❶ Israeli forces demolish homes of 2 Palestinians in Hebron area
❷ When Israel’s bulldozers escape our attention
❸ SodaStream admits bowing to boycott pressure
❹ ‘NYT’ article on roots of recent violence in Israel/Palestine fails to use the word ‘occupation’
❺ Opinion/Analysis: WHY IT’S DANGEROUS TO CONFLATE HAMAS AND DAESH
❻ Poetry by Mourid Barghouti
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❶ MA’AN NEWS AGENCY
ISRAELI  FORCES  DEMOLISH  HOMES  OF  2  PALESTINIANS  IN  HEBRON  AREA
Feb. 23, 2016
Israeli forces raided two Palestinian towns in the southern occupied West Bank district of Hebron overnight Monday, where they demolished the homes of two young men who carried out attacks against Israelis.
___A video shared online by an Israeli army spokesperson showed excavators demolishing two houses in the middle of the night.      More . . .
❷ THE ELECTRONIC INTIFADA
WHEN  ISRAEL’S  BULLDOZERS  ESCAPE  OUR  ATTENTION
Barbara Erickson
Feb. 22, 2016
Last autumn, when word came that the unpaved road to al-Hadidiya would be repaired, villagers in this Jordan Valley herding community looked forward to a winter of less hardship.
___Now, even when the rains arrived and turned the track into muck, supplies could get through, children could walk to school and the sick could reach clinics. . . .
___ . . . an attorney had won an injunction, and the work, supported by aid from donors, went forward.
___Nevertheless, Israeli bulldozers arrived before dawn on 25 November and began to destroy what had been accomplished, piling gravel in heaps.     More . . .

❸ THE ELECTRONIC INTIFADA
SODASTREAM  ADMITS  BOWING  TO  BOYCOTT  PRESSURE
Ryan Rodrick Beiler
Feb. 22, 2016
SodaStream, the maker of fizzy drink machines, has confirmed that pressure from an international boycott campaign prompted it to withdraw from the occupied West Bank. . . .
___ SodaStream’s CEO Daniel Birnbaum said that his firm had planned to eventually close its factory in Mishor Adumim, an industrial park adjoining an Israeli settlement in the West Bank.
___The shutdown was accelerated by pressure from the Palestinian-led boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement, he confirmed.      More . . .
❹ MONDOWEISS
‘NYT’  ARTICLE  ON  ROOTS  OF  RECENT  VIOLENCE  IN  ISRAEL/PALESTINE  FAILS  TO  USE  THE  WORD  ‘OCCUPATION’
Dan Cohen
Feb. 22, 2016
The New York Times published an aesthetically engaging interactive titled “Roots of the Recent Violence Between Israelis and Palestinians” that attempts to explain the situation since October 1st. Rife with clichés and pro-Israel talking points, the piece fails to use the word “occupation” and tacitly lends support to Israel’s policy of land grabs and ghettoizing Palestinians behind walls.     More . . .
❺ Opinion/Analysis
AL-SHABAKA, THE PALESTINIAN POLICY NETWORK
WHY  IT’S  DANGEROUS  TO  CONFLATE  HAMAS  AND  DAESH
Belal Shobaki
Feb. 22, 2016
While Israel’s efforts to link Palestinian resistance to its military occupation to global terrorism are not new, it has expanded its propaganda to address Arab as well as Western audiences. By so doing, it is clearly seeking to exploit the global aversion to movements that have drifted towards extremism and terrorism while claiming to represent Islam. “Hamas is ISIS and ISIS is Hamas,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared at the United Nations in 2014. Yet better than anyone else, Netanyahu and the Israeli political establishment know that Hamas and Daesh are not related, as do those Arab regimes that also tar all Islamic movements with the same brush to serve their own ends.
___ Belal Shobaki is assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at Hebron University, Palestine.     More . . .

“THE  STAB,”  BY  MOURID  BARGHOUTI
The moonlight said:
I am the first of the homeless,
the eternal wanderer;
you find me on the breakwaters,
on the soldier’s helmet,
on the false teeth of the party’s general secretary,
in the begging of the willow and in the river’ obstinacy,
on the woman’s brow when pleasure lifts it,
on the executioner’s fingernails and the robber’s key-ring,
on parliament’s oppressive dome,
on a deserter’s medals,
on the tilted surface of a bomber,
on the marble steps,
on a knife blade
which a friend takes from the front of his cloak
and points at your backbone.
And in my moment of agony,
I beg the clouds:
“Hide me!”

About Mourid Barghouti
From Barghouti, Mourid. MIDNIGHT AND OTHER POEMS. Trans. Radwa Ashour. Todmorden, UK: Arc Publications, 2008. Available from Amazon.