Trump intends to move US embassy to Jerusalem, Palestinian president says

from Mondoweiss Allison Deger on December 5, 2017

This morning President Donald Trump called Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to notify him of his intention to move the U.S. embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, according to a spokesperson for President Abbas. Trump also called Jordan’s King Abdullah to notify him, according to reports out of Jordan.


Israeli press is also reporting Trump made additional calls to Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Egypt’s President Abdel-Fattah al-Sissi and Saudi Arabia’s King Salman, to relate his plans.

Trump is expected to announce his plans tomorrow.

Channel 2’s Dana Weiss, the reporter who broke the story that Trump plans to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital this week, commented on social media that Trump and Netanyahu coordinated the move in advance, intentionally leaving Abbas and Arab heads of state in the dark until today.

Late this afternoon, Netanyahu’s office emailed reporters that the Israeli prime minister will make a speech at Jerusalem’s Waldorf Astoria tomorrow, immediately following Trump’s remarks.

Responses from Ramallah reflect shock. Abbas had a frenzied morning after his talks with Trump, reaching out to U.S. allies and foreign influencers, including Vladimir Putin, in a last-ditch effort to change the course of U.S. policy. The Palestinian leader also phoned pleas to Morocco and Jordan, according to the Palestinian outlet Wafa.

Earlier today, Wafa reported details about Trump’s call to Abbas stating his intention to move the embassy. Abbas “warned of the dangerous repercussions of such step on the [long-stalled] peace process, security and stability in the region and the world,” according to his spokesperson Nabil Abu Rudeineh.

The PLO’s Hanan Ashrawi said moving the embassy would “guarantee the destruction of the two-state solution.” She chided Trump for ignoring “repeated words of advice and caution from all concerned and from global leaders.” She went on:

“President Trump seems to be hell-bent on annihilating the chances of peace and destroying the stability and security of the entire region and beyond, provoking violence and playing into the hands of extremists and terrorists around the world. He is willfully committing an act of the utmost folly which is not only illegal but also designed to inflame religious and spiritual sentiments, and raise the specter of sectarianism and religious strife.”

For the Palestinian leadership, Trump’s Jerusalem gambit would constitute a betrayal of agreements signed during the Oslo peace process in the 1990’s. Palestinians were promised that the status of the capital, Jerusalem, was part of negotiations that would ultimately give them sovereignty.

With the exception of Russia, which recently recognized West Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, no country acknowledges Israel’s claim to sovereignty over Jerusalem. No country has an embassy in Jerusalem.

That U.S. commitment on Jerusalem was circulated on social media in the hours after Trump and Abbas’ call by spokesperson for the PLO, Xavier Abu-Eid, who posted a copy of a 1991 letter from James Baker that has guided American policy for nearly three-decades in brokering Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.

“The United States understands how much importance Palestinians attach to the question of east Jerusalem,” Baker wrote, “Thus, we want to assure you that nothing Palestinians do in choosing their delegation members in this phase of the process will affect their claim to east Jerusalem, or be prejudicial or precedential to the outcome of negotiations. It remains the firm position of the United States that Jerusalem must never again be a divided city and that its final status should be decided by negotiations.”

Baker also said in no uncertain terms that the U.S. does “not recognize Israel’s annexation of east Jerusalem” and encouraged “all sides to avoid unilateral acts that would exacerbate local tensions or make negotiations more difficult or preempt their final outcome.”

Today in Washington State Department spokesperson Heather Nauert declined to state Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s position on moving the embassy and skirted questions about a travel warning issued by the U.S. Consul-General in Jerusalem barring government employees from visiting Jerusalem’s Old City and the West Bank, in anticipation of “widespread calls for demonstrations.”

Many journalists posited that Trump will not move the embassy, and instead through a statement will recognize it as Israel’s capital. Although, no sources are on the record to confirm this.

On MSNBC, White House correspondent Michelle Kosinski reported that Trump will sign the latest waiver, meaning that the U.S. Embassy will stay in Tel Aviv for another six months, but that he will recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and announce his intention to move the embassy there ultimately. Bloomberg is reporting the same.

Aaron David Miller described such an outcome as disastrous: it will “set the stage perhaps for violence” and undermine the U.S. role as a broker in a peace process that is “comatose” anyway.

“Jerusalem is a tinderbox waiting for a match,” Miller said. The President could seek to balance his announcement by saying that the U.S. intends to recognize a Palestinian capital in East Jerusalem, but “that would drive the Israelis crazy” and antagonize the political forces Trump is seeking to placate with the announcement.

Martin Indyk postulated that Trump’s strategy is to: “sign waiver for last time; order relocation of embassy in next 6 months; recognize J’m as Israel’s capital; and recognize Pal aspiration to have east J’m as their capital, to be decided in negotiations.”

The liberal Zionist group J Street issued an alarmed statement saying the reported plan is a “profound mistake” that reverses longstanding U.S. policy, and only 20 percent of US Jews support the idea.

The effect of moving the American embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem or of declaring that Jerusalem is Israel’s capital prior to a negotiated agreement will be to anger key Arab allies, foment regional instability and undermine nascent US diplomatic efforts to resolve the larger conflict.

Americans for Peace Now has called the plan “pyromaniacal” and a gift to those looking “to blow up a peace process before it begins.”

The Republican Jewish Coalition is excited by the news.

Obama’s ambassador to Israel approved the plan but said Trump should use the shift to “make clear the context in which our (still-delayed, but impending) embassy move will take place: US determination to achieve a conflict-ending two-state solution in which both parties have capitals in a unified city of Jerusalem.”

This article was updated at 5:30 p.m.

Liberal Zionists confront, or deny, the ‘Doomsday settlement’

Philip Weiss on November 29, 2017

Liberal Zionism is in crisis. The occupation is more permanent than ever. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu celebrated the settlement project’s 50th anniversary in a settlement and announced many more settlements in recent weeks. The Israeli left is marginalized to the point that Labor politicians parrot the right. While U.S. politicians have failed to openly criticize the occupation, even Democrats– till they are leaving office. All signs are that the dream of a Palestinian state is over.

Here are two responses by liberal Zionists to the crisis. In the first case, Alon Ben-Meir, a long time negotiator, pleads with Americans to hold on tight, the left is still alive in Israel, and p.s., Israelis will never accept one state between the river and the sea.

In the second case, Danny Seidemann in a Peace Now podcast is more realistic about Israeli politics. Everything looks grim, he says, including approval of a “doomsday settlement” that would kill a Palestinian state; but Seidemann holds out hope that Israel might still be saved from itself.

Ben-Meir, a professor at NYU, appeared at the Palestine Center on November 17, and said the Israeli left is alive and well.

There is a very strong, well-operating left in Israel today. But you don’t hear much of the left because there is no election going on today. All you have to do is, read the Israeli newspapers, read the commentaries in Haaretz… The public is very sick and tired– the majority … are sick and tired of the conflict. They need to see an end to it. They talk openly about the two-state solution. There are scores and scores of organizations in Israel that’s all they do, promote peace peace peace, based on a two state solution.

The one state solution is never going to happen because no Israeli government from the extreme left to the extreme right will never allow to have one state and be governed eventually by a Palestinian majority. That’s not going to happen.

That’s not going to happen, plain and simple.
Ben-Meir called on the audience to “appeal to the segment of the Israeli population that wants to end this conflict.”

Danny Seidemann of Terrestrial Jerusalem spoke in a Peace Now podcast on November 15, and expressed far more pessimism than Ben-Meir.

Seidemann described an unprecedented “major surge” in new settlements in East Jerusalem since the summer. For the first time in a long time there is a “major surge in the number of settlements:” 1300 apartments on the fringes of existing neighborhoods. He pointed to four settlement plans in Sheikh Jarrah, approved in November, including a yeshiva. When these settlements are complete, Seidemann said, they will transform Sheikh Jarrah into an extension of Jewish, pre-67 Israel far east of the Green Line.

“This is a game changer because it’s a border changer.”

Seidemann also cited a “Doomsday settlement” on the south side of Jerusalem, given that nickname because it would end the two-state solution.

Secondly we’ve learned that one of the Doomsday settlements, Givat Hamatos, has been greenlighted by Netanyahu even though there’s no confirmation of that publicly. We’ve heard behind the scenes that the previous restraints have been removed by Netanyahu and the first tenders are going to be expected in the first quarter of 2018.

Givat Hamatos, on an empty hill near Har Homa, would cut off all connection between Jerusalem and Bethlehem for Palestinians.

Seidemann also described “massive infrastructures” that have erased the Green Line, integrating East Jerusalem settlements and West Bank settlements into Israel proper.

It’s possible to go from Tel Aviv to Etzion bloc [far south of Jerusalem] without hitting a traffic light, something you can’t do to my house in Jerusalem.

His conclusion :

So it really cuts to the quick… the authoritative question as to whether the two state solution is alive or dead.

Seidemann said that if there were a peace agreement, Israel would need to remove 163,000 settlers who do not live in the major settlement blocs, or about a quarter of more than 600,000 settlers east of the Green Line. That number used to be 116,000 when Netanyahu took office in 2009, but it goes up 6,000 or 7,000 a year, he said.

So if Israel has the capacity and the will to relocate 163,000 settlers, the two state solution is alive. And if it doesn’t, it’s dead.

He went on to say that Israel clearly has “the capacity” to remove those settlers, “because we absorbed 1 million immigrants from the Former Soviet Union.” But Israel doesn’t have “the will to relocate one.”

Now, here are several critical comments on the liberal Zionist crisis.

Ali Abunimah of Electronic Intifada responded to Alon Ben-Meir at the Palestine Center, and said that if Israelis are pressured, they could change their approach:

The claim we always hear that Israelis will never accept democracy, they will never accept equal rights for Palestinians, I think is underestimating the capacity for people to change. When I studied South Africa I looked at all the opinion surveys through the years from the 1980’s to the 1990’s… where solid majorities of whites said we will never accept a one person one vote system, that that would be suicide for us. FW de Klerk [former president of South Africa] said we will never accept one person, one vote, at the beginning of negotiations to end the racist system. And lo and behold within a couple of years, they accepted it. And no one says South Africa is utopia, but they accepted the thing they said they would never, never, never accept.

Historian Avi Shlaim explained in an interview at Jadaliyya that the left in Israel was killed by Labor Prime Minister Ehud Barak. Having failed to negotiate a deal with the Palestinians in 2000, Barak convinced the public that there was no Palestinian partner for peace:

This was a tragic mistake and it had a real impact on Israeli politics, because if there is no Palestinian partner for peace then negotiations are pointless and hopeless. If there is no Palestinian partner for peace, Israelis don’t need to vote for a party like Labour that believes in negotiations. And rather than a moderate leader, a man of compromise, they would look for a strong one who is good at killing Arabs…. There was a Likud victory in 2001 and either it or an offshoot of the Likud, Kadima, which is also a right-wing party, has been in power ever since.

Meanwhile, the Labour Party is a shadow of its former self and no longer represents a clear alternative to the Likud. It has become a nationalistic party, and has changed its name from the Labour Party to the Zionist Union, which tells you everything. So it’s a Zionist party which believes in the land of Israel, that Jerusalem is the unified and eternal capital of the Jewish people, and that Israel should keep all the major settlement blocks in the West Bank in a final settlement. It is therefore not a moderate party, it is not a socialist party, it is not a left-wing party, it is a hybrid sort of centre-left party with no coherent ideology and with no clear alternative to the policies of the Likud.

Seidemann foresees Israel holding on to those settlement blocs. They contain about 200,000 settlers in the West Bank, in addition to the 200,000 or so settlers in East Jerusalem.

David Shulman writes in the latest New York Review of Books that we have now entered the period of a struggle for equal rights within a single country, as a minority of Palestinians now believe in the possibility of a Palestinian state. He is dismissive of the traditional liberal Zionist position. Labor Zionists started the settlement project and have never changed their minds about anything. “Inhabiting a mythic cosmos tends to reduce reality to a manageable set of indubitable equations,” he said.

Finally, Scott Roth points out that equating Israel’s ability to absorb the immigrants from the Soviet Union with removing settlers is a false equivalence because in fact those settlers are doing what the Soviet immigrants did: fulfilling the Zionist ideology. In fact many of the immigrants became settlers in illegal settlements out of the state’s Zionist impulse.


About Philip Weiss
Philip Weiss is Founder and Co-Editor of Mondoweiss.net.
Other posts by Philip Weiss.

Israeli Labor sells out African refugees, as ‘infiltrators’

from Mondoweiss
Jonathan Ofir on November 21, 2017

”What has become of you? Are you the Zionist Union or the expelling union? Have you gone mad? In your tactics for wooing votes, you’ve abandoned your fundamental values and ability to tell right from wrong.”

Tamar Zandberg, a lawmaker from the leftist Meretz Party, shouted that at the left-bloc Zionist Union members who yesterday backed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s draconian legislation to forcibly deport the remaining roughly 40,000 African asylum seekers to a third country – Rwanda.

Zandberg’s party leader Zehava Gal-On, added that the Zionist Union leader, Avi Gabbay, has “forgotten what it means to be human” – playing a bitter pun on the Gabbay’s recent echoing of Netanyahu, where he said that “the left has forgotten what it means to be Jewish.”

Prime Minister Netanyahu told the cabinet on Sunday that it is time to “increase the pace of deporting African migrants”, as the Jerusalem Post reported, introducing a bill which passed 53-10 on Monday – much thanks to Gabbay’s support of a policy that is contrary to Labor’s former position.

Jerusalem Post Gil Hoffman yesterday summarized Gabbay’s many shifts rightwards since his being elected chair of Labor this summer:

Gabbay said recently that there would be no need to evacuate settlements in a peace deal, that he would not sit in a coalition with the Joint (Arab) list, that he was not sure if there was a partner on the Palestinian side, that “the Left forgot what it means to be Jewish”, and that “the whole land of Israel is ours, because it was promised to our patriarch Abraham by God”.


Tamar Zandberg of Meretz, from her Twitter feed.

Indeed, with an opposition like this, who needs Netanyahu? As Meretz leader Gal-On put it, Gabbay was moving so far right, that he could even “outflank Bayit Yehudi [Jewish Home] leader Naftali Bennett”.

Netanyahu’s legislative move comes after a Supreme Court ruling two months ago that limited the state’s practice to coerce refugees to accept being deported to a third country, through indefinite imprisonment. At that point Netanyahu, together with Culture Minister Miri Regev (who has earlier called African refugees “a cancer in our body”), went on a major incitement tour against African refugees in southern Tel Aviv, saying that “We are here on a mission to give back south Tel Aviv to the Israeli residents”.

Netanyahu was making clear that he will not be deterred by the court ‘limitation’:

“We’ll have to enact new laws that will enable us … to send the illegal infiltrators out of our country”, he said.

As the Times of Israel rightly noted at the time, “expulsion to a third country is largely unprecedented in the Western world. Italy and Australia signed similar agreements with third-party countries — Italy with Libya, and Australia with Malaysia — but both proposals were shot down by local courts. In both cases, courts ruled the bills inconsistent with international law and the 1951 UN convention on refugees — to which Israel is also a party.”

But the court did, in fact, not rule against Israel’s practice of deportation to a third country – which is now known to be Rwanda. It merely limited the state’s practice of indefinite detention aimed at putting pressure on refugees to agree to be deported. It limited the imprisonment period to 60 days. In other words, refugees who seek to hold on to their human rights could still be imprisoned for it, but ‘only’ for 60 days.

Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked was clear at the time about the necessity of this coercive measure, in her statement condemning the Supreme Court decision:

“The High Court removed from the state the ability to pressure the illegal infiltrators,” she said. “It turned the [migrant’s] lack of cooperation into a reward. We will fight this until we achieve the necessary results,” she said.

So Israel is now working on moves that would simply legalize what the court has struck down, and let’s see how far it goes before it’s challenged. As Ilan Lior reported in Haaretz on Friday, “The border authority will formally announce within a few weeks a new policy, under which asylum seekers will have to return to their countries of origin, agree to be sent to Rwanda or be jailed indefinitely in Israel.”

Gabbay’s recent push to support Netanyahu’s bill has divided the Labor leaders, and even Shelly Yachimovitch of Labor– the one who demanded immediate pardon for medic-killer Elor Azarya– said that it’s “morally impossible to support this.”

Labor lawmaker Zouheir Bahloul said, “I don’t understand how the party can support such an immoral move by the right, which seeks to throw refugees to hell.” He added: “Angela Merkel was willing to take the political risk until Election Day and take her moral stance of accepting thousands of refugees, and we hesitate and squirm here. Israel can handle a few tens of thousands of refugees and spread them across the country.”

In the end, most of the Zionist Union MKs who are against refugee rights (and that’s the plurality of the 22 Zionist Union members) were absent from the Knesset vote. But the measure still passed, as mentioned, 53-10.

With all the dissent, let’s look at what the leaders of the Israeli left say in the end:

Gabbay’s predecessor Isaac Herzog (still leader of Zionist Union in Knesset as Gabbay isn’t MK), said that “The infiltrators took Israeli Arab jobs.” Wow. The ‘infiltrators’. Netanyahu uses the same term. And is Herzog’s concern now really about ‘Arabs’ – the one who warned the Israeli center-left not to be seen to be ‘Arab lovers’?

Think about it – “Arab jobs”. Does anyone in Israel even notice the vile, blatant, racism here?

And Labor’s Merav Michaeli, (who recently said that “a lot of the BDS movement is good old anti-Semitism”), backed Herzog’s line, just a touch more “liberally”, without the ‘Arabs’ and substituting “infiltrators” with “migrants”:

“Residents have been left at home with no work, because of the migrants”, she said. “There are MK’s in the opposition who cannot look in[to] the eyes of residents who are screaming for us to save them”, she added.

Gosh, what empathy. The Israeli residents are screaming to be saved. Nonetheless, the cries of the refugees, who at best are called “migrants” and commonly regarded as “infiltrators”, even by the left, appear inaudible.

Gabbay is no doubt wooing votes from the right, and he said behind closed doors yesterday that “this is not an issue of right or left”. Already assuming his future constituency, he said that “we would pay a price for arguing with the public”.

So whilst not wanting to argue with “the public”, Gabbay apparently didn’t mind arguing with his own party leadership to support Netanyahu’s bill.

The Israeli Labor is further shedding masks. But let us not forget, that this is also the movement whose leaders contemplated genocide in Gaza in 1967, as newly declassified documents show. This is the same political movement that was responsible for the major ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948, subsequent major ethnic cleansings in 1967 and on, and the settlement project since 1967.

The movement that has so arduously created such a great Palestinian refugee crisis for the sake of the Jewish State– what is the meaning to Labor of another 40,000 African refugees after all?

How Avi Shlaim moved from two-state solution to one-state solution

from Mondoweiss 11/11/17
Avi Shlaim

Jadaliyya has posted an excellent interview with the British-Israeli historian Avi Shlaim, in which Shlaim states that he is an “Arab Jew” because he was born in Iraq and describes the long history of Jewish-Muslim coexistence in the Arab world before the rise of Zionism in the 20th century.

Palestinians, Shlaim says, were not the only victims of Zionism.

[T]here are other victims of Zionism—the Jews of the Arab lands. There was a Jewish community in Iraq which had been there for two and a half millennia, and had no wish to leave. It is only because of the rise of nationalism in the twentieth Century that peaceful coexistence was no longer possible.

Shlaim has no faith in Donald Trump’s ability to resolve the conflict. Trump is only listening to Netanyahu. Shlaim points out that President Obama promised to treat Palestinians fairly in Cairo in 2009 and did not follow through at all, but failed to pressure Israel, instead increasing aid. When will U.S. establishment voices begin to echo this truth:

The American-sponsored peace process, which began in 1991 after the Gulf war, is all process and no peace. It is a charade. It is pretence. It is worse than a charade because the peace process gives Israel the cover it needs to pursue its aggressive colonial project on the West Bank.



Shlaim is proud of his Israeli background, including his serving in the Israeli armed forces in the 1960s. He used to be for partition, but today he has given up on the two-state solution. He describes his progress as he observed Israel’s steadfast refusal to allow a Palestinian state.

I was a proponent of a two-state solution for most of my life because there can never be absolute justice for the Palestinians. I believe that the creation of the state of Israel involved a monumental injustice to the Palestinians but I don’t want to go a step further and say that Israel should be dismantled in order to deliver justice to the Palestinians. I accept the reality of Israel within its original borders, I accept the legitimacy of Israel within its original pre-1967 borders.

Edward Said described the two communities as two communities of suffering. We have to take into account the tragic history of the Jews as well as the suffering of the Palestinians. The two-state solution seemed to be not a perfect solution but a reasonable solution. The PLO by signing the Oslo Accords gave up the claim to 78 percent of Mandatory Palestine in the hope that they would get an independent Palestinian state on the remaining 22 percent, on the West bank and Gaza. So I supported the two-state solution but Israel under both Labour and Likud governments continued to expand settlements. This is incompatible with a two-state solution.

The settlements represent land-grabbing, and land-grabbing and peace-making don’t go together, it is one or the other. By its actions, if not always in its rhetoric, Israel has opted for land-grabbing and as we speak Israel is expanding settlements. So, Israel has been systematically destroying the basis for a viable Palestinian state and this is the declared objective of the Likud and Netanyahu who used to pretend to accept a two-state solution. In the lead up to the last election, he said there will be no Palestinian state on his watch. The expansion of settlements and the wall mean that there cannot be a viable Palestinian state with territorial contiguity. The most that the Palestinians can hope for is Bantustans, a series of enclaves surrounded by Israeli settlements and Israeli military bases.

So a two-state solution is no longer a viable option and that is why I have become a supporter of the one-state solution, a single state with equal rights for all its citizens. Ideologically, I don’t have any problem with a one-state solution. Ideologically, it is very attractive, it is a noble vision of two communities living in harmony in one space with equal rights for all its members. But, I am not naïve enough to think that the one-state solution is a realistic prospect because there is no support for a one-state solution in Israel. And if pushed really hard I think Israel would withdraw to the wall on the West Bank and annex whatever bits it wants of the West Bank. It would annex the main settlement blocks in Ma’ale Adumim, and the whole area around Jerusalem, and it would do so unilaterally rather than have a one-state so I am not in the least bit optimistic that the one-state solution is a viable proposition. But this is where I stand and I blame Israel for eliminating the alternative of a two-state solution.

Note that the one-state solution is the idealistic alternative, two peoples sharing sovereignty democratically. And if you object that it is not realistic, alright– but neither is two states.

Shlaim also endorses BDS, Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, saying that it frightens Israel and it is the only hope Palestinians have of making progress globally.

BDS is a global grass-roots movement which has been gathering support at a very impressive pace and it has had a large number of successes with major companies divesting from Israel. It has also had considerable impact on public opinion throughout the world, delegitimising the Israeli occupation. The Israelis take it very seriously. They have formed a unit with a budget of GBP 40 million in order to fight BDS by launching personal attacks on individuals and delegitimising them rather than engaging with the arguments of BDS. And it seems to me that there is now hope that western governments will change their policy of support for Israel….

So going back to BDS, there is no hope for the Palestinians to bring about the end of occupation through the support of western governments or the UN, the only hope that the Palestinians have is through BDS.

That is not to say that in the foreseeable future BDS could bring about an end of the Israeli occupation. But that is the only hope the Palestinians have of making progress.

It’s amazing that these simple straightforward ideas are not reflected in the U.S. discourse. Though I would say that progressive Americans readily accept these ideas, and that is why the Democratic Party establishment is today running scared of these ideas entering the mainstrea

Roger Waters Slams Trump and Israel, Lauds BDS and Black Lives Matter at Desert Trip

Donald Trump's face appears on massive video screen above the stage with 'Charade' across it as Waters performs the Pink Floyd song 'Pigs (Three Different Ones).'

The Associated Press Oct 10, 2016 8:16 PM
 

Roger Waters performs at Desert Trip music festival at Empire Polo Club in Indio, California U.S., October 9, 2016.
Mario Anzuoni, Reuters



Roger Waters sets the record straight: I hate apartheid, not Israel

Roger Waters made his feelings about Donald Trump and Israel abundantly clear during a politically-charged performance at the Desert Trip music festival Sunday night.

The 73-year-old singer-songwriter also denounced war and addressed the Black Lives Matter movement in his 2.5-hour set that closed out the three-day classic rock concert in Indio, California.
Waters blasted the Republican presidential candidate in music and images. Trump's face appeared on the massive video screen above the stage with the word "Charade" across it as Waters performed the Pink Floyd song "Pigs (Three Different Ones)." Subsequent images showed Trump wearing a Ku Klux Klan hood.

Meanwhile, a parade-sized balloon shaped like a pig floated above the audience. It had Trump's face painted on the side with the words "Ignorant, lying, racist, sexist pig." And in case that wasn't straightforward enough, giant letters flashed across the big screen reading "Trump is a pig."
Waters followed up with "Another Brick in the Wall (Part II)," during which 15 school-age children came onstage wearing T-shirts that read, "Derriba el muro" — Spanish for "Take down the wall."
While other Desert Trip performers mentioned the presidential election, Waters was the only one who brought up the Black Lives Matter movement in front of the overwhelmingly white audience. As he performed "Us and Them," the big screen showed pictures of protest signs. "White silence is violence," read one. "I cannot believe I still have to protest this (expletive)," another said.
Waters told the crowd that he's been working with wounded warriors in Washington, D.C., and brought a young American veteran who lost his legs onstage to play lead guitar with the band on "Shine on You Crazy Diamond."

"Working with these men has been one of the most rewarding things I've ever done in my life," Waters said. He dedicated the song to all victims of war and violence.
His set also included "Time," ''Money," ''Wish You Were Here" and "Dark Side of the Moon."
The former Pink Floyd frontman waited until near the end of his performance to voice his support for the BDS movement, which calls for boycotts and sanctions against Israel.
"I'm going to send out all of my most heartfelt love and support to all those young people on the campuses of the universities of California who are standing up for their brothers and sisters in Palestine and supporting the BDS movement," he said, "in the hope that we may encourage the government of Israel to end the occupation."
Before closing with "Vera" and "Comfortably Numb," Waters told the audience, "It's been a huge honor and a huge pleasure to be here to play for you tonight."

The Who took the stage earlier Sunday and rocked through hits from their discography for just over two hours. Frontman Roger Daltrey grinned and danced with guitarist Pete Townsend, who bantered with the audience.
"We love you for coming to see us," he said, dedicating "The Kids Are Alright" to "the young ones" in the crowd.
The Who's set also included "My Generation," with Daltrey stuttering the vocals just right, "You Better You Bet," ''Eminence Front," ''The Acid Queen" and "Pinball Wizard."
Townsend said "I Can See for Miles" was the band's first hit in the United States, back in 1967.
"Such a long (expletive) time ago," he said with a laugh. "We were 1967's version of Adele or Lady Gaga or Rihanna or Bieber."

It's been 49 years since then, but the rockers maintained their classic sound and trademark moves: Daltrey swung his microphone cord around anytime he wasn't singing, and Townsend exaggerated his windmill move as he strummed.
"Roger and I are so glad to be out here at our age," Townsend said. "And I couldn't do it without Roger."
After seeing Bob Dylan and the Rolling Stones on Friday, Neil Young and Paul McCartney on Saturday, concertgoers deemed the event a success. While there were some traffic snarls and shuttle-bus issues on Friday, things smoothed out by Sunday, and many attendees said they'd come to Desert Trip again if they liked the lineup.
Held at the same venue where Coachella takes place each spring, Desert Trip aimed at an older and more moneyed crowd than other music festivals, earning it the nickname "Oldchella."
The event repeats next weekend.


read more: https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/u-s-election-2016/1.746984

‘A legal shield for the Palestine movement in the U.S.’

from +972
Posted On October 18, 2017

Pro-Israel organizations are increasingly using the law to target Palestinian solidarity groups in the United States. Dima Khalidi, head of Palestine Legal, speaks with +972 Magazine about the ‘Palestine exception’ to free speech, and what her organization is doing to fight back.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a lawsuit last week on behalf of a Kansas public school teacher who, as a condition for taking her job, was required under a new state law to declare that she would not engage in boycotts of Israel. The law is just one in a growing list of measures in recent years aiming to counter the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement in the United States.

Political boycotts in the U.S. are meant to be stringently protected under the First Amendment. “The state should not be telling people what causes they can or can’t support,” Esther Koontz, the Kansas teacher, said about her lawsuit.

That’s not necessarily the reality these days, however. “It’s clear that when it comes to talking about Palestine, there’s a suspension of the notion that the government has no authority to interfere in that right,” says Dima Khalidi, founder and director of Palestine Legal.

Established in 2012 in partnership with the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), Palestine Legal has been one of the key players holding the frontline against efforts to suppress BDS activity and speech about Palestine across the U.S., from state legislatures to university campuses. Khalidi and her staff responded to 650 such incidents between 2014 and 2016.

Just last month, Palestine Legal responded to false legal threats sent to activists and professors by a group called “Outlaw BDS New York,” which accused them of violating an anti-BDS law that never actually passed the New York State legislature. Along with its legal work, the organization also tracks anti-BDS laws in all 50 states (21 have already enacted such laws) and at the federal level.

I spoke with Khalidi last month about Palestine Legal’s work and to hear her perspective on the various threats to – and signs of hope for – Palestine activism in the U.S., including BDS. The following was edited for length.

Palestine Legal Director Dima Khalidi (Courtesy photo)
Palestine Legal Director Dima Khalidi (Photo courtesy of Palestine Legal)
How and why was Palestine Legal created? What compelled the need for its existence?

“The idea started with conversations among lawyers and activists who were thinking about what we could do legally on Palestine in the U.S. This was in the context of largely unsuccessful attempts – including by CCR, where I interned and co-counselled – to seek accountability for Israel’s violations of international law through domestic and international legal mechanisms.

“This was also happening in the context of a rise in Palestine activism after the 2008-2009 Gaza war – a mobilization that we hadn’t seen in decades. And at the same time, there was an escalation in the backlash against that movement: 11 students at the University of California, Irvine were being criminally prosecuted for protesting a speech by the Israeli ambassador to the U.S., and the Olympia Food Co-op was being sued for passing a resolution to boycott Israeli goods.

“What I kept hearing from people was the need for help: that talking about Palestinian rights, and challenging Israel’s actions and narrative, opened people up to a huge amount of risk, attacks, and harassment – much of it legal in nature, or with legal implications.

“So with the support of a handful of people – including the instrumental vision of the legendary human rights lawyer Michael Ratner, who passed away last year – I established Palestine Legal. Our work is meant to provide a legal shield for the Palestine movement, to protect and expand the space to advocate on this issue. As an organization dedicated to movement lawyering, we don’t consider ourselves part of the movement per se, but as supporting the movement’s efforts to challenge the status quo, whatever their tactics.”

That can be a tricky distinction to make – being part of a movement versus supporting a movement.

“It is a tricky balance. Movement lawyering requires us to recognize that it’s not the lawyers that lead or dictate the movement, even if we personally disagree with their tactics or know they’ll land people into trouble. All our staff are deeply political people with their own activist and personal histories, but we try to step back from that role and focus instead on responding to the legal needs of activists on the ground.”

File photo of a pro-BDS protest outside Target in Chicago. (Tess Scheflan/Activestills.org)
File photo of a pro-BDS protest outside Target in Chicago. (Tess Scheflan/Activestills.org)
Does Palestine Legal only deal with the right to boycott, or does it also address the substantive content or arguments of the BDS movement itself?

“We always go back to why people are motivated to speak out and engage in BDS, which are central to why we have the right to do it. Boycotts are a means for people who don’t necessarily have access to power to take collective action in order to influence change – as was done with the civil rights boycotts, boycotts of apartheid South Africa, and boycotts for farm workers’ rights. The U.S. Supreme Court itself recognized this as a legitimate activity protected by the First Amendment in 1982.

“In this case, the goal of boycotts is to achieve justice, freedom, and equality for Palestinians, who have been continuously dispossessed of their land, livelihoods, dignity, and agency for over seven decades. Those opposed to Palestinian rights try to claim otherwise; so it’s imperative to the legal argument that we return to the key issues that describe the Palestinian experience.”

This isn’t the first time in U.S. history that the right to boycott, or free speech in general, has been suppressed. Why is there still a “Palestine exception” to these rights today? What lessons do you take from the past when dealing with your cases?

“When we talk about the Palestine exception, it’s not to say that it’s the only exception. You can look at the anti-Communist hysteria of the Cold War, when people were forced to sign loyalty oaths and were subjected to witch hunts and blacklists. The response to that McCarthyist era was an eventual strengthening of First Amendment jurisprudence, which now provides better legal protections against ‘compelled speech,’ for example. This is also true of the Civil Rights era, when states tried to issue new laws to stop certain kinds of protests, and to use existing laws to indict people for boycotting – hence the Supreme Court ruling that recognized political boycotts as a right.

“Still, it’s clear that when it comes to talking about Palestine, there’s a suspension of the notion that the government has no authority to interfere in that right. We see all kinds of bogus justifications for strangling Palestine advocacy: it’s anti-Semitism, it’s support for terrorism, it’s propaganda, it’s discriminatory. Our position is to step in and say there’s no exception here. Talking about Palestine is exactly what the First Amendment is supposed to protect: it’s a dissenting view from what the vast majority of our politicians and officials espouse, and it is speech that the government most wants to censor, so it must be vigilantly protected.

“Another part of the reason why Palestine feels different is that the attacks pervade all aspects of our lives today. The backlash can be online (look at outfits like Canary Mission, which profile and harass people); from employers (look at Steven Salaita, fired for tweeting critically about Israel’s war on Gaza); from donors; from institutions (look at the students censored or punished at Fordham University, University of California-Berkeley, or at the Missouri History Museum). This is because there are influential domestic groups and individuals that are doing everything in their power to shield Israel from scrutiny on every forum, and to ensure that the U.S. continues to unconditionally support Israel.”

The head of a major Israel advocacy group was quoted in 2016 saying to BDS activists: “While you were doing your campus antics, the grown-ups were in the state legislature passing laws that make your cause improbable.” What do you take from that? Why is more of the anti-BDS backlash today coming in the form of legislation?

“That quote says a lot about the political dynamics in the U.S. On the one hand, you have an intersectional grassroots movement that’s driven by students and youth. On the other hand, you have a well-resourced and well-connected constituency that’s deeply entrenched in state and public institutions. The way that Israel lobby groups are successful in pushing such blatantly unconstitutional laws, and the way university heads face (and often succumb to) pressure from advocacy groups, alumni, donors, and state officials, further illustrates this top-down approach.

“There’s a growing and visible alliance between Zionist groups in the U.S., the right-wing Israeli government, and far right groups in the US. They believe that they can dictate the discourse on Israel-Palestine, and get around the First Amendment problem, by pandering to Islamophobic sentiment; by conflating nonviolent resistance with terrorism; and by undermining the motivation and rights of the entire Palestine movement. Even many in the Democratic Party and self-described “progressives” blindly support these agendas.

“At the same time, we’re seeing groups like Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) offering different paths. There’s an enormous pushback to the more established right-wing Jewish organizations – and that’s exciting. But at the moment, those organizations still have the ability to drive the narrative from above. We have a long way to go; but in the long run, it’ll become untenable to ignore a powerful and growing grassroots movement.”

In Israel we have an anti-boycott civil law and now another law to deny entry to foreigners who partake in BDS. The right wing seems to think that legislation is an effective way to achieve its goals.

“Indeed. Dissent becomes the exception the more authoritarian the regime is, and we see signs of this in both the U.S. and Israel as forms of protest are being punished. It’s also telling that the language in Israeli laws is showing up in anti-BDS legislation in the U.S., such as the phrase ‘Israeli-controlled territory’ to refer to West Bank settlements. It just goes to show that we’re dealing with the same forces – and ultimately, that translates into advocating for those same things domestically. How can you be for equality in the U.S. when you defend Israel’s discriminatory laws and apartheid policies? It doesn’t add up.”

Anti-Semitism is routinely charged against Palestine activism. How do you address those accusations?

“We’ve had success with this legally on some levels. One of the tactics advanced by pro-Israel groups is to codify a redefinition of anti-Semitism which encompasses the ‘three D’s’: delegitimization, demonization, and double standards toward Israel. You can imagine that any and all criticism of Israel can basically fall into those three categories. But when these things go to court or even government agencies, a clear distinction is made between discrimination on the basis of religion or national origin, versus criticism of states and state actions.

“For example, the U.S. Education Department received complaints under Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, claiming that universities are tolerating hostile anti-Semitic activities by allowing groups and events that criticize Israel. The Education Department dismissed the complaints and said that this is political speech, and that just because it might be offensive to some, it doesn’t mean that it’s harassment or discrimination.

“Moreover, the vast majority of Palestine advocates are unequivocal about their opposition to all forms of racism, including anti-Semitism. When we put these matters in the context not only of free expression, but also that the Palestine movement opposes all forms of oppression – that’s when we’re able to make the most impact.”

File photo of a pro-Palestine rally in downtown Boston. (Tess Scheflan/Activestills.org)
File photo of a pro-Palestine rally in downtown Boston. (Tess Scheflan/Activestills.org)
Do all the attacks feel coordinated or concerted?

“Undoubtedly. We see the same two dozen Israel advocacy groups engaging in the same tactics around the country, accusing activists of being threatening, violent, and anti-Semitic for engaging in Palestine activism.

“But it’s also clear that not all those groups agree on tactics. Some, like David Horowitz and Canary Mission, who publicly name and blacklist Palestinian rights advocates as ‘Jew-haters’ and ‘terrorist-supporters,’ are seen as going beyond the pale even among Zionist groups that actively engage in suppression in other ways. There are also disagreements about pursuing anti-BDS legislation, and about imposing the new definition of anti-Semitism mentioned earlier.

“But ultimately, the more ‘extreme’ tactics serve the same purpose as the others: they want to make it so costly to engage in Palestine advocacy that people just become exhausted, give up, and stay silent. I don’t think these tactics are going to work: more and more people are seeing that they can be successfully challenged, more people are learning about the horrors of Israel’s occupation and apartheid, and more people are refusing to stay silent about those policies and the U.S.’s role in enabling them.”

The ACLU recently came out in defense of the right to boycott Israel. How do you reach out to audiences that aren’t your conventional supporters, including those in the American mainstream?

“Palestine is still a lightning rod and there’s still a reluctance to come out on this issue. That said, the more egregious the measures against Palestine advocacy, and the more they attack our fundamental freedoms, the more we see the likes of ACLU being compelled to speak up – even though they still claim neutrality on the underlying political and human rights issues. We’ve worked in several states with ACLU chapters and other groups that typically wouldn’t be willing to step up publicly on these matters, and we’re now seeing them do so because of what’s at stake.

“Steven Salaita’s case is an example of this: when he was fired for tweeting about the 2014 Gaza war, it sent shock waves across academia. Thousands of professors around the U.S. pledged to boycott the university, and a dozen departments voted no confidence in the chancellor. That’s when you see more people being willing to step into the fray, saying that this is dangerous beyond just the matter of Palestine advocacy — that this threatens all our basic rights to dissent and to debate the most important issues of our time.”

What are your thoughts on the future of your work, and on Palestine advocacy in the U.S. in general? What new strategies are you considering?

“We feel like we’ve been on the defensive and putting out a lot of fires over the last five years, which also seem to be coming faster and faster. There’s no doubt that we’ll continue to help those who are under attack; but we’re also thinking about more proactive ways to tackle some of these issues.

“Our lawsuit with CCR against Fordham University – which refused to grant club status to Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) because some considered their views too “polarizing”– is an example. The attack on SJP aims to make Palestine activism so radioactive that universities won’t even allow such student groups to form – so it’s crucial that we prevent this from happening. We have a long way to go in enshrining a new narrative that views Palestine advocates as forces for freedom and justice, and their advocacy as protected political expression – but we’re on our way.

“Regarding legislation, our role is to explain to activists and the public what these laws do and don’t do. This is important because one of the main purposes of the legislation is to make people believe that Palestine advocacy is prohibited or criminalized – and that really isn’t the case with most of these laws. So it’s critical to make sure that activists aren’t scared off from their work, but instead feel empowered to confront its challenges.

“There’s also no question that grassroots mobilization has been successful in impacting the political arena, though we hear less about it. Look at the failure of legislative initiatives in states like Virginia, South Carolina, Maryland, and Montana. These victories are because of groups like the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, American Muslims for Palestine, JVP, church groups, and the US Palestinian Community Network. Anti-BDS measures have ultimately strengthened the networks of Palestine advocates across the country, and these coalitions outlast the lifespan of a bill. We believe that the power of these grassroots movements is what will effect change – and that’s what Palestine Legal aims to bolster.”

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rip Fats Domino

Photo

Mr. Domino performing in 2007 on NBC’s “Today” show. Credit Richard Drew/Associated Press
Fats Domino, the New Orleans rhythm-and-blues singer whose two-fisted boogie-woogie piano and nonchalant vocals, heard on dozens of hits, made him one of the biggest stars of the early rock ’n’ roll era, has died at his home in Louisiana. He was 89.

His death was confirmed by his brother-in-law and former road manager Reggie Hall, who had no other details. Mr. Domino lived in Harvey, La., just outside New Orleans.

Mr. Domino had more than three dozen Top 40 pop hits through the 1950s and early ’60s, among them “Blueberry Hill,” “Ain’t It a Shame,” “I’m Walkin’,” “Blue Monday” and “Walkin’ to New Orleans.” Throughout he displayed both the buoyant spirit of New Orleans, his hometown, and a droll resilience that reached listeners worldwide.

He sold 65 million singles in those years, with 23 gold records, making him second only to Elvis Presley as a commercial force. Presley acknowledged Mr. Domino as a predecessor.

“A lot of people seem to think I started this business,” Presley told Jet magazine in 1957. “But rock ’n’ roll was here a long time before I came along. Nobody can sing that music like colored people. Let’s face it: I can’t sing it like Fats Domino can. I know that.”

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John L 7 minutes ago
Oh no, not Fats...ain't that a shame...thanks for the melodies, often sweet and hot in one.RIP
cheryl 9 minutes ago
He's the kind that never wears out!
Sally 44 minutes ago
True blue. Heart songs. Soul rhythms. Thanks Mr. Fats Domino. RIP.
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Short and rotund, with a big, infectious grin and a love for ornate, jewel-encrusted rings, Mr. Domino was an easygoing performer; even in plaintive songs his voice had a smile in it. And he was a master of the wordless vocal, making hits out of songs full of “woo-woo”s and “la-la”s.

Working with the songwriter, producer and arranger David Bartholomew, Mr. Domino and his band carried New Orleans parade rhythms into rock ’n’ roll and put a local stamp on nearly everything they touched, even country tunes like “Jambalaya” or big-band songs like “My Blue Heaven” and “When My Dreamboat Comes Home.”

Antoine Dominique Domino Jr. was born on Feb. 26, 1928, the youngest of eight children in a family with Creole roots. He grew up in the Ninth Ward of New Orleans, where he spent most of his life.

Music filled his life from the age of 10, when his family inherited an old piano. After his brother-in-law Harrison Verrett, a traditional-jazz musician, wrote down the notes on the keys and taught him a few chords, Antoine threw himself at the instrument — so enthusiastically that his parents moved it to the garage.

He was almost entirely self-taught, picking up ideas from boogie-woogie masters like Meade Lux Lewis, Pinetop Smith and Amos Milburn. “Back then I used to play everybody’s records; everybody’s records who made records,” he told Offbeat magazine in 2004. “I used to hear ’em, listen at ’em five, six, seven, eight times and I could play it just like the record because I had a good ear for catchin’ notes and different things.”

He attended the Louis B. Macarty School but dropped out in the fourth grade to work as an iceman’s helper. “In the houses where people had a piano in their rooms, I’d stop and play,” he told USA Today in 2007. “That’s how I practiced.”

In his teens, he started working at a club called the Hideaway with a band led by the bassist Billy Diamond, who nicknamed him Fats. Mr. Domino soon became the band’s frontman and a local draw.

“Fats was breaking up the place, man,” Mr. Bartholomew told The Cleveland Plain Dealer in 2010. “He was singing and playing the piano and carrying on. Everyone was having a good time. When you saw Fats Domino, it was: ‘Let’s have a party!’ ”

He added: “My first impression was a lasting impression. He was a great singer. He was a great artist. And whatever he was doing, nobody could beat him.”

In 1947 Mr. Domino married Rosemary Hall, and they had eight children, Antoine III, Anatole, Andre, Anonio, Antoinette, Andrea, Anola and Adonica. A complete list of survivors was not immediately available.

In 1949 Mr. Bartholomew brought Lew Chudd, the owner of Imperial Records in Los Angeles, to the Hideaway. Mr. Chudd signed Mr. Domino on the spot, with a contract, unusual for the time, that paid royalties rather than a one-time purchase of songs.

Immediately, Mr. Domino and Mr. Bartholomew wrote “The Fat Man,” a cleaned-up version of a song about drug addiction called “Junkers Blues,” and recorded it with Mr. Bartholomew’s studio band. By 1951 it had sold a million copies.

Mr. Domino’s trademark triplets, picked up from “It’s Midnight,” a 1949 record by the boogie-woogie pianist and singer Little Willie Littlefield, appeared on his next rhythm-and-blues hit, “Every Night About This Time.” The technique spread like wildfire, becoming a virtual requirement for rock ’n’ roll ballads.

“Fats made it popular,” Mr. Bartholomew told Rick Coleman, the author of “Blue Monday: Fats Domino and the Lost Dawn of Rock ’n’ Roll” (2006). “Then it was on every record.”

Photo

Fats Domino in 1956. Credit Associated Press
In 1952, on a chance visit to Cosimo Matassa’s recording studio in New Orleans, Mr. Domino was asked to help out on a recording by a nervous teenager named Lloyd Price. Sitting in with Mr. Bartholomew’s band, he came up with the memorable piano part for “Lawdy Miss Clawdy,” an early rhythm-and-blues record to cross over into the pop charts.

Through the early 1950s Mr. Domino turned out a stream of hits, taking up what seemed like permanent residence in the upper reaches of the R&B charts. His records began crossing over into the pop charts as well.

In that racially segregated era, white performers used his hits to build their careers. In 1955, “Ain’t It a Shame” became a No. 1 hit for Pat Boone as “Ain’t That a Shame,” while Mr. Domino’s arrangement of a traditional song, “Bo Weevil,” was imitated by Teresa Brewer.

Mr. Domino’s appeal to white teenagers broadened as he embarked on national tours and appeared with mixed-race rock ’n’ roll revues like the Moondog Jubilee of Stars Under the Stars, presented by the disc jockey Alan Freed at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn. Appearances on national television, on Steve Allen and Ed Sullivan’s shows, put him in millions of living rooms.

He did not flaunt his status as an innovator, or as an architect of a powerful cultural movement.

“Fats, how did this rock ’n’ roll all get started anyway?” an interviewer for a Hearst newsreel asked him in 1957. Mr. Domino answered: “Well, what they call rock ’n’ roll now is rhythm and blues. I’ve been playing it for 15 years in New Orleans.”

At a news conference in Las Vegas in 1969, after resuming his performing career, Elvis Presley interrupted a reporter who had called him “the king.” He pointed to Mr. Domino, who was in the room, and said, “There’s the real king of rock ’n’ roll.”

Mr. Domino had his biggest hit in 1956 with his version of “Blueberry Hill,” a song that had been recorded by Glenn Miller’s big band in 1940. It peaked at No. 2 on the pop charts and sold a reported three million copies.

“I liked that record ’cause I heard it by Louis Armstrong and I said, ‘That number gonna fit me,’ ” he told Offbeat. “We had to beg Lew Chudd for a while. I told him I wasn’t gonna make no more records till they put that record out. I could feel it, that it was a hit, a good record.”

He followed with two more Top Five pop hits: “Blue Monday” and “I’m Walkin’,” which outsold the version recorded by Ricky Nelson.

“I was lucky enough to write songs that carry a good beat and tell a real story that people could feel was their story, too — something that old people or the kids could both enjoy,” Mr. Domino told The Los Angeles Times in 1985.

Mr. Domino performed in 1950s movies like “Shake, Rattle and Rock,” “The Big Beat” (for which he and Mr. Bartholomew wrote the title song) and “The Girl Can’t Help It.” In 1957, he toured for three months with Chuck Berry, Clyde McPhatter, the Moonglows and others.

Well into the early 1960s, Mr. Domino continued to reach both the pop and rhythm-and-blues charts with songs like “Whole Lotta Lovin’,” “I’m Ready,” “I’m Gonna Be a Wheel Someday,” “Be My Guest,” “Walkin’ to New Orleans” and “My Girl Josephine.”

He toured Europe for the first time in 1962 and met the Beatles in Liverpool, before they were famous. His contract with Imperial ended in 1963, and he went on to record for ABC-Paramount, Mercury, Broadmoor, Reprise and other labels.

His last appearance in the pop Top 100 was in 1968, with a version of “Lady Madonna,” the Beatles song that had been inspired by Mr. Domino’s piano-pounding style. In 1982, he had a country hit with “Whiskey Heaven.”

Although he was no longer a pop sensation, Mr. Domino continued to perform worldwide and appeared for 10 months a year in Las Vegas in the mid-1960s. On tour, he would bring his own pots and pans so he could cook.

His life on the road ended in the early 1980s, when he decided that he did not want to leave New Orleans, saying it was the only place where he liked the food.

He went on to perform regularly at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, and in 1987 Jerry Lee Lewis and Ray Charles joined him for a Cinemax special, “Fats Domino and Friends.” He released a holiday album, “Christmas Is a Special Day,” in 1993.

Reclusive and notoriously resistant to interview requests, Mr. Domino stayed home even when he was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1986 as one of its first members. He did the same when he received a lifetime achievement Grammy Award in 1987. In 1999, when he was awarded the National Medal of Arts, he sent his daughter Antoinette to the White House to pick up the prize.


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But he was often seen around New Orleans, emerging from his pink-roofed mansion in the Ninth Ward driving a pink Cadillac. “I just drink my little beers, do some cookin’, anything I feel like ” he told The Daily Telegraph of London in 2007, describing his retirement.

In 1953, in Down Beat magazine, the Atlantic Records producer Jerry Wexler made a bold-sounding prediction that turned out to be, in retrospect, quite timid. “Can’t you envision a collector in 1993 discovering a Fats Domino record in a Salvation Army Depot and rushing home to put it on the turntable?” he wrote. “We can. It’s good blues, it’s good jazz, and it’s the kind of good that never wears out.”

Daniel E. Slotnik contributed reporting.lign: left;" trbidi="on">