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Content about Nelson Mandela

December 11, 2013
Obama, Mandela and Castro: absurd hypocrisy
Bill Weinberg

While Republicans wax outraged over Obama's handshake with Raúl Castro at the Mandela memorial, US client state Israel offers a far better analogy to apartheid South Africa.

Obama's notorious handshake with Raúl Castro at the Nelson Mandela memorial in Johannesburg yesterday is prompting requisite outrage from all the predictable quarters—beginning with Florida's Republican Congressional delegation. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen called the handshake "nauseating and disheartening," while Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, also the offspring of Cuban immigrants, said "the president's friendly demeanor with Raúl Castro is reflective of his policies to the Castro regime and every other terrorist dictatorship." Sen. Marco Rubio said Obama "should have asked [Castro] about those basic freedoms Mandela was associated with that are denied in Cuba." (USA Today)
December 6, 2013
Israeli forces attack Mandela commemorations
Maan News Agency

Dozens of Palestinians were injured as Israeli forces opened fire to disperse protests against the Israeli occupation and commemorating Nelson Mandela.

Dozens of Palestinians were injured and one detained as Israeli forces opened fire to disperse protests against the Israeli occupation and commemorating Nelson Mandela's death across the West Bank on Dec.

December 6, 2013
Nelson Mandela: forgotten history
Bill Weinberg

Nelson Mandela was arrested in 1962 thanks to CIA intelligence, and only removed from the US "terrorist watch list" in 2008—15 years after his Nobel Peace Prize.

With the passing of Nelson Mandela today, Barack Obama of course issued the requisite accolades, hailing the departed icon of South African freedom as "one of the most influential, courageous, and profoundly good human beings that any of us will share time with on this Earth... Like so many around the globe, I cannot fully imagine my own life without the example that Nelson Mandela set. And so long as I live I will do what I can to learn from him." (USA Today) Obama's words may well be heartfelt, but the notion that the US stood beside Mandela in the long struggle against apartheid is revisionism that must be combatted.