, leaving nothing behind but his trademark hat and "big ass." Facing his death, Malone pleads for his life with the Angel, promising to change. However, all is not well after Malone's revelation, for Aziz, a Middle Easterner he had interviewed, is actually a terrorist who will bomb a 4th of July rally along with his underlings Ahmed and Fayed. However, when Fayed and Ahmed learn they are going to be detonated along with the planned bomb, they figure their slim chance of survival is by seeking out Malone.
Later, Malone arrives at an anti-Fourth of July protest rally and publicly renounces his former views. This triggers an outraged mob from which he is rescued, however, by American servicemen. Meeting up with Malone, Ahmed and Fayed defuse their own bomb, thus sparing the people at the anti-Independence Day rally and resulting in the capture of the terrorist Aziz. Safe inside a country music concert, the three are formally welcomed to "the real America" by Trace Adkins (this time as himself). A reformed Malone then goes to a Navy base to see his nephew Josh off to the Persian Gulf. He tells Josh how very proud he is of him and promises to look in on his wife and family during his deployment. In the final scene, Malone now decides to make films he feel people would appreciate, as well as Fayed and Ahmed as part of the crew, who have been pardoned for foiling the bombing. Malone is last seen working on a biographical film about President Kennedy.
guidoanselmi posted:shows him an alternate United States where slavery still exists because Abraham Lincoln chose not to fight the Civil War.
Well no wonder the film bombed, putting something that that early in the film is going to completely alienate your target audience.
i don't know or care enough about oliver hardy to know whether he had a brother, but i sometimes pretend he was the father of the hardy boys and grandfather of the hardy boyz. luciano pavarotti doesn't have a brother as far as i know. yokozuna doesn't have a brother but the bonds within a sumo stable run deep, so he might as well have a ton of fat awesome brothers, which is a life that i'm envious of. rick steiner is fat but scott steiner isn't, although he is a disgusting physical specimen. fat joe always talked about big pun as though he were his brother, and both are kind of physically hilarious.
and this video with a hovercar and diamond studded platinum helicopter is also funny. fat joes lil lisp is hilarious, though the fact that big pun was violently abusive towards his girlfriend isn't funny. the fat boys weren't brothers but are funny, especially because one of them was named "big buff love"
i can't do this any more. i'm going to go have a really big lunch
