v a l l e j o n o c t u r n o

Holy Moly

Vallejo Nocturno 2010- awaiting for the go

Night Slice

Vallejo Nocturno 2010 - dense life

Dennis Hollingsworth

Detail

Jeffrey Tranchell’s second solo exhibition

illustration by Stephanie Otto for Jeffrey Tranchell

The Scaffold. . .

From Pepys' Diaries:

Up by four o’clock in the morning and upon business at my office. Then we sat down to business, and about 11 o’clock, having a room got ready for us, we all went out to the Tower-hill; and there, over against the scaffold, made on purpose this day, saw Sir Henry Vane brought. A very great press of people. He made a long speech, many times interrupted by the Sheriff and others there; and they would have taken his paper out of his hand, but he would not let it go. But they caused all the books of those that writ after him to be given the Sheriff; and the trumpets were brought under the scaffold that he might not be heard. Then he prayed, and so fitted himself, and received the blow; but the scaffold was so crowded that we could not see it done. But Boreman, who had been upon the scaffold, came to us and told us, that first he began to speak of the irregular proceeding against him; that he was, against Magna Charta, denied to have his exceptions against the indictment allowed; and that there he was stopped by the Sheriff. Then he drew out his, paper of notes, and begun to tell them first his life; that he was born a gentleman, that he was bred up and had the quality of a gentleman, and to make him in the opinion of the world more a gentleman, he had been, till he was seventeen years old, a good fellow, but then it pleased God to lay a foundation of grace in his heart, by which he was persuaded, against his worldly interest, to leave all preferment and go abroad, where he might serve God with more freedom. Then he was called home, and made a member of the Long Parliament; where he never did, to this day, any thing against his conscience, but all for the glory of God. Here he would have given them an account of the proceedings of the Long Parliament, but they so often interrupted him, that at last he was forced to give over: and so fell into prayer for England in generall, then for the churches in England, and then for the City of London: and so fitted himself for the block, and received the blow. He had a blister, or issue, upon his neck, which he desired them not hurt: he changed not his colour or speech to the last, but died justifying himself and the cause he had stood for; and spoke very confidently of his being presently at the right hand of Christ; and in all, things appeared the most resolved man that ever died in that manner, and showed more of heat than cowardize, but yet with all humility and gravity. One asked him why he did not pray for the King. He answered, “Nay,” says he, “you shall see I can pray for the King: I pray God bless him!” The King had given his body to his friends; and, therefore, he told them that he hoped they would be civil to his body when dead; and desired they would let him die like a gentleman and a Christian, and not crowded and pressed as he was. So to the office a little, and so to the Trinity-house all of us to dinner; and then to the office again all the afternoon till night. So home and to bed. This day, I hear, my Lord Peterborough is come unexpected from Tangier, to give the King an account of the place, which, we fear, is in none of the best condition. We had also certain news to- day that the Spaniard is before Lisbon with thirteen sail; six Dutch, and the rest his own ships; which will, I fear, be ill for Portugall. I writ a letter of all this day’s proceedings to my Lord, at Hinchingbroke, who, I hear, is very well pleased with the work there.

Ameer Makhoul was permitted to see his lawyers

Update on arrested activist in Israel from JNews:

Israeli citizen and human rights defender Ameer Makhoul was permitted to see his lawyers after 17 May when the prohibition on meeting them was finally lifted.

He has provided them with testimony regarding the methods of his interrogation and conditions of detention. According to the lawyers, these may amount to torture or ‘cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment’ under the UN Convention Against Torture.

Makhoul, arrested on 6 May, had been denied his right to a lawyer for 11 days, in the course of which he was held in isolation and interrogated by members of the Israeli Security Agency (shin bet or shabac, Israel’s secret police).

Permission for Makhoul to see his lawyers was only granted after they declared they would not participate in a Court hearing on 17 May while the prohibition remained.

Makhoul’s legal defense team, Attorney Hussein Abu Hussein and Adalah Attorneys Orna Kohn and Hassan Jabareen, have obtained a detailed affidavit from Makhoul containing precise details of the interrogation methods used against him.

According to them, Makhoul was trembling and apathetic throughout their meeting with him, and his skin showed patches of discolouration. Further disclosure is not possible under the gag order in force regarding both conditions of detention and interrogation methods used.

An appeal made by Adalah, the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI) and PHR-Israel on Sunday 23 May to lift the gag order was rejected by the Court on Tuesday.

In a press release, rights group Adalah stressed that Makhoul’s testimony regarding these matters does not fall within the grounds for the gag order, which relate to obstruction of the investigation and prevention of harm to state security.

Prison authorities confirmed to the legal team that Makhoul had been seen by a doctor twice in the course of his interrogation.

Despite requests by both the legal team and rights group Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHR-Israel) to see his medical documents these have not been disclosed. Nor has permission to send an independent doctor to visit Makhoul been granted. The Israel Prisons Service (IPS) claims that permission can only be given by the shabac, which has failed so far to respond to these requests.

No formal charge has been laid against Makhoul. There are only general allegations by the shabac regarding suspicions of contact with a foreign agent and espionage for the Lebanese group Hizballah.

The Inverted Truth

Vallejo Nocturno 2010- in the wake of the bass

I was away

Daniel Heyman

Shin Bet interrogations

From COUNTERPUNCH:

A leading human rights activist from Israel’s Palestinian Arab minority was charged yesterday with the most serious security offences on Israel’s statute book, including espionage.

Prosecutors indicted Ameer Makhoul, the head of Ittijah, an umbrella organisation for Arab human rights groups in Israel, with spying on security facilities on behalf of Hizbollah after an alleged meeting with one of its agents in Denmark in 2008.

Mr Makhoul, who had been held incommunicado by Israel’s secret police, the Shin Bet, for much of the time since his arrest three weeks ago, appeared in court and pleaded not guilty. In his first public statement, he told the court: “The Shin Bet controls the Israeli justice system.”

As a gag order was lifted on the case, his lawyers said Mr Makhoul had been tortured during his detention, including being told by interrogators that they would leave him “disabled”. The three lawyers said he had been forced to make a false confession, which they would argue was inadmissible.

Mr Makhoul’s arrest had angered many in Israel’s Palestinian minority, nearly a fifth of the population, who suspect he is being persecuted for his leading role in promoting internationally the boycott movement against Israel and his prominent opposition to Israel’s attack on Gaza nearly 18 months ago.

He has been backed by human rights groups abroad, including Amnesty International, which declared him a prisoner of conscience and accused Israel of “pure harassment”.

Mr Makhoul’s brother, Issam, a former MP for a joint Jewish-Arab party, told Israel Radio yesterday that Mr Makhoul had been threatened by the Shin Bet back in January 2009, shortly after he organised protests against the Gaza attack. The Shin Bet had told him that they would frame him and “make him disappear”, Issam Makhoul said.

Mr Makhoul’s wife, Janan, who saw her husband in court for the first time since he had been arrested, said he was in constant pain and had impaired vision. She added: “He is very exhausted and he told me about the torture he underwent in his interrogation. Thirty-six hours without sleep tied to a chair stuck to the floor.”

The memoirist

Jonathan Raban from an interview:

Memory and imagination are inseparable powers. Memory shapes, distills, exaggerates, orders—and ruthlessly loses what it doesn't need for its own storytelling purposes. I wouldn't trust memory in a courtroom but I trust it absolutely in a book. I can't write until memory has done its job, which it does slowly, over months and sometimes years. (It took me three years to get around to writing Coasting after I finished piloting a boat around the British Isles—much of the time was spent writing a novel—Foreign Land—while I let the voyage settle in the back of my mind.)

You talk of my "introspection" and "misanthropy." I can't speak for the second, but there's precious little room for introspection when one's managing a boat in a small gale, or trying to immerse oneself in the lives of long-gone homesteaders in a ruined Montana shack. Introspection comes much later, to the writer at his keyboard rather than to the person he once was, in oilskins or snake boots, too busy with the here and now to give much of a thought to himself.

As for "connecting" with "loggers, fishermen, etc," I do find this hard to square with my supposed misanthropy. I like being away from home, living among strangers, and I am always fascinated by other people's lives in a landscape that's alien terrain for me. A sense of my own displacement in the world fuels my appreciation of people who are, or seem, more securely placed in their own geography.