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As my followers may have noticed, I haven't been posting on this blog for some time. That's either because I've been busy (mainly in Palestine, researching a new version of the Bradt Guide to Palestine), or because I'm now blogging mainly on my new website. Please join me there!

ei: Seeing the land as one: Raja Shehadeh interviewed

I don't normally use this blog for plugging articles I've written elsewhere, but this one I'm a bit proud of and the interview itself was very exciting to do - because I love Raja Shehadeh's work, and because it was the same day Sharyn and I appeared at Edinburgh International Book Festival ourselves with an almost sell-out audience for Gaza: Beneath the Bombs.

ei: Seeing the land as one: Raja Shehadeh interviewed

Cool project and crap press

My friend Kolya just sent me a very cool project - a Gazan recipe book being put together by Madrid-based translator Maggie Schmitt and Gazan writer Laila el-Haddad, of Gazamom fame. They're currently in Gaza and the initial posts about the research they're doing look absolutely mouthwatering...
The book is also interesting because it's using Kickstarter to help fund the research - a donations website which allows people to put money into one-off projects they want to support.
The crap press part of the heading is a reference to the common practice of reporting the exciting/shocking/dramatic bit of an event, and failing to report the more mundane downside. This is a widespread phenomenon - I remember reading some research years ago about how newspapers were much more inclined to print the titillating (to a distressingly large number of revolting men) details of rape trials, but then rarely followed up with boring details like, y'know, verdicts and sentences. The main culprits, shock horror, were various tabloids and the vile Torygraph. Posh blokes getting their rocks off at the idea of women being assaulted? Shurely shome mishtake.
But an example I came across today via the blog of an American blogging from Sanaa rather shows up the political agenda behind a lot of our media.
You may remember news agency stories last month of an audacious gun attack on the British Embassy in Yemen, rapidly attributed to al-Qaeda (obviously). What you may not recall are any follow-up reports of the fact that the attack never happened. What actually took place was a squabble between two security guards who were meant to be defending said Embassy, but who got in a row and opened up on one another, and then were too embarrassed to 'fess up to the origins of the gunfire. Read all about it here.
Genius.

Claremont Road Kurdish bakery

Despite the shite weather, less-than-marvellous waste disposal and occasional pissed/gouched neighbours staggering past at all hours, sometimes I love living in Moss Side. One of the best things to pop up in our neighbourhood recently is the new Kurdish bakery on Claremont Road, between the Natwest Bank on the corner with Lloyd St and the old Maine Road ground.


There are no complicated choices to make here. You walk in and give the guys at the desk the number of hot, fragrant flat breads you want (in multiples of four). One young man flips the fat balls of dough waiting on the side with his hands until they're about a foot wide and flat, then the other uses a kind of cushion to slap them onto the inside of the oven and tongs to whisk them back out, seconds later. They come out a bit like a nan bread, but lighter, and absolutely delicious. And at a pound for four, a total bargain.

Support a judge! (yes, really)

Not the sort of thing I'd usually say. But strange times...

After the historic victory of the EDO Decommissioners (http://www.corporatewatch.org.uk/?lid=3673) earlier this month, the judge in the case, Judge George Bathurst-Norman, has become subject of a concerted campaign of smears and defamation by a number of right-wing columnists, the Zionist Federation, and the Board of Deputies of British Jews on grounds that his summary of the evidence was 'anti-semitic'.

The Office of Judicial Complaints (OJC) has as a result opened an investigation into Judge Bathurst Normans handling of the case.

Although we don't normally find ourselves sticking up for judges we find the charge of anti-semitism a grossly cynical attempt to undermine the significance of these acquittals of pro-Palestinian activists on evidence of Israeli war crimes that was for the most part agreed by the Crown Prosecution Service.

There is nothing anti-semitic in putting agreed evidence of Israeli war crimes to a jury.

You can express your concern about this investigation by sending an email to the Office Judicial Complaints, marking your email 'Bathurst Norman'.

[email protected]

A full transcript of the Judge's summary of the evidence has been published by the Jewish Chronicle (strange times indeed!) here.

Weird things to be happy about

There's something wrong, and yet very right, about being cheered up by people's amazing strength and cheerfulness in response to horrible things happening to them. Fr'instance, there's Emily Henochowicz, the 21-year-old Jewish-American activist who had her eye smashed out by an Israeli high-velocity tear gas canister at a peaceful West Bank demonstration only a few weeks ago. One of her reactions to losing an eye, something which as an artist can't be great news, is to design a really fucking cool pair of glasses, with a beautiful pattern half-covering one eye socket. There's a picture of them on her blog here.
And then there's Tristan Anderson, who was also hit in the face by a high-velocity tear gas canister fired by an Israeli soldier against peaceful protesters (spot a pattern here?). Despite spending the first six months after the incident in what was often described as a coma but which was something which I guess to most of us would look similar, Tristan is now in a wheelchair, able to speak and function in many ways, although severely constrained in others. He's back in the USA and at a rehab centre, which is probably more than many of us who were following his situation from afar ever thought would be possible (and is of course very far from what most Palestinians who suffer similar injuries would ever be able to access). A Q&A on his progress is here.

On a completely different subject, this neat little site gives an easily digested run-through of why all the Tory cuts which are currently cutting a swathe through public sector and probably third sector employment in this country, as well as many not-as-useless-as-they-might-make-out services, are ill-conceived, economically damaging and hypocritically and ideologically selective.

Manchester Anarchist Bookfair

Message from Dave at Manchester Anarchist Bookfair:

We can now announce that the Manchester Anarchist Bookfair will take
place from 11.00am until 5.00pm on Saturday 2nd October 2010 at The
Dancehouse Theatre, Oxford Road (opposite the BBC).
The venue is bigger and more importantly brighter than last year!
Are you interested in having a stall at the next Manchester Anarchist
Bookfair?
Stalls cost £10 per table.
If you are a bookstore or distributor and require more you can book
more tables at £10 per table.
Let us know how many you need.
We'll be posting details of stalls as they are confirmed at:
http://www.bookfair.org.uk
Follow us on twitter
If you live in Manchester and want to get involved in organising
things get in touch.