OUTLINE: After a heart-wrenching summary of recent news: There is a long history of Zionist collaboration with the Nazis. That history has been carefully hidden from public view. Today, we have the privilege of exploring that history with Professor Mazin Qumsieh. Professor Qumsiyeh currently teaches and does research at Bethlehem and Birzeit Universities in occupied Palestine and is President of the Palestinian Center for Rapprochement between People.

SCRIPT: It is Sunday, August 2nd, 2009. We begin with a summary of news highlights.

The issue of illegal Israeli settlements is still very much at center stage. We recall that, at a press conference following a meeting on May 27th, 2009, with an Egyptian delegation consisting of Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmad Ali Abul Gheit, Chief of the Egyptian General Intelligence Services, Lieutenant General Omar Suleiman, and others, Secretary Hillary Clinton declared: "With respect to settlements, the President was very clear when Prime Minister Netanyahu was here. He wants to see a stop to settlements – not some settlements, not outposts, not natural growth exceptions. We think it is in the best interests of the effort that we are engaged in that settlement expansion cease. That is our position. That is what we have communicated very clearly, not only to the Israelis but to the Palestinians and others. And we intend to press that point."

About a week later, on June 4th, President Obama gave a speech in Cairo in which he appeared to press for the end of all settlement construction. His exact words regarding settlements, however, were: "The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements." Notice how he used the word "continued" to refer to Israeli settlements. That was not accidental. It was a deliberately chosen vague word subject to interpretation in the best tradition of sly lawyerly language in which Mr. Obama excels having been trained in the best Ivy League schools. The Israelis, equally expert in parsing language, immediately stepped into the breach when, almost two weeks later, on June 17th, at a press conference with Israeli FM Lieberman at her side, Secretary Clinton repeated the demand she had made before the Cairo speech for the end of all settlement construction, Mr. Lieberman protested saying that exceptions must be allowed for the so-called "natural growth of settlements."

With just a little reflection, we can see why the thought of asking for that exception is totally wacko. Think about it: yes, the settlements are considered illegal under international law. Yes, they were, and continue to be, built on land acquired by armed robbery from their rightful Palestinian owners, and military-backed demolition of Palestinian homes. But….now that many of them have been built, provision must be made for their expansion! Sheer lunacy, isn't it? And yet…..Mr. Obama's own words deliberately left open that possibility. "Natural growth" construction of existing settlements is technically not "new" settlement construction. As a matter of fact, according to the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz, the U.S. is expected to agree to the construction of 2,500 units currently under construction which Israel believes cannot be halted. These units are also, technically, not "new" construction because they were planned, and construction had started, before the pronouncements of Secretary Clinton and President Obama. Got it? To understand what is going on, you've got to dissect every sentence, parse every word, uncover the number of ways every word can be twisted to mean the opposite of what most normal people understand is being said. Mr. Obama and his gang are not to be trusted. With all the promise of change, all they have done, in every sphere, is perpetuate George Bush's policies.

In the same article we mentioned earlier, Ha'aretz reported that Secretary Clinton told European Foreign Ministers that Israel will agree to temporarily freeze construction of settlements "in the framework of new understandings that Jerusalem will reach with Washington." She also said, according to Ha'aretz, that she expected the European Union to show support and appreciation for the move by Israel. Now, isn't that nice? Israel should be rewarded for temporarily suspending its criminal activities! What other deceits should we expect from the Obama administration within the so-called "framework of new understandings that Jerusalem will reach with Washington?"

A clue to what awaits us can be found in Mr. Obama's meeting on July 13th with 15 American Jewish leaders in the White House. Again, according to Ha'aretz, "The president and the Jewish officials huddled for talks aimed at clearing the air following allegations that his administration was taking a tough line with Israel over settlement activity. At the meeting, Obama told the leaders that he wants to help Israel overcome its demographic problem by reaching an agreement on a two-state solution, but that in order to do so, Israel would need "to engage in serious self-reflection."" We have to wonder what Mr. Obama's view of the two-state solution is given the fact that he himself regards Palestinians as a "demographic problem" and that he is giving the green light to more settlement construction on Palestinian land. It certainly looks as if Obama's nightmarish vision of a "two-state solution" is a more sliced up version of the West Bank than even former PM Ariel Sharon engineered!

Soon after the July 13th meeting at the White House, a group of Israeli rabbis, headed by Chief Rabbi Shlomo Amar, sent a letter to U.S. rabbis and the President's Conference, urging them to exert political leverage in Israel's favor. The letter said: "We ask you to make use of your political power to lobby the American authorities to reconsider this policy in the spirit of truly democratic justice…" So there you have it: the Israel lobby in the U.S. has received its marching orders from Israel to pressure the President to accept further settlement construction "in the spirit of truly democratic justice!!" On which side of the looking glass are we living??

Meanwhile, a group of legal experts from Israel's Foreign Ministry is writing a defense brief for the government ahead of two United Nations reports that are expected to be highly critical of the extent of civilian injuries in the Gaza Strip during the operation. A draft of the two reports is expected to be given to Israel around the end of August, before they are officially presented to the UN Human Rights Council in mid-September.

The release of the UN reports could lead to legal action against Israel. The first of the two reports, considered the harshest critique since the war, is being compiled by an investigative committee chaired by Judge Richard Goldstone, appointed by the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. The second report is under preparation by the UN Commission on Human Rights.

Legal experts in the Foreign Ministry told the special ministerial committee following suits against Israeli public figures abroad and various reports on Operation Cast Lead that they believe the release of the two UN reports could lead to legal proceedings against Israel or individual Israeli public figures in the International Court of Justice or the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

Hamas' political bureau chief Khaled Meshal reportedly told Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Saltanov in Damascus that if PA President Abbas comes to an agreement on a final settlement of the conflict with Israel, and if the agreement is approved in a Palestinian referendum, Hamas would not try to derail such an accord. When Minister Saltanov relayed Mr. Meshal's message to the Israelis, they predictably dismissed it and criticized Mr. Saltanov for meeting with Mr. Meshal, as they have done with former U.S. President Jimmy Carter when he relayed the same message to them last year. We expect to hear Israel very soon claim that it can not negotiate a peace treaty with Mr. Abbas because Mr. Abbas can not speak for the Palestinians in Gaza.

On the ground, probably to curry favor with the UN whose scathing reports are due to come out next month, Israel has authorized a one-of-a-kind shipment of 130,000 metric tons of cement and building materials into Gaza for the reconstruction of a flour mill, and the repair of some sewage, electricity and water facilities. The flour mill will be reconstructed in partnership with the UN's Works and Relief Agency, or UNRWA.

To curry favor with the United States, Israel also suspended the construction of some 900 apartments in East Jerusalem. The houses were planned for the illegal settlement of Pisgat Ze'ev built on Palestinian land in the West Bank around East Jerusalem.

The big event in Palestine next week is the convening of the Sixth Fateh Congress in Bethlehem this coming Tuesday, August 4th. The results of this Congress may have very far reaching effects on the Palestinian political landscape. Interestingly, many of Mr. Abbas' opponents may not be able (or allowed) to attend that conference.

You may recall that we reported last week on Israeli FM Avigdor Lieberman's instructions to all Israeli embassies and consulates to hang a 1940s picture of the then Grand Mufti of Jerusalem sitting with Hitler in a clear attempt to smear the Palestinians and muster public support for Israel. While it is true that the Grand Mufti appealed to Hitler in desperation of watching the Zionist-British alliance rape his country, it is also true that former Israeli PM Yitzhak Shamir, then the operations commander of the notorious terrorist group of thugs known as the Stern gang, who were responsible for many massacres of Palestinians, sent emissaries to Beyrouth to meet with German agents and offer the services of the Zionist military to Nazi Germany. Indeed, there is a long history of Zionist collaboration with the Nazis. That history has been carefully hidden from public view.

Today, we have the privilege of exploring that history with Professor Mazin Qumsieh. Professor Qumsiyeh currently teaches and does research at Bethlehem and Birzeit Universities in occupied Palestine and is President of the Palestinian Center for Rapprochement between People. He has had a long and distinguished career, having previously served on the faculties of Yale University, Duke University and the University of Tennessee. He has published several books of which the most acclaimed is "Sharing the Land of Canaan: human rights and the Israeli/Palestinian Struggle" which was translated to Spanish. The book explores the history of Zionism and is available online at his website: www.qumsiyeh.org. He joins us now by telephone from Palestine.

Good afternoon Professor Mazin Qumsiyeh and thank you for being our guest today. I hope you and your family are well.

1. The long history of Zionist collaboration with Nazi Germany is well known to professional historians but is rarely, if ever, discussed outside academic circles. As you know, Israeli FM Lieberman instructed all Israeli embassies and consulates to display the picture of Mufti Husseini sitting with Hitler, comfortable in the notion that the public is ignorant of the Zionist collaboration with Nazi Germany. Could you give us a primer on the other side of this coin – the nature and extent of the Zionist connection with Hitler's Germany?

2. Some Zionist-Nazi connections were related to encouraging immigration from Germany to Palestine in order to create the State of Israel. These Zionist attempts to force the immigration of European Jews to Palestine, led the Zionists to enforce oppressive measures on Jews. For example, as you mention in your book "Sharing the Land of Canaan," Ben Gurion opposed the British plan in 1938 to rescue thousands of Jewish children and told a meeting of Labor Zionist leaders: "If I knew that it would be possible to save all the children in Germany by bringing them over to England, and only half of them by transporting them to Eretz Yisrael, then I would opt for the second alternative. For we must weigh not only the life of these children, but also the history of the people of Israel."

3. But there was another more insidious offer of collaboration with Nazi Germany. I'm thinking about Former PM Yitzhak Shamir's offer to have his Stern gang of terrorist thugs fight alongside Nazi Germany's forces should Germany decide to enter Palestine. As you know, Mazin, a copy of that proposal was found in the archives of the German Embassy in Ankara, Turkey. In that document, the point was made that:
"The establishment of the historical Jewish state on a national and totalitarian basis, and bound by a treaty with the German Reich, would be in the interest of a maintained and strengthened future German position of power in the Near East."
(So, while the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem was desperately looking for help to end the carnage and rape of his land, Israel would offer the Wehrmacht power and influence in the Middle East.)

4. If I may, Mazin, I would like to turn to the Zionists' behavior in the camps of displaced persons which dotted Europe right after the war in 1946 – 1947; the manufacture of the equation: "Jew=Zionist;" and the manufacture of countless myths about Jewish history that survive to this day.

5. What are your thoughts about a post-Zionist era and how one can get to that era?

I'm afraid we are being given the signal that we have run out of time. I would greatly appreciate the opportunity of discussing this big subject further with you in another edition. Thank you very much Professor Mazin Qumsiyeh for being our guest today.

And that is all we have for today. We wish our listeners a pleasant and restful weekend and look forward to having you with us next week, same time. Until then, this is Sherif Fam signing off for now and reminding our listeners to GET INVOLVED!

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