Received by email:

The Congress of South African Trade Unions issues statement supporting CUPE resolution

The President, Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Ontario, June 6, 2006

Brother Sid Ryan,

On behalf over 1,2 million South African workers organized under the banner of COSATU I greet you in the name of worker internationalism. It is this solidarity, since the formation of the very first union and across space and time, often in the face of harsh repression, that provided vital moral succour and allowed workers to strengthen their resolve against oppression and exploitation.

From the JTA, May 20:

Congresswoman cuts off AIPAC
A congresswoman says AIPAC is unwelcome in her office until it apologizes for an activist who called her a terrorist supporter.

Israel is continuing "targetted assassinations" in supposedly unoccupied Gaza. But internecine Palestinian violence, alas, now seems equally efficient in killing off the Palestinian leadership.

An Israeli missile strike on a car in Gaza City May 20 killed a top Islamic Jihad commander, Mohammed Dahdouh. A Palestinian woman, Hanan Aman, her 4-year-old son Mohanad and a female relative Naima Aman were also killed in the attack, and three others wounded. (Al-Bawaba, May 20)

Ten Palestinians have been shot and killed in the last two years while protesting Israel's separation wall non-violently. Hundreds of protestors have been injured, including internationals and Israelis. From the ISM media office, May 14:

Non-Violent Demonstration Against the Wall in Ar-Ram Attacked by Israeli Military
Saturday 13th May: Around 800 Palestinian and 200 Israeli and international demonstrators, representing a broad coalition of people, united in a march to call for the dismantling of the Apartheid Wall in the Palestinian town of Ar-Ram, just north of Jerusalem. With the participation of schoolchildren, teachers, neighborhood residents and representatives of all the different Palestinian political parties, it was carefully prepared as a non-violent protest. It was well disciplined, with a line of organizers at the front of the march preventing any impatient youth from provoking a confrontation with the soldiers.

From Ha'aretz, May 11:

Fear and loathing in Petah Tikva / Neo-Nazi gangs assaulting ultra-Orthodox Jews
A week after the desecration of the Great Synagogue in Petah Tikva, nothing remains of the horror the worshipers encountered there last Thursday when they arrived for morning prayers. The walls, which had been sprayed with swastikas and blasphemy, have been newly painted, the floor polished and the curtain covering the holy ark replaced.

According to this decision, if he married her now and she was under 25, an Israeli parliamentarian's wife wouldn't be allowed to live with him in Israel. From Ha'aretz, May 14:

MK Barakeh: High Court ruling supplies an 'alibi for racism'
Senior Arab Israeli lawmaker Mohammed Barakeh on Sunday strongly condemned the High Court's ruling banning Israeli Arabs and their Palestinian spouses from living together, saying it "gives racism a shady alibi."

The two were shot with rubber bullets at close range in the head. From the International Solidarity Movement: [photos at the link]

May 12, Bi'lin, occupied West Bank
"I saw blood gushing out of his head, and helped bandage it. As we were getting him into the ambulance an Israeli soldier grabbed his long hair and they all tried to stop him from leaving in the ambulance even though they knew he was injured", said American eyewitness Zadie Susser who saw Phil sitting in shock immediately after he was hit.

From the American Library Association, May 5:

Brandeis Students Protest Removal of Palestinian Art
Some 100 people, many of them students at Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts, marched May 4 to protest the removal a week earlier of "Voices from Palestine: Aida Refugee Camp Children Speak Out"—an artwork exhibit that had been on display at the campus's Farber Library. Drawn by Palestinian youths, the paintings depict such images as a bulldozer threatening a girl lying in a pool of blood, a boy with an amputated leg, and a dove perched on barbed wire.