Palestine: World's Largest Open Air Prison?

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The Free Gaza Movement

World Unites for Democracy in Iran

People unite in 30 cities worldwide to support the people of Iran as they fight for freedom.

President Obama: Palestinian Cause Legitimate

Terrific write-up by an Expat and Ellis Island on the Nile blogger on the Israeli reaction to President Obama's Cairo speech:

Sanjeev Bery in the Huffington Post offered a great analysis of the way Israeli commentators have received President Obama's speech in Cairo. Some liked it, and some reacted with resistance and fear, but all had some common interpretations that, in Bery's words, "offer insights into U.S. foreign policy that many American observers might not get at home."

Two main points heard loudly in Israel:

1) Obama linked the Palestinian cause with the struggle for racial equality in America and South Africa. The linkage was explicitly about the need for nonviolent resistance, but it also has strong moral implications. One week ago, using apartheid analogies in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was the reserve of secular leftist one-staters. Now its coming from US President committed to the two-state solution.

2) While condemning Palestinian violence, Obama acknowledged that Hamas has popular support, and implied that in the long run it needs to be part of the solution.

It may be, as Leo Rennert writes in The American Thinker, that President Obama's lecture to Palestinians and Arabs was not heard nearly as loudly in the US press as his demands on Israelis. But people are used to American presidents criticizing Arabs. Plus, what may be more striking is that his message to Palestinians was nuanced. He told them that violence is both wrong and counterproductive, and condemned rhetorical excesses of hatred and anti-semitism - but he also legitimized their cause, placing it on equal ground with Zionism.

Link: How Israelis heard Obama's speech (and why they might be worried)

Global Migration Reverses for 1st Time Since Depression

The developed world, which for decades has offered a difficult but promising path to upward mobility, appears to be losing its allure. Unemployment is rising, and backlashes against foreign workers are mounting.

The result is potentially the biggest turnaround in migration flows since the Great Depression, economists say.

WSJ Article

Littering Earth's Space

This graphic by NASA shows the amount and position of debris in Earth's orbit. Some 95% is "orbital debris" ( i.e., dead satellites, rocket parts). Space shuttle Atlantis is flying at about 350 miles above Earth, an area littered with more dangerous space junk. .

Koyaanisqatsi (Life Out Of Balance): The Film

An art-house circuit sensation in 1982, this feature-length documentary is visually arresting and possesses a clear, pro-environmental stance.

Koyaanisqatsi is composed of nature imagery, manipulated in slow motion, double exposure or time lapse, juxtaposed with footage of humans' devastating environmental impact on the planet.

The message of director Godfrey Reggio is clear: humans are destroying the planet, and all of human progress is pointlessly foolish.

Koyaanisqatsi - the film 1:26.05
Koyaanisqatsi - the trailer 2.21
Koyaanisqatsi - the music by Phillip Grass 3.27

Elvira Arellano Keeps Fighting: Sets Sights on Mexican Congress

Candidates from Mexico’s different political parties launched their bids for the lower house of the Mexican Congress. Mexican voters go to the polls in July. Among them is Elvira Arellano, the mother and activist who came to symbolize the face of the new immigrant movement.

Taking refuge in a Chicago church in August 2006, Arellano defied a deportation order and US immigration authorities for one year in an attempt to remain with her young son. In August 2007, she was arrested and deported to Mexico following an immigrant rights rally in Los Angeles.

Arellano is now on campaigning in Tijuana, Baja California, where she is the candidate for Congressional on the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD).

As expected, Arellano is stressing her commitment to immigrant and women's rights issues:

“I am going to seek laws in Congress that protect women, and also that protect undocumented Central Americans who are treated like criminals in Mexico."

Arellano is counting on the migrant-friendly border city of Tijuana to propel her candidacy. She is, however, running against two men from Mexico's representing Mexico's dominant political and economic interests via Partido Revolucionario Institucional and Partido Acción Nacional.

Source: Frontera NorteSur

AP Photo of Arellano at the Third Migrant March from San Diego to Canada in 2008.