If Daily Kos’ banning of Steve Amsel and Eileen Fleming, two peace activists who support the rights of the Palestinian people, a few days ago, and three other peace activists that preceded them, were not enough, today Daily Kos banned two Palestinian peace activists. This action was taken in an apparent attempt to appease a small group of right wing proIsrael supporters who have invaded Daily Kos. If anyone believes that of course they should probably take ownership of the Brooklyn Bridge. The true source of all of these banning is not yet evident, but no one is ready to believe that Daily Kos is getting ready to be sold to an AIPAC subsidiary.
As for Daily Kos’ investment in progressive and liberal issues like civil and human rights, the word is that Kos the owner doesn’t care one way or another about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, even though it is a core issue in American foreign policy. That’s an interesting prospective when a Left Wing Democrat does not care about human rights issues. Because many people believe that the Left Wing of the Democratic party is taking its lead from the netroots, places like Daily Kos, which is the largest political blog on the internet, not giving a damned one way or another about human rights issues is not exactly what a typical liberal or progressive Democrat would expect from a blog that purports to be liberal or progressive. Leadership in civil and human rights is certainly not what any liberal or progressive Democrat will find at Daily Kos.
Here are the obituaries for the most recent voices snuffed out by Daily Kos, both of whose writings cried out for justice for the Palestinian people, especially because they are both Palestinian.
Hiatham Sabbah
Haitham Sabbah; is a husband and father of two active boys and one little girl; an Electronics & Communication Engineer; born at Kuwait on April, 2nd, 1969. His family was forcibly uprooted from Palestine and presently considers himself a man without a country, a Palestinian in exile.
Haitham runs the blog, Sabbah’s Blog located at: http://sabbah.biz/mt/
Haitham started Sabbah’s Blog because he felt….
….disappointment about what (he) read about what and how the Middle East is represented to the world online, especially the lies and biased coverage of the news media concerning atrocities and the murder of his countrymen and women in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (while Israel continued to colonize the West Bank and Gaza).
(He states that his) blog topics encourage healthy discussions on political, cultural, religious, and life in the Arab World, but (his) chief interest is in the intersection between politics, individual liberty, and freedom in the Middle East, particularly in Palestine. The vast majority of his blog posts and essays touch on this in one way or another, and he tries to create a better understanding of what is going on, speaking the truth, which is always hidden in Western media when it comes to Palestine/Israel conflict.
Hiatham Sabbah no doubt became familiar with the extensive censorship, lies, and propaganda that pervade the global news media, especially in the United States, about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. His contributions at Daily Kos largely revealed the human rights violations and injustices that pervade the lives of Palestinians today, and the peace he supports.
When Daily Kos took down Haitham Sabbah today, he took down a decent voice that spoke about truth and peace in relation to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Umkahlil
Umkahlil runs Umkahlil, a blog dedicated to the rights of the Palestinians, especially the “right of return” of the Palestinian refugees, who have lingered in numerous refugee camps in the Palestinian territories as well as surrounding Arab countries like Jordan and Lebanon, for sixty years. Although her family originally came from Ramallah, West Bank, she is a naturalized Palestinian-American citizen, who is employed as a school teacher. I can’t imagine what she will have to say tomorrow to her pupils about free speech in America, but certainly it cannot be very pleasant.
http://umkahlil.blogspot.com/2007_03_01_archive.html
Her blog profile is short and direct (no picture, sorry):
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 13, Section 2 states “Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.” This blog advocates for the implementation of the Palestinians’ inalienable right to return home and calls upon each and every blogger concerned about human rights, justice, and a durable peace in the Middle East to get behind the effort to advocate for its implementation.
Over the years, Umkahlil watched as Palestine progressively diminished as Israel colonized more and more land, until only 10% of what was once 90% ownership of Palestine existed. That colonization continues in the West Bank today, with more and more acres added to the tens of thousands already confiscated, and more and more Palestinians dead, added to the tens of thousands already killed in defense of their lands.
So in parting, we say to Sabbah and Unkahlil, goodbye. The Democratic Left, or at least that portion of the Left that resides on Daily Kos, has left you. As the sixth and seventh peace activist banned from Daily Kos recently, you will be missed. But we will be back. Who? The Democratic Left, the true liberals and progressives who support our civil and human rights agenda. No blog owner will ever kill that one thing that has made us unique among Democrats, indeed, among Americans.