A review of Gabriel Kuhn’s book, “Sober Living for the Revolution”.
by Stefanie Knoll

Kuhn, Gabriel, ed, 2010, Sober Living for the Revolution. Hardcore Punk, Straight Edge, and Radical Politics, Oakland: PM Press, 299 pages, ISBN: 978-1-60486-051-1, US $ 22.95

I learned about Gabriel Kuhn accidentally – a comrade of mine met him at the London Anarchist Bookfair in 2009 and told me about this book on his return to South Africa. Excited about the book, I googled it and discovered that Gabriel was not only born in the same small town as I was – Innsbruck in Austria – but that he’s also an anarchist (there aren’t many in Innsbruck) and also straight edge (there are only three of us in Innsbruck as far as I know)! Excited as I was about this I got in touch with him and, after some e-mails sent back and forth in our Alpine dialect, he sent me a free copy for review, something which I must say I’m very happy to be able to do.

[Read the review]

Mazin Qumsiyeh
8 May 2010

A poll reveals that a majority of Israeli’s are willing to see the banning of human rights organization in the ‘Jewish state’ and a bill was introduced in the Knesset to outlaw any Israeli human rights organization which exposes Israeli war crimes.

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Statement on the Greek crisis

Greece is a test case for the social dismantling that awaits us all. This policy is being enacted by all the institutional parties, by every government and by all of globalised capitalism’s institutions. There is only one way to hold back this policy of barbaric capitalism: popular direct action, to widen the strike movement and increase the number of demonstrations all across Europe. [Italiano] [Ελληνικά]

The Greek working class is angry, and with good reason, with the attempt to load responsibility for the bankruptcy of the Greek State onto their shoulders. We maintain instead that it is the international financial institutions and the European Union who are responsible. The financial institutions have plunged the world, and Greece in particular, into an economic and social crisis of historical proportions, forcing countries into debt, and now these same institutions are complaining that certain States risk not being able to repay their debts. We denounce this hypocrisy and say that even if Greece – and all the other countries – can repay the debt, they should not do so: it is up to those responsible for the crisis – the financial institutions, not the workers – to pay for the damage caused by this crisis. The Greek workers are right to refuse to pay back their country’s debt. We refuse to pay for their crisis!

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MoveYourMoney.info
7 May 2010

In St Louis, the CWA Local 6355, a union that represents about 7,000 public sector workers, just closed its $100,000 account at Bank of America. The union decided that it doesn’t support the big bank’s practices and didn’t want to reward them with its money. The Huffington Post reports:

This is a really unethical institution that we shouldn’t be supporting or doing business with,” said Bradley Harmon, president of the CWA Local 6355, which represents some 7,000 public sector workers in Missouri. “We shouldn’t be supporting Bank of America with our dues money.” Harmon said the money will be deposited with Enterprise Bank in St. Louis.

[…]“Instead of using the taxpayer bailout money to stabilize itself and help working families keep their homes, Bank of America has spent it rewarding its incompetent bosses and lobbying against legislation to help working families and reform our financial system,” Harmon said.

[Read more | via MoveYourMoney.info]

Israeli war hero accused of suppressing testimony that could reveal what really happened to Gaza activist

By Ben Lynfield, The Independent, 7 May 2010

Seven years after the American activist Rachel Corrie was killed by an Israeli army bulldozer in Gaza, evidence has emerged which appears to implicate Israel’s Gaza commander at the time, in an attempt to obstruct the official investigation into her death.

The alleged intervention of Major-General Doron Almog, then head of Israel’s southern command, is documented in testimony taken by Israeli military police a day after Ms Corrie was killed on March 16, 2003. The hand written affidavit, seen by The Independent, was submitted as evidence during a civil law suit being pursued by the Corrie family against the state of Israel.

[Read the report]