Endless wars: another name on the wall (video)

Source: War Is A Crime

Justice Through Music, www.jtmp.org, partners again with the band Op-Critical, www.myspace.com/opcritical, in a new music video rendition of Roger Waters’ “The Wall,” to focus attention on the heartbreak of endless wars. “We made a few changes in the lyrics,” said Op-Critical’s Storm, “with the most powerful being: ‘Daddy, what’d you leave behind for me? On the Mall you left another name on the Wall.’” The video, posted a few days ago on YouTube, has already had thousands of views and rave reviews.

The chorus hook is sung by the fabulous Harmonic Angels Children’s Choir whose members are featured in the video. Roger Waters said that he encourages artists to use the song to resist all forms of oppression and that he sees artists as playing a vital role in resistance to repression and brutality. “I applauded and supported the resistance of schoolchildren in South Africa to that repressive and brutal regime,” he said, “and also applaud and support the resistance of Palestinian children in Gaza and the West Bank to the repressive and brutal occupation they endure.”

The music video was animated and directed by world renowned Scottish film director Matt Brown.

Justice Through Music is a non profit charity that works with famous bands to inspire young people to get involved with social causes. The organization has worked with Op-Critical on a number of music videos focusing on Darfur, Torture, Nuclear Weapons, Fracking, Propaganda, and Arlington Cemetery.

See also:

Bradley Manning Humiliated and Abused:

Why Is Exposing a War Crime More Dangerous Than Committing One?

Remembering the dead and the Rachel Corrie’s mission

by Paul Woodward on June 4, 2010   War In Context

Humanitarian aid workers, a firefighter, a politician, a taekwondo champion, a photojournalist, a student who hoped to become a doctor — nine Turkish men, mostly fathers who leave behind children and wives.

Even while their deaths are at the center of an international crisis that is rocking the state of Israel, these individual lives lost have scarcely gained attention — firstly because the Israeli government resisted revealing any information about who died and in what circumstances, and then, while maintaining a stranglehold on the facts, Israel’s propaganda machine has worked furiously to portray the victims as villains.

The world has largely viewed Israel’s efforts to conceal its brutality with a mixture of skepticism, contempt and outrage. Yet in one regard the hasbara has worked: it has effectively sold the idea that the organizers and participants in the Freedom Flotilla were intent on picking a fight. This was an act of provocation and where opinions differ is on whether the provocation was justified or not.

As MJ Rosenberg wrote:

The first thing you need to know about the Gaza flotilla disaster is that the intention of the activists on board the ships was to break the Israeli blockade. Delivering the embargoed goods was incidental.

In other words, the activists were like the civil rights demonstrators who sat down at segregated lunch counters throughout the South and refused to leave until they were served. Their goal was not really to get breakfast. It was to end segregation.

Yes and no.

The Freedom Flotilla is part of a movement that aims to end the siege of Gaza, but delivering humanitarian aid is not incidental.

Monster’s Ball: Drawing Back the Veil on the ‘Death State’

Complacency is not appropriate:

“ For more than a hundred years, the foreign policy of the United States government has been directed to the establishment and maintenance of global dominance. To this end, violence, overthrow, conquest and murder have been utilized as required … More and more, oppression and brutalization have become the bywords of domestic policy as well. Today, the United States as a political entity is a corporatist-authoritarian-militarist monstrosity: its major products are suffering, torture, barbarism and death on a huge scale.”

by Chris Floyd EmpireBurlesque

Wednesday, 21 April 2010

Arthur Silber is back, with piercing insights that rip the veil which even self-proclaimed dissenters still draw across the blood-soaked reality of what Silber aptly calls the “Death State” that has long “wrapped the world in flames” (to quote the preferred method of resolving diplomatic conflicts famously voiced by Abe Lincoln’s secretary of state) from its mephitic base on the Potomac. As always with Silber, you must read the whole piece (and follow the links) to get the full force of the argument, which is nuanced, multifarious and deeply considered, but here is just the briefest excerpt to send you on your way: I repeat a few words I first wrote at the beginning of 2009…: For more than a hundred years, the foreign policy of the United States government has been directed to the establishment and maintenance of global dominance. To this end, violence, overthrow, conquest and murder have been utilized as required … More and more, oppression and brutalization have become the bywords of domestic policy as well. Today, the United States as a political entity is a corporatist-authoritarian-militarist monstrosity: its major products are suffering, torture, barbarism and death on a huge scale. I repeat the fundamental point to make certain there is no misunderstanding as to where I stand on this question: as a political entity, the United States is an endlessly destructive monstrosity. The overwhelming majority of people — including, I regret to say, even many of those who are severely critical of the United States government — fail to understand this point in anything close to the thorough and consistent manner required. This failure is the result of an earlier one: an inability to grasp fully what it means to revere the sacred value of a single human life. There is more, much more in the original post — “An Evil Monstrosity: Thoughts on the Death State“; excerpting it actually does it an injustice. So go there now and read it. When you’ve done that, scoot on over to Truthdig, where you will find William Pfaff writing in a similar vein about the bloody deceptions of the Death State: past, present — and future. Some excerpts: