UN report on Gaza

A shocking UN report on Gaza has been published with today:
A humanitarian and protection crisis unfolding
(pdf via Spiegel online)

Since the Israeli military operation “Cast lead” began on 27 December until 8 January (4:00PM), 758 Palestinians have been killed—approximately 42% of whom were women (60) and children (257) according to the Palestinian Ministry of …

Molten Lead

Today’s issue of the taz (die tageszeitung) republishes an article by Uri Avnery, who analyzes from within Israel, how there was never a real ceasefire, how a cruel experiment of maximum endurance of misery was put on a whole population under the eyes and with the help of the whole world. He describes, how …

West Bank wall graffiti – UPDATED

a bansky painting from a slide show on spiegel online/ another row of images on the theme can be looked up at reuters.com
In the West Bank, Israel’s security barrier has started to resemble the western side of the Berlin Wall. The Israeli side is bleak and clean, but on the Palestinian side graffiti …

assume the fetal position ….

Today I came across an article in in the german newspaper FAZ (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung) which offers a read-worthy, though kind of bitter review on the heritage which the current president of the US will leave behind to all of us. As looking back and recounting the distortions caused over the years within the …

new new deal (*)

Saskia Sassen writes on Open Democracy on the recent financial crisis – the article ‘The new new deal’ is obviously the opener for a new series ‘When local housing becomes a global electronic instrument’ ... and it might be interesting to read further opinions and analysis on the theme:The current moment would be a …

… the way art works / Chinese way

The Committee to Protect Journalists points to an interesting – or better to say – shocking interview with Zhang Yimou, film director, who did the coreography for the Beijing opening show: Thanks to Xiao Qiang, director of the China Internet Project at the University of California Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism and Sophie Beach …

Habermas explores the post-secularist society

In a recent article for the german Blätter für deutsche und internationale Politik, which luckily got translated by sightandsign.com, Habermas contemplates about religious developments and tendencies, the tradition of tolerance, multiculturalism and the notion of ‘post-secularism’: ... what interests me in the present context is the question of whether a secularist devaluation of religion, ...