Thursday, November 29, 2012

United Nations Grants Palestine Nonmember Observer State


U.N. Assembly, in Blow to U.S., Elevates Status of Palestine

Damon Winter/The New York Times
The Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas, center, was congratulated by Turkey’s foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu. More Photos »




UNITED NATIONS — More than 130 countries voted on Thursday to upgrade Palestine to a nonmember observer state of the United Nations, a triumph for Palestinian diplomacy and a sharp rebuke to the United States and Israel.
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Chang W. Lee/The New York Times
An Israeli envoy, Ron Prosor, right front, was not among those celebrating Palestine’s new status. More Photos »

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But the vote, at least for now, did little to bring either the Palestinians or the Israelis closer to the goal they claim to seek: two states living side by side, or increased Palestinian unity. Israel and the militant group Hamas both responded critically to the day’s events, though for different reasons.
The new status will give the Palestinians more tools to challenge Israel in international legal forums for its occupation activities in the West Bank, including settlement-building, and it helped bolster the Palestinian Authority, weakened after eight days of battle between its rival Hamas and Israel.
But even as a small but determined crowd of 2,000 celebrated in central Ramallah in the West Bank, waving flags and dancing, there was an underlying sense of concerned resignation.
“I hope this is good,” said Munir Shafie, 36, an electrical engineer who was there. “But how are we going to benefit?”
Still, the General Assembly vote — 138 countries in favor, 9 opposed and 41 abstaining — showed impressive backing for the Palestinians at a difficult time. It was taken on the 65th anniversary of the vote to divide the former British mandate of Palestine into two states, one Jewish and one Arab, a vote Israel considers the international seal of approval for its birth.
The past two years of Arab uprisings have marginalized the Palestinian cause to some extent as nations that focused their political aspirations on the Palestinian struggle have turned inward. The vote on Thursday, coming so soon after the Gaza fighting, put the Palestinians again — if briefly, perhaps — at the center of international discussion.
“The question is, where do we go from here and what does it mean?” Salam Fayyad, the Palestinian prime minister, who was in New York for the vote, said in an interview. “The sooner the tough rhetoric of this can subside and the more this is viewed as a logical consequence of many years of failure to move the process forward, the better.” He said nothing would change without deep American involvement.
President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority, speaking to the assembly’s member nations, said, “The General Assembly is called upon today to issue a birth certificate of the reality of the state of Palestine,” and he condemned what he called Israeli racism and colonialism. His remarks seemed aimed in part at Israel and in part at Hamas. But both quickly attacked him for the parts they found offensive.
“The world watched a defamatory and venomous speech that was full of mendacious propaganda against the Israel Defense Forces and the citizens of Israel,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel responded. “Someone who wants peace does not talk in such a manner.”
While Hamas had officially backed the United Nations bid of Mr. Abbas, it quickly criticized his speech because the group does not recognize Israel.
“There are controversial issues in the points that Abbas raised, and Hamas has the right to preserve its position over them,” said Salah al-Bardaweel, a spokesman for Hamas in Gaza, on Thursday.
“We do not recognize Israel, nor the partition of Palestine, and Israel has no right in Palestine,” he added. “Getting our membership in the U.N. bodies is our natural right, but without giving up any inch of Palestine’s soil.”
Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Ron Prosor, spoke after Mr. Abbas and said he was concerned that the Palestinian Authority failed to recognize Israel for what it is.
“Three months ago, Israel’s prime minister stood in this very hall and extended his hand in peace to President Abbas,” Mr. Prosor said. “He reiterated that his goal was to create a solution of two states for two peoples, where a demilitarized Palestinian state will recognize Israel as a Jewish state.
“That’s right. Two states for two peoples. In fact, President Abbas, I did not hear you use the phrase ‘two states for two peoples’ this afternoon. In fact, I have never heard you say the phrase ‘two states for two peoples’ because the Palestinian leadership has never recognized that Israel is the nation-state of the Jewish people.”
The Israelis also say that the fact that Mr. Abbas is not welcome in Gaza, the Palestinian coastal enclave run by Hamas, from which he was ejected five years ago, shows that there is no viable Palestinian leadership living up to its obligations now.

Jennifer Steinhauer contributed reporting from Washington, Isabel Kershner from Jerusalem, and Khaled Abu Aker from Ramallah, West Bank.

Poet Eugene Redmond's 75th Birthday Celebration





Hail! Hail! Marvin X! See (below) what's happening in the "heart of the heart"
of the country . . .

Subject: SAVE the DATE - - Dr. Eugene B. Redmond's 75 Birthday Celebration

September-November 2012
From: Darlene Roy 618 235-1392 (poetdarlene@charter.net) & Donahue Redmond 919
334-9797 (dredmond@att.com)

TO: Media, Friends, Family, Fellow Artists, and Supporters of Dr. Eugene B.
Redmond
SUBJECT: FOUR-DAY FESTIVAL TO HONOR POET LAUREATE'S 75TH BIRTHDAY IN EAST ST.
LOUIS, IL

A four-day Metro-East St. Louis (IL) Festival (Nov. 28th-Dec. 1) will honor the
75th  birthday of Dr. Eugene B. Redmond, poet laureate of the city.
Highlighting his life and works, the celebration will include poetry
performances, music, dance, scholarship, and a “kwansaba” poetry writing
contest for high school students. All festivities, with the exception of an
invitation-only Multi-Arts Gala on December 1st (EBR's Birthday), are free to
the public.

An SIUE emeritus professor of English at Southern Illinois University
Edwardsville, Dr. Redmond is the author/editor of several dozen books, journals
and plays for stage and television, winner of two American Book Awards
(1993/2012), and namesake of the ESL-based EBR Writers Club.

Owing to the poet's close association with the late Katherine Dunham (1909-
2006) and his career-length engagement with the performing/percussive arts,
drum ensembles will invoke ancestors at each of the five major events.

Festival Sketch:

Wednesday, November 28th—free to family
12:00 Noon—Poetry Readings (& refreshments) with Michael Castro, Shirley
Leflore, & Desmond Porter, winner of the student poetry contest  (Library
[Building B] of the East St. Louis Higher Education Campus, 601 J.R. Thompson
Drive, ESL, IL 62201) (Contact: Treasure Shields Redmond at 618 874-8708)

Thursday, November 29th—free to family
12:30-1:30 PM—Kwansaba Panel/Readings featuring Charlois Lumpkin, Darlene Roy,
Jeffery Skoblow & Open Mic w/SIUE students (Southern Illinois U-Edwardsville
Lovejoy Library, 1st Floor [62026])
Reception from 1:30 'til 2:00 PM (Contact: Dr. Howard Rambsy at 618 650-2326)

Friday, November 30th—free to family
(#1) 2:30-3:45 PM—ESL Senior High School's (District 189) World Renowned Jazz
Band (Directed by Delano Redmond), Student Poets/Guest Speaker (Small Gym, 4901
State Street, ESL, IL 62205) (Contact: Darlene Roy at 618 235-1392)
(#2) 7:00-9:00 PM—Jazz & Poetry Festival at East St. Louis City Hall (301 River
Park Drive, 62201) w/The Bosman Twins, The Mark Haynes Trio & Visiting Poets—
free; adults only (Contact: Jaye P. Willis at 618 593-9142)

Saturday, December 1st—invitation only
6:00-10:00 PM—EBR Birthday Gala Banquet at ESL w/Sunshine's Community
Performance Ensemble, ESL Jazz Combo & Literary Luminaries (Contact: Darlene
Roy and/or Donahue Redmond; see below)

In lieu of gifts, the Festival Committee suggests donations to the Dr. Eugene
B. Redmond Learning Center and Reading Room. The Center, consisting of hundreds
of thousands of books, art works, manuscripts, photographs, letters, brochures,
flyers, playbills, posters, and other memorabilia, will be housed in the Elijah
P. Lovejoy Memorial Library at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville.
Donations should be made (via check or money order) to Drumvoices Revue/EBR
Center and mailed to: EBR Writers Club, P.O. Box 6165, ESL, IL 62201. Donors of
$50.00 or more will receive a copy of Dr. Redmond's new book, "Arkansippi
Memwars: Poetry, Prose & Chants, 1962-2012."

Please let us know if you are planning to come to East St. Louis to join in the
celebration!!!

Please email or call the committee co-chairpersons, Darlene Roy at 618 235-1392
(poetdarlene@charter.net) or Donahue Redmond at 919 334-9797
(dredmond@att.com).

We are excited about celebrating Eugene's 75th year!!!

For info on the EBR Writers Club, call 618 650-3991; email: eredmon@siue.edu
EBR's website: http://www.EugeneBRedmond.com/

For more about the Eugene B. Redmond Collection visit
www.siue.edu/lovejoylibrary/ebr.shtml

To view digitized portions, go to
www.siue.edu/lovejoylibrary/about/digital_collections.shtml

Amiri Baraka on Newark's Neo Nazi Negro May Whore


Coery Booker, Newark’s “Virtual Mayor” Shows Out  As Negro Nazi
Amiri Baraka
               For two years or so Newark’s May Whore , Corey  Booker, never set foot in the City Council chambers. Why? So he wd  not have to be confronted by the peoples’ elected representatives. Instead, that is why he is called our “Virtual Mayor”, because on the tube he is ubiquitous, on radio, at press conferences from undisclosed hideouts. But personally, almost never.
               He has appeared, rarely, when the council smoked him out, e.g., when he tried to sell the city’s water, to some of his cronies disguised as the Municipal Utilities Authority(MUA). But  as a result of his desperate foray into the real world , the MUA  got defeated and apparently he learned from that and stayed out of sight except as  occasional  Oprah mascot and Steadman lookalike.
               At another rare emergence into the real world, when he closed our libraries (and  you wonder why a dude well advertised in his sweetheart press as Stanford Univ, Yale Law School, Rhodes scholar would close libraries – I tried to ask him this question , he turned his head to some white member of the library’s board, who said , “No”.
               The rest of the Newark Activists there rose up and started whooping and hollering at the Mayor’s brief excursion into reality. The people screamed at him and he fled. The main library was reopened.
               What I had wanted to ask was to address the mayor’s  Republican sounding statement that “ the government can’t do everything.” I wanted to ask him  then  Why  he doesn’t demand that  Prudential, the world’s largest insurance company  pay it’s taxes, since it hasn’t paid since 1970. That one white building is worth 300 million dollars a year, taxesl  A 45 year old tax exemption!
               Now, around the question of a replacement for City Council President, Donald Payne, Jr, who replaced his father as Congressman, the Virtual One decided to dare reality again. This time with the collusion of city clerk  “Bye Bye Bob” Marasco , and El Sucio Quatro, four council members to mislead the people—there was no mention of the replacing of the council president on the Council agenda, but in the middle of the seeming regular council business, the Virtual One tried to sneak back into reality . He tip toed, on a cue from Traitor Ramos & the Junta as they waved Booker’s replacement dummy on the scene and tried to have “Bye Bye Bob” swear her in.
               This whole scene was preposterous! When Councilman Baraka tried to protest this burlesque Traitor Ramos refused to recognize him. This prompted council persons Baraka, Sharif, & Crump to come off the platform, take the public mikes and began to assail the rump council’s illegal actions & Booker’s clownish violation of the city’s legal statutes.
               When these small time Nazis tried to continue their ripoff of Newark laws and democracy  the people in the hall started to scream foul and tried to stop the criminal actions en masse. Some of us were trying to tell Booker’s stooges  Ramos & the rest who are all linked to North Ward il Duce, Steve Adubato & his boy Essex County Executive, Joe DiVincenzo , that they were committing criminal acts .   Now people surged to the front demonstrating that they be  heard. Instead one policeman started pepper  spraying the people, while  the Virtual One tip toed back into his virtualness.
               It is said that Booker had fellow conspirator Marasco swear the fake council person in, Chenique Davis Speight ,whose husband is an political associate of Steve Adubato, in his office. But we must challenge this whole fiasco as an attack on Democracy and ask at the same time why wd you try this Nazi foolishness on us? Wait a minute, someone might ask, are you trying to accuse these people of Racism as well. How could you do that, the Mayor is a Negro.
    Very much so, we answer, but then we have to quote Fanon, “Some of the oppressed don’t want to destroy their enemies, they want to be them”.
                                                                                                                                                        
Amiri Baraka
                                                                                                                                                         11/28/12


Marvin X, one of the founders of the Black Arts Movement
Now Available for readings/performance/lectures
Booking agent: Sun in Leo PR 718 496 2305
prgirl@suninleo.com

Monday, November 26, 2012

MARVIN X INTERVIEWED FOR PBS DOCUMENTARY ON BLACK PANTHERS AND THE BLACK ARTS MOVEMENT

Marvin X concluded his Revolution on the Rocks Book Tour 2012 with a lunch interview with producer Laurens Grant who is working on a documentary on the Black Panther Party. Marvin X has urged her to include how the Black Panther Party in particular and the liberation movement in general was influenced by the Black Arts Movement. According to Marvin X, there was cross fertilization between the Nation of Islam, Black Panthers, Black Arts Movement and the Black Student Movement that led to Black Studies.

Bobby Seale and Marvin X at the Joyce
Gordon Gallery Black History Celebration, 2012

No aspect of the Black Consciousness Movement sprang up in isolation. We cannot discuss the Black Panthers without discussing the African American Association, led by Donald Warden, aka Khalid Abdullah Tariq Al Mansour. From the AAA's influence came the Panthers and the establishment of Black Studies at Oakland's Merritt College, even before the violent strike for Black Studies at San Francisco State College, now university.

And would the students at Merritt and San Francisco State have been motivated without the West Coast Black Arts Movement, e.g., Bobby Seale performed in Marvin X's second play Come Next Summer before joining the BPP. Bobby played the role of a young black man in search of revolutionary consciousness.

At San Francisco State College, LeRoi Jones, aka Amiri Baraka's Communications Project enrolled student actors and playwrights such as Jimmy Garrett, Benny Stewart, George Murray, Jo Ann Mitchell, Elleadar Barnes, et al., who went on to participate in the Black Panther Party after BAM consciousness.

At San Francisco State College, now University, Marvin X's first play, Flowers for the Trashman, produced by the Drama Department, 1965, ushered in Black Arts West Theatre, 1966, with X and playwright Ed Bullins. Danny Glover performed in BAW. BAW came under the influence of the Nation of Islam will key players joining the NOI, i.e., Marvin X, Duncan X, Hillary X and Ethna X.



The only known photo of Eldridge Cleaver and Marvin X


Upon his return from exile, Marvin X organized his Christian ministry and traveled with him
internationally.

Upon his release from prison, 1967, Eldridge Cleaver hooked up with Marvin X and they established the Black House, a political/cultural center, along with Ethna X, Ed Bullins and Willie Dale. Again the Muslim influence: Marvin X an d BAW guru and former inmate with Eldridge, Alonzo Batin, forced Eldridge Cleaver out of his white woman's house (Beverly Axelrod, the attorney who took his manuscript Soul on Ice out of Soledad Prison and whom Eldridge promised to marry, who also contracted a portion of royalties from Soul on Ice and won by default while Eldridge was exiled in Algeria). Eldridge died poor while his book is still an international bestseller as we write! You nigguhs keep fucking with Miss Ann and you will receive a similar fate! Marvin X eventually introduced Eldridge Cleaver to Bobby Seale and Huey Newton, Marvin's companions from Merritt College.

But just as the Nation of Islam recruited members of the Black Arts West Theatre, Marvin X would later recruit for the NOI. His biggest fish was no doubt Nadar Ali or Bobby Jones who Elijah Muhammad put over the fish import business.

Islam had a significant role on the East Coast Black Panther Party and the genre Muslim American literature begins with Marvin X and the BAM writers, e.g., Sonia Sanchez, Amiri Baraka, Askia Muhammad Toure, et al.

Marvin X and his mentor and associate, Master Sun Ra,
outside Marvin's Black Educational Theatre on O'farrel Street, between Fillmore and Webster, 1972,
Sun Ra and Marvin X were both teaching Black Studies at UC Berkeley. They produced a five hour concert without intermission and a cast of fifty, at San Francisco's Harding theatre on Divisadero St.

See My Friend the Devil, a memoir of Eldridge Cleaver by Marvin X, Black Bird Press, Berkeley, 2009. Also, Somethin' Proper, the autobiography of a North American African Poet, Marvin X, Black Bird Press, 1998. Somethin' Proper came off the press the day Eldridge Cleaver made his transition to the ancestors, May 1, 1998. Marvin X performed the memorial rites in Oakland. Kathleen and her daughter Joju attended the memorial. Kathleen said, "Marvin, the memorial was great, but there were just too many Muslims!" Alas, their son is Ahmed Maceo Eldridge Cleaver, a Sunni Muslim!