Tag Archives: israeli soldiers

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Can foreign gangsters bulldoze YOUR family home without warning… and get away with it?

slittlewood-1


There can be few things more despicable than robbing a family of their home then destroying it in front of their eyes. But this is Israeli policy.

And when the following news item arrived in my inbox I was more than usually interested. ICAHD (the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions) took me to see Beit Arabiya, the much demolished and rebuilt Bedouin home, nearly six years ago. Of course, it has been bulldozed and rebuilt a few times since then.

I’m reproducing the whole thing so that you get the full flavour of Israel’s evil. And it’s from an impeccable Israeli source too. Continue reading →

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Palestine’s Students Must Be Set Free

Stuart Littlewood

Stuart Littlewood

The last thing Israel wants is masses of bright and clever young Palestinians nextdoor in the shredded remains of the Occupied Territories. But that’s exactly what Palestinian youngsters are… bright and clever, given half a chance. So they need repressing. They need humiliating constantly. They need to be discouraged. They need to have their education disrupted big-time, so that they become a broken, dispirited, docile mass without ambition, utterly dependent on a few crumbs of comfort and easy to control.

So the Israelis make spiteful war on students especially, as well as women and children generally.

Last week’s report from Bethlehem University about the brutal attacks by Israeli squatters, in one case under the indulgent eye of Israeli soldiers, on a professor and a student reminds me that I have written on three earlier occasions about intimidation and obstruction by the Israeli authorities. At this moment in the long struggle for decency and freedom it is worth recalling these incidents, which vividly illustrate why Palestinian independence is so vitally important.

To get to Bethlehem University, or any other, many students have to run the gauntlet of Israeli checkpoints. “Sometimes they take our ID cards and they spend ages writing down all the details, just to make us late,” said one. Students are often made to remove shoes, belt and bags. “It’s like an airport. Many times we are kept waiting outside for up to an hour, rain or shine, they don’t care.” The soldiers attempt to forcibly remove students’ clothes or they swear and shout sexual slurs at female students.

Some tell how they are sexually harassed and spend the rest of the day worrying what the Israelis will do to them on their way home.

The daily abuse undermines student motivation and concentration. Many other obstacles are put in their way by the Occupation. Here are just three cases that are representative of thousands of others. They will, I think, make you angry… spitting-blood furious in fact.

Merna

Merna was an honours student in her final year majoring in English. Israeli soldiers frequently rampaged through her Bethlehem refugee camp in the middle of the night, ransacking homes and arbitrarily arresting residents. They took away her family one by one. First her 14-year-old cousin and best friend was shot dead by an Israeli sniper while she sat outside her family home during a curfew.

Next the Israelis arrested her eldest brother, a 22 year-old artist, and imprisoned him for 4 years.  Then they came back for Merna’s 18-year-old brother. Not content with that the military came again, this time to take her youngest brother – the ‘baby’ of the family – just 16. These were the circumstances under which Merna had to study.

“As he was being taken away, he told us to take care of ourselves,” said Merna, her eyes brimming with tears. “He’s my little brother!  He is the one who needs taking care of. What is he doing in an awful prison cell and how are his spirits?”

Israeli military law treats Palestinians as adults as soon as they reach 16, a flagrant violation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Israeli youngsters are regarded as children until 18. Palestinians are dealt with by Israeli military courts, even when it’s a civil matter. These courts ignore international laws and conventions, so there’s no legal protection for individuals under Israeli military occupation.

As detention is based on secret information, which neither the detainee nor his lawyer is allowed to see, it is impossible to mount a proper defence. Besides, the Security Service always finds a bogus excuse to keep detainees locked up “in the greater interest of the security of Israel”. Although detainees have the right to review and appeal, they are unable to challenge the evidence and check facts as all information presented to the Court is classified.

Faced with this great mental stress Merna nevertheless determined to carry on with her studies. The “most moral army in the world”, as the Israelis call their uniformed thugs, may have robbed her brothers of an education, but she would still fight for hers. Sleepless and tearful, Merna went to university next day as usual.

A fellow student recalls than when chatting to Merna online in the evenings, she often had to leave the computer because the military had barged into her home. But even if she’d been up all night while Israeli soldiers trashed her house and questioned her family, she always came to school the next day.

“Coming to school is a way of getting away from what is happening in the refugee camp,” says Merna. “It’s like an oasis here for me.”  But her thoughts are never far from her cousin and brothers. “I only wish they were allowed this opportunity.”

She became a senior member of the Bethlehem University Student Ambassadors
Programme and an example to fellow classmates. She hopes to pursue post-graduate studies abroad and return to the University to give back to the community some of the support it has offered her.

Young minds like Merna’s must continue to persevere against the odds. Though greatly distracted by the cruel fate of her close family, the ordeal forged a steely resolve. The purposeful way she lived her university life, say the Brothers, gave her added strength and confidence. Merna managed to turn the tables on adversity. Her loss was actually her gain.

What a remarkable young lady.

Berlanty

This Christian girl, a 4th year Business Administration student,  was originally from Gaza but had lived in the West Bank since 2005 after receiving a travel permit from the military to cross from Gaza to the West Bank. She was snatched by the Israeli military while returning from a job interview in Ramallah. The 21 year-old, due to graduate in a few weeks’ time, was suddenly deported to Gaza “for trying to complete her studies at Bethlehem University”.

She too was about to be robbed of her degree at the last minute.  The most moral army in the world blindfolded and handcuffed her, loaded her into a military jeep and drove her from Bethlehem to Gaza, despite assurances by the Israeli Military Legal Advisor’s office that she would not be deported before an attorney from Gisha (an Israeli NGO working to protect Palestinians’ freedom of movement) had the opportunity to petition the Israeli court for her return to classes in Bethlehem.

When they’d crossed the border the world’s most moral army dumped Berlanty in the darkness late at night and told her: “You are in Gaza.”

“Since 2005, I refrained from visiting my family in Gaza for fear that I would not be permitted to return to my studies in the West Bank,” she told Gisha on her mobile phone before the soldiers confiscated it. “Now, just two months before graduation, I was arrested and taken to Gaza in the middle of the night, with no way to finish my degree.”

The Israeli embassy in London, when asked for an explanation, said that Berlanty held a permit that had expired and she’d been living in the West Bank illegally. “As you probably know, every Gaza resident who stays in the West Bank requires a permit, failing to do so is a breach of the law.”

The embassy spokesperson added that if she wished to complete her studies at Bethlehem she should apply for a permit to the relevant authorities. However, Bethlehem University told me that 12 students from Gaza had applied to attend the University and NOT ONE had received permission from the relevant Israeli authorities.

Her appeal, handled by Gisha, was turned down. It was a classic example of how Israel’s administrative ‘laws’ are framed to ride rough-shod over citizens’ rights enshrined in international law. For example, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip are internationally recognized as one integral territory and under international law everyone has the right to freely choose their place of residence within a single territory. The state of Israel also has an obligation under the Oslo Agreements to “respect and preserve without obstacles, normal and smooth movement of people, vehicles and goods within the West Bank, and between the West Bank and Gaza Strip”.

While Israel’s embassy here was issuing its despicable ruling on Berlanty’s fate, the Ambassador was whining about a warrant issued in London for the arrest of ex-foreign minister Tzipi Livni for alleged war crimes. Livni had overseen the murderous assault on Gaza the previous December/January, which killed 1400, including a large number of women and children, maimed thousands more and left countless families homeless.

If Berlanty, who has committed no crime, could not come and go as she pleased in her own country – the Holy Land – what made Israel’s Ambassador think that the bloodsoaked Livni, and others like her, should be allowed to come and go as they please in the UK? But that’s another shameful story.

Samer

A few months before he was due to graduate, in 2003, the Israeli military arrested Samer and threw him in jail… for 6 long years. Then at 27 he returned to campus to finish what he started.  “I feel like a regular student again,” he said with a wide grin. “I have a university notebook and textbooks.  I can ask and answer questions freely.  I can communicate openly with students, professors, and staff.  It’s a real life, an authentic life.”

When imprisoned he was denied access to a lawyer for 55 days then moved from one Israeli prison to another for more than six years. He was tortured on numerous occasions, he says, and regularly interrogated eight hours a day for four to five days, in just a T-shirt, squatting on the cold ground with his hands tied and an air conditioner blowing on his back.  He was held in solitary confinement for more than a year.

Membership of a student group in Palestine is outlawed under Israeli military law, and students who engage in campus politics risk arrest by Israel’s uniformed gangs who barge into Palestinian society and academic life to abduct them. Many western leaders began their political careers making a name for themselves at the Oxford Union and similar student debating groups or taking part in demos. How would they have reacted to being clapped in irons for it?

A good many of them are now firm ‘Friends of Israel’ although the regime stamps on the sort of student activities they enjoyed. Members of the Israeli cabinet presumably went to university. Are we to believe that they never engaged in student politics?

Samer’s experience is similar to that of hundreds of Palestinian students who find themselves political prisoners.  Many are left to rot in jail indefinitely, denied their basic right to due process, a fair trial and legal representation. Some wait up to two years to be charged. Others are charged under Israeli military law, which falls a long way short of the justice standards required under international law.

The Palestinian Prisoner’s Society reckoned that seven Bethlehem University students were at that time in Israeli prisons for taking part in ‘student activities’. In Samer’s case, he was abducted for joining Fatah’s resistance movement after the 2000 Intifada (uprising). It is, of course, perfectly legitimate to resist an illegal occupier.

But coming back to university after prison is no easy thing, as Samer discovered. He was suffering the cruel effects of six years’ incarceration and was often tired, depressed, stressed and jumpy. But he knew that the University was his anchor, the main hope in his young life.

At first he had problems communicating with other students, many of whom were younger than him. But the English professor who taught Samer earlier and received letters and messages from prison, said: “I see him as a success story in the sense that he hasn’t lost hope. He so much wanted to continue his education and he came back. Prison was tough for him but he came through it. He’s doing well, all things considered.”

Another professor remembered him from six years earlier. “There is a definite measure of maturity in Samer now,” she observed.  “He’s proud of being at Bethlehem University and he knows the value of education.  Samer doesn’t miss any classes. A six year gap in his education – and six rather difficult years – is not something that everyone can overcome. But he is doing it because he wants to improve himself, and his classmates see and admire it.”

Samer was determined to make the most of this second chance. Full marks to him for enduring and overcoming the cruelty of the Occupation.

Unpalatable Facts

A UN Human Rights Council report (A/HRC/WG.6/3/ISR/3) of December 2008 highlighted some unpalatable facts…

• DCI/PS (Defence for Children International, Palestine Section) expressed concern about coercive techniques used by Israeli authorities to extract confessions; the provision of typed confessions to Palestinian child detainees; the use of confessional evidence, most of which is obtained illegally, in the Israeli military courts in order to obtain convictions, and the lack of effective mechanisms for investigating complaints of torture.

• Referring to Israel’s policy of administrative detention, ICJ (International Commission of Jurists) said that arrests and detentions are often based on secret evidence to which neither the detainees nor their counsels have access. The Israeli authorities can repeatedly extend the initial detention without evidential justification.

• The International Complaints Commission (ICC) noted that there were about 800 Palestinian administrative detainees at the Israeli detention centres. The Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association reported that all are detained without any charges or any trial procedures. Administrative detention is ordered by a military commander and grounded on ‘security reasons’. Detainees must be brought before a military judge within 8 days but hearings are not open to the public. Addameer further reported that administrative detention has regularly been used against Palestinian children.

• AI (Amnesty International) confirmed that some 800 Palestinians were held without charge or trial in administrative detention and although they have the right to appeal to a military court and ultimately to the Supreme Court, neither they nor their lawyers have the right to see the evidence against them.

• The Mandela Institute reported serious deterioration in all Israeli detention facilities, including over-crowdedness; forbidding family visits; arbitrary transfers; violence against prisoners by prison officials; torture and ill treatment by the Israeli General Security Services (GSS or Shin Bet), Israeli soldiers and prison guards against Palestinians; deterioration of health conditions, and deaths in custody.

So there you have it. The evil of Israel’s ‘snatch squads’ that prey on Palestine’s students and other young people, and the regime’s cynical disregard for their wellbeing while in its clutches, are laid bare for everyone to see.

It is clear that Israel still hasn’t emerged from the swamp, and probably never will.


Stuart Littlewood

Stuart Littlewood

Stuart Littlewood is an industrial marketing specialist turned writer-photographer. In 2005 he was invited to write and shoot pictures for a book about the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. ‘Radio Free Palestine’ was published in 2007. For details please see www.radiofreepalestine.co.uk.

  • The Author is a regular contributor to RamallahOnline.com. Find more Articles by Stuart Littlewood on RamallahOnline.

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Turkey Does The Right Thing

Turkey joined NATO in 1952.

Turkey Does the Right Thing – An Analysis (3 September 2011)

In the wake of the dubious UN investigatory report which all but exonerated Israel for its May 31, 2010 attack on the Mavi Marmara–an attack that killed 8 Turkish citizens and 1 Turkish-America–Turkey has downgraded its diplomatic relations with Israel and suspended all military cooperation. Ankara had little choice in this matter. The Israeli attack was egregious. It took place in international waters against an unarmed civilian vessel and was carried out in defense of a barbaric and illegal policy of collective punishment against one million Palestinians bottled up in Gaza by an Israeli blockade.

For their part, the Israelis claim that they murdered the Mavi Marmara Turks in self-defense. I juxtapose the words self defense and murder quite purposefully, for the Turkish passengers were in the process of defending themselves from a violent assault when they were gunned down by Israeli soldiers who now describe their actions as self-defense. This scenario is a tragic parody of a hundred years of Zionist action in the Middle East. Having come to the region in the baggage train of an imperial occupying power (Great Britain) and successfully establishing themselves by evicting the native population (a process that is on-going), the Israelis define all acts of resistence to their aggression as attacks which require their defending themselves. The Mavi Marmara action fits neatly into this Zionist world of peculiar logic. In this sense, they turn the world upside down.

The Turkish government will have none of this and demanded the minimum of decency from the Israelis–an apology and compensation. In so doing they stand for civilized behavior. The Israelis refuse to apologize. After all, when you have turned the world upside down in the fashion described above, any admission that there lies a bit of faulty reasoning in your outlook threatens to collapse your universe like a deck of cards. So what can Ankara do? It can and has distanced itself from these crazy people and refuses any military affiliations. Why militarily assist the murders of your own citizens?

In making the announcement Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu observed that the Israelis apparently see “themselves above international laws and human conscience.” Actually, that is not the half of it. Not only do the Israelis disregard international law, be on the high seas, in the maintenance of the obscene ghetto of Gaza, or through their colonial impositions in the West Bank, but they assiduously seduce others to support their criminal behavior anywhere and everywhere they have lobby influence. Everywhere they go they are the poor victims who need carte blanche to protect themselves. They are the victims who victimize others in the name of self-defense. Israel is taking us all back to a barbaric state of nature.

You can see this perverse influence in the way the UN investigatory report on the Mavi Marmara assault was manipulated and distorted. Though headed by Geoffrey Palmer, a New Zealand lawyer and politician with a reputation for integrity and honesty, he was hemmed in by having to share the investigation with ex-Columbian president Alvaro Uribe–a devoted follower of the Israeli line and ally of Washington. The UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, who is currently under attack by the United Nations Office of Internal Oversight for weakening the moral integrity of the organization, also bowed to a combination of American and Israeli pressure. As a result the panel restricted itself to “reviewing reports from Israel and Turkey, thus sidestepping any independent gathering of evidence or hearing of testimony from eyewitnesses.” Ban Ki-Moon insisted that no report would be released unless Palmer and Uribe could reach consensus. That guaranteed equity for Israel’s perverse and lopsided logic. Thus the best the investigation could do is come up with a report that has an Alice in Wonderland quality to it: Israeli assault troops acted in self-defense against civilians even through they (the Israelis) used excessive force bordering on slaughter and mayhem. The investigatory process was suppose to be “transparent” to avoid this sort of corruption, but Ban Ki-Moon refused to let that happen.

Turkey, of course, has rejected the UN report. Now you might say all of this is in vain. Israel’s influence in the halls of power both in the U.S. and Europe is too great for Turkey’s position to be anything but symbolic. Well, you never know. The Turks do have some leverage. Israel dreams of the day when it can officially associate itself with NATO. Turkey is a member of NATO. Indeed, it has the second largest military force in that alliance and will soon host an extension of the organizations early warning system. Under present circumstances hell will freeze over before Israel becomes a full member of NATO. Unfortunately, within Zionist world of illogic, Turkey’s position will just reinforce Israel’s narcissistic sense of victimhood. Yasir Arafat once said that Israel acts like a homicidal “big baby.” He was so right.

 

 

 

Dr. Lawrence Davidson

Dr. Lawrence Davidson

 

Dr. Lawrence Davidson is professor of history at West Chester University. He is the author of numerous books, including Islamic Fundamentalism and America’s Palestine: Popular and Official Perceptions from Balfour to Israeli Statehood.

The author is a regular contributor to RamallahOnline.com.More articles can be found on RamallahOnline.com, Logos Journal, and Dr. Davidson also maintains an online blog, you can find it at http://www.tothepointanalyses.com

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The Return of the Generals

Uri Avnery

Uri Avnery

SINCE THE beginning of the conflict, the extremists of both sides have always played into each other’s hands. The cooperation between them was always much more effective than the ties between the corresponding peace activists.

“Can two walk together, except they be agreed?” asked the prophet Amos (3:3). Well, seems they can.

This was proved again this week.

AT THE beginning of the week, Binyamin Netanyahu was desperately looking for a way out of an escalating internal crisis. The social protest movement was gathering momentum and posing a growing danger to his government.

The struggle was going on, but the protest had already made a huge difference. The whole content of the public discourse had changed beyond recognition.

Social ideas were taking over, pushing aside the hackneyed talk about “security”. TV talk show panels, previously full of used generals, were now packed with social workers and professors of economics. One of the consequences was that women were also much more prominent.

And then it happened. A small extremist Islamist group in the Gaza Strip sent a detachment into the Egyptian Sinai desert, from where it easily crossed the undefended Israeli border and created havoc. Several fighters (or terrorists, depends who is talking) succeeded in killing eight Israeli soldiers and civilians, before some of them were killed. Another four of their comrades were killed on the Egyptian side of the border. The aim seems to have been to capture another Israeli soldier, to strengthen the case for a prisoner exchange on their terms.

In a jiffy, the economics professors vanished from the TV screens, and their place was taken by the old gang of exes – ex-generals, ex-secret-service chiefs, ex-policemen, all male, of course, accompanied by their entourage of obsequious military correspondents and far-right politicians.

With a sigh of relief, Netanyahu returned to his usual stance. Here he was, surrounded by generals, the he-man, the resolute fighter, the Defender of Israel.

IT WAS, for him and his government, an incredible stroke of luck.

It can be compared to what happened in 1982. Ariel Sharon, then Minister of Defense, had decided to attack the Palestinians and Syrians in Lebanon, He flew to Washington to obtain the necessary American agreement. Alexander Haig told him that the US could not agree, unless there was a “credible provocation”.

A few days later, the most extreme Palestinian group, led by Abu Nidal, Yasser Arafat’s mortal enemy, made an attempt on the life of the Israeli ambassador in London, paralyzing him irreversibly. That was certainly a “credible provocation”. Lebanon War I was on its way.

This week’s attack was also an answer to a prayer. Seems that God loves Netanyahu and the military establishment. The incident not only wiped the protest off the screen, it also put an end to any serious chance of taking billions off the huge military budget in order to strengthen the social services. On the contrary, the event proved that we need a sophisticated electronic fence along the 150 miles of our desert border with Sinai. More, not less, billions for the military.

BEFORE THIS miracle occurred, it looked as if the protest movement was unstoppable.

Whatever Netanyahu did was too little, too late, and just wrong.

In the first days, Netanyahu treated the whole thing as a childish prank, unworthy of the attention of responsible adults. When he realized that this movement was serious, he mumbled some vague proposals for lowering the price of apartments, but by then the protest had already moved far beyond the original demand for “affordable housing”. The slogan was now “The People Want Social Justice”

After the huge 250,000-strong demonstration in Tel Aviv, the protest leaders were facing a dilemma: how to proceed? Yet another mass protest in Tel Aviv might mean falling attendance. The solution was sheer genius: not another big demonstration in Tel Aviv, but smaller demonstrations all over the country. This disarmed the reproach that the protesters are spoiled Tel Aviv brats, “sushi eaters and water-pipe smokers” as one minister put it. It also brought the protest to the masses of disadvantaged Oriental Jewish inhabitants of the “periphery”, from Afula in the North to Beer Sheva in the South, most of them the traditional voters of Likud. It became a love-fest of fraternization.

So what does a run-of-the-mill politician do in such a situation? Well, of course, he appoints a committee. So Netanyahu told a respectable professor with a good reputation to set up a committee which would, in cooperation with nine ministers, no less, come up with a set of solutions. He even told him that he was ready to completely change his own convictions.

(He did already change one of his convictions when he announced in 2009 that he now advocates the Two-State Solution. But after that momentous about-face, absolutely nothing changed on the ground.)

The youngsters in the tents joked that “Bibi” could not change his opinions, because he has none. But that is a mistake – he does indeed have very definite opinions on both the national and the social levels: “the whole of Eretz Israel” on the one, and Reagan-Thatcher economic orthodoxy on the other.

The young tent leaders countered the appointment of the establishment committee with an unexpected move: they appointed a 60-strong advisory council of their own, composed of some of the most prominent university professors, including an Arab female professor and a moderate rabbi, and headed by a former deputy governor of the Bank of Israel.

The government committee has already made it clear that it will not deal with middle class problems but concentrate on those of the lowest socio-economic groups. Netanyahu has added that he will not automatically adopt their (future) recommendations, but weight them against the economic possibilities. In other words, he does not trust his own nominees to understand the economic facts of life.

AT THAT point, Netanyahu and his aides pinned their hopes on two dates: September and November 2011.

In November, the rainy season usually sets in. No drop of rain before that. But when it starts to rain cats and dogs, it was hoped in Netanyahu’s office, the spoiled Tel Aviv kids will run for shelter. End of the Rothschild tent city.

Well, I remember spending some miserable weeks in the winter of the 1948 war in worse tents, in the midst of a sea of mud and water. I don’t think that the rain will make the tent-dwellers give up their struggle, even if Netanyahu’s religious partners send the most fervent Jewish prayers for rain to the high heavens.

But before that, in September, just a few weeks away, the Palestinians – it was hoped – would start a crisis that will divert attention. This week they already submitted to the UN General Assembly a request to recognize the State of Palestine. The Assembly will most probably accede. Avigdor Lieberman has already enthusiastically assured us that the Palestinians are planning a “bloodbath” at that time. Young Israelis will have to exchange their tents in Tel Aviv for the tents in the West Bank army camps.

It’s a nice dream (for the Liebermans), but Palestinians had so far showed no inclination to violence.

All that changed this week.

FROM NOW on, Netanyahu and his colleagues can direct events as they wish.

They have already “liquidated” the chiefs of the group which carried out the attack, called “the Popular Resistance Committees”. This happened while the fire-fight along the border was still going on. The army had been forewarned and was ready. The fact that the attackers succeeded nevertheless in crossing the border and shooting at vehicles was ascribed to an operational failure.

What now? The group in Gaza will fire rockets in retaliation. Netanyahu can – if he so wishes – kill more Palestinian leaders, military and civilian. This can easily set off a vicious circle of retaliation and counter-retaliation, leading to a full-scale Molten Lead-style war. Thousands of rockets on Israel, thousands of bombs on the Gaza Strip. One ex-military fool already argued that the entire Gaza Strip will have to be re-occupied.

In other words, Netanyahu has his hand on the tap of violence, and he can raise or lower the flames at will.

His desire to put an end to the social protest movement may well play a role in his decisions.

THIS BRINGS us back to the big question of the protest movement: can one bring about real change, as distinct from forcing some grudging concessions from the government, without becoming a political force?

Can this movement succeed as long as there is a government which has the power to start – or deepen – a “security crisis” at any time?

And the related question: can one talk about social justice without talking about peace?

A few days ago, while strolling among the tents on Rothschild Boulevard, I was asked by an internal radio station to give an interview and address the tent-dwellers. I said: “You don’t want to talk about peace, because you want to avoid being branded as ‘leftists”. I respect that. But social justice and peace are two sides of the same coin, they cannot be separated. Not only because they are based on the same moral principles, but also because in practice they depend on each other.”

When I said that, I could not have imagined how clearly this would be demonstrated only two days later.

REAL CHANGE means replacing this government with a new and very different political set up.

Here and there people in the tents are already talking about a new party. But elections are two years away, and for the time being there is no sign of a real crack in the right-wing coalition that might bring the elections closer. Will the protest be able to keep up its momentum for two whole years?

Israeli governments have yielded in the past to mass demonstrations and public uprisings. The formidable Golda Meir resigned in the face of mass demonstrations blaming her for the omissions that led to the fiasco at the start of the Yom Kippur War. The government coalitions of both Netanyahu and Ehud Barak in the 1990s broke under the pressure of an indignant public opinion.

Can this happen now? In view of the military flare-up this week, it does not look likely. But stranger things have happened between heaven and earth, especially in Israel, the land of limited impossibilities.

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Daily Israeli Crimes Against Humanity

Bil’in Invasion (Photo by Hamde Abu Rahmah)

Stephen Lendman, 10 Jan 2011

Daily accounts can be followed on important sites such as Palestine Chronicle.com, Palestine Telegraph.com, and the Electronic Intifada.net as well as others like Israel’s oldest daily newspaper, Haaretz, available online in English.

They and others document harrowing crimes virtually ignored in the West, especially by America’s media offering one-sided pro-Israeli reports with imperfect exceptions like Isabel Kershner’s January 7 New York Times article headlined, “Israeli Soldiers Kill Palestinian, 65, in His Bedroom,” saying:

“Israeli soldiers shot and killed an unarmed 65-year-old Palestinian man….in what appeared to be a case of mistaken identity. The man’s wife said he was sleeping and she was praying when soldiers burst into the apartment before dawn, entered the bedroom and immediately opened fire.”

Without explanation, “(t)he Israeli military expressed regret,” she said, and promised “a speedy investigation, with conclusions to be presented as early as next week.” In fact, all Israeli “investigations” whitewash crimes to absolve guilty commanders, troops, and top government officials who sanction occupation, violence and wars of aggression.

Rarely ever do US media journalists report anything less than fully supportive of Israel. Even Kershner’s account wasn’t fully accurate or candid, suggesting “mistaken identity” when killings, assaults and other abuses happen regularly against targeted individuals and others who happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time – “collateral damage” for the Pentagon and Israel when, in fact, it’s willful, at times, indiscriminate cold-blooded murder, a US and Israeli specialty.

Kershner’s article also misreported “a period of relative calm” preceding the killing and two others when, in fact, daily violence and repression define life in Occupied Palestine. It also mentioned what she covered in a January 1 article, headlined, “Tear Gas Kills a Palestinian Protester,” saying:

Jawaher Abu Rahmah, a 36-year old Palestinian woman “died Saturday after inhaling tear gas fired by Israeli forces a day earlier at a protest against Israel’s separation barrier in a West Bank village.”

Again, she highlighted Israel’s side, calling the protest a “violent and illegal riot,’” when, in fact, demonstrations against occupation and Israel’s (International Court of Justice July 4, 2004 ruled illegal) Separation Wall are always nonviolent and legal on Palestinian, not Israeli, land. Israeli-initiated violence always follows, victimizing, injuring, and at times killing peaceful protesters like Jawaher.

Kershner also ignored the type and origin of the dangerous tear gas used. Called CS, it’s supplied by the Defense Technology Corporation of America, and may either be fired randomly into crowds, homes, or aimed directly at targets at close range, increasing the possibility of serious injury or death. In fact, a few days before she died, a CS canister blow to the chest killed Bassem Abu Rahmah, and Jawaher’s brother, Basem, was killed the same way in April 2009.

US television news ignores these crimes, and rarely ever do even distorted accounts appear in print. When they do, however, they’re never fully accurate or candid. Kershner, like other US reporters, highlights Israel’s version of events, never hinting that regular outrageous crimes occur, that Israel’s occupation and Separation Wall are illegal, and that since June 2007 over 1.5 million Gazans are suffocating under siege.

Moreover, most important is what’s omitted in reports, especially background information on this decades-long conflict, why it continues, and that Washington supplies Israel with billions of dollars annually, the latest weapons and technology, interest-free loans, and virtually anything else Israel requests, even when doing so harms US interests.

One Palestinian CS survivor described the experience as feeling “like a million blue shards of glass tearing at your alveoli (air sacks in lungs) and shredding your eyes…Every breath tears at your insides; vicious animals live in your lungs. I’d rather not breathe than take one more anguished, searing, charred breath. Then, you don’t have a choice; you can’t breathe.”

Kershner omitted those and other facts from her articles or that weapons this dangerous should be prohibited. All high-velocity projectiles also, what killed Bassem Abu Rahmen and others, fired directly at them at point blank range with intent to seriously injure or kill. Terror weapons, they’re regularly used against nonviolent protesters to disperse, intimidate, and/or willfully cause harm.

On January 4, Kershner’s article headlined, “Israeli Military Officials Challenge Account of Palestinian Woman’s Death,” saying:

“….Israeli military officials, who insisted on anonymity (always a red flag) while their investigation (read whitewash) was continuing, told various journalists and bloggers that they had never heard of tear gas killing anyone in the open, and raised the possibility that (Jawaher) had some pre-existing ailment, that alone or compounded by the tear gas, caused her death.”

Jawaher, in fact, was fine. She was at work the previous day, and her brother, Samir, said she was happily looking forward to spending time with her family over New Year’s. Moreover, hospital records confirmed “no history of chronic disease.” Recent medical tests also showed everything was normal.

Israeli forces routinely use CS gas against protesters. On January 3, Haaretz writers Avi Issacharoff and Anshel Pfeffer, headlined, “Protester death shows IDF may be using most dangerous type of tear gas,” saying:

The Ramallah hospital treating Jawaher reported “her death was caused by respiratory failure resulting from the inhalation of tear gas….In recent years, a number of studies have cast doubts about (CS) gas; there have been reports of several deaths caused by” inhaling it.

“One of the main factors influencing the extent of (its) damage….is the amount of particles in the air,” according to Israeli Dr. Daniel Argo “who regularly takes part” in anti-Wall protests. “He also trains activists to (treat) injuries caused by police and soldiers using crowd-dispersal techniques.”

Argo explained that CS is known to cause eye and lung injuries, as well as skin diseases, saying:

“There are other types of tear gas that are not as dangerous as CS; why the defense establishment insists on continuing it use is not clear. In addition, since no studies have (addressed its) long-term effects, security personnel who use it frequently should be worried about their own health.”

Protest participants say Israel uses “barrages of tear gas both in front and behind” them, trapping them. Moreover, the gas remains effective even when no longer visible. It’s also used beyond its expiration date to increase its deadliness. Whenever deaths or serious injuries result, Israel denies responsibility, blaming peaceful protesters for provoking violence, when, in fact, thuggish police, military or other security forces alone are to blame.

The Legal Right to Protest Peacefully

A January 4 Haaretz editorial headlined, “Israel must allow Palestinians to protest in peace,” saying:

Tear gas killed Jawaher, her brother Bassem, and her “third brother, Ashraf, was caught on camera as he was shot by Israeli soldiers while he was handcuffed.” Yet, peaceful protests “are entirely legitimate. (Palestinians) have the right to protest (occupation and) the theft of their land for the giant settlements,” pockmarking the West Bank as well as the illegal Separation Wall.

Jawaher “died in vain. She didn’t endanger anyone. There’s no need to mention the countries where the regimes kill people who demonstrate against them. Israel must not become one of them.”

Israel, of course, has been one for decades, Palestinian sources confirming 21 West Bank protesters killed since 2005, besides thousands more over Israel’s decades long reign of terror – information Kershner and other US journalists won’t report.

Nor that in 2004, the IDF Medical Corps published a study on CS gas in the Israeli medical journal Refuah and the Germany-based Archives of Toxicology. It concluded that high gas concentrations can cause serious harm or kill. Yet in Bil’in and other villages, Israeli military forces routinely fire multiple canisters into small areas, releasing thick clouds of gas. The clear motive isn’t just crowd control.

A Final Comment

On January 8, Stop the Wall.org headlined “Hundreds march in memory of Jawaher,” saying:

“Hundreds of Palestinian and international activists, members of Palestinian women’s institutions and unions, and Palestinian political officials and leaders joined in the protest in Bil’in this week to honor Jawaher Abu Rahmah” who died New Year’s day in a Ramallah hospital from CS gas inhalation.

They also wore yellow Stars of David, symbolizing ones Nazis forced Jews to wear, their message saying:

“the Occupation is bringing down on us what was practiced against the Jews by the Nazis, using all its deadly weapons to exterminate the Palestinian people.”

Israeli soldiers confronted them with massive amounts of CS gas, sound bombs, rubber-coated metal bullets, and water cannons spraying skunk water (raw sewage). Numerous injuries were reported, including dozens from inhalation and the effects of contaminated water. Several protesters were also beaten and one or more arrested.

Nabi Saleh protests were also viciously attacked, including by tear gassing nearby homes. Mahmoud Samir Shehada’s house was filled with gas, suffocating everyone inside. His wife collapsed and was rushed to Ramallah hospital for treatment.

Al Ma’sara residents protested Jawaher’s killing despite Israeli soldiers kicking and beating them with rifle butts. In Ni’lin, residents commemorated the second anniversary of Arafat and Mohammed Khawaja’s deaths, killed during Cast Lead, as well as Jawaher, in their weekly march.

Soldiers confronted them violently. Village leader Ahad Khawaja said assaults have been especially vicious lately, an apparent Israeli decision to more ruthlessly crush opposition to its lawless occupation, Separation Wall, and daily crimes against humanity, an Israeli specialty unreported by America’s major media.

Stephen Lendman

Stephen Lendman

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.progressiveradionetwork.com/the-progressive-news-hour/

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Palestine’s Burning Olive Groves

Olive trees on Thassos.JPG Olive trees on Thassos (Wikimedia Commons)

Rannie Amiri, 22 Oct 2010

“Lit from a blessed tree, an olive, neither of the east nor of the west, whose oil is well-nigh luminous, though fire scarce touched it … ”

Quran 24:35

“And when he had set the brands on fire, he let them go into the standing corn of the Philistines, and burnt up both the shocks, and also the standing corn, with the vineyards and olives.”

Judges 15:5

Olives and olive oil. Nothing symbolizes Palestinian land, identity and culture as they do. They are the hallmarks of national pride and the veritable heart of Palestine’s agricultural economy.

Although the subjugation and daily humiliation of occupation takes various forms in East Jerusalem and the West Bank—demeaning checkpoint searches; arrest and interrogation of minors; preventing ambulances from expeditiously transporting the sick to hospitals; the eviction of families and demolition of homes—few situations evoke more outrage and deep sadness as do the torching of olive orchards by vigilante settlers.

Last Friday was the official start of the olive harvest season in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Gunfire and real fire once again heralded its opening. Hundreds of trees were burned by settlers as Israeli soldiers looked on. Fire trucks were prevented from helping put out the blaze in what has become an annual ritual of despoiling the land by those who have illegally settled on it.

To coincide with the beginning of the harvest, the international relief agency Oxfam released its report, “The Road to Olive Farming: Challenges to Developing the Economy of Olive Oil in the West Bank” on Oct. 15 in Jerusalem.

Oxfam indicates that Palestinian olive oil production contributes $100 million annually to some of the poorest, most disadvantaged families and communities in the West Bank. It is a primary source of revenue for the economy and nearly half of all agricultural land use is devoted to it. As one of the territory’s major exports, the extent to which olives and olive oil contributes to employment opportunities and income for 100,000 Palestinian farming families cannot be overstated.

Yet, the Israeli government deliberately prevents access to land where olive farms are located.

“Physical barriers such as checkpoints and road blocks have restricted the free movement of people and goods within the West Bank and obstructed access for Palestinian agricultural produce, including olives and olive oil, to internal, Israeli and international markets,” the report said.

It also concluded the Israeli government sanctions settler violence against the groves, which include stealing its fruits, torching or uprooting tens of thousands of trees and attacking farmers to intimidate them from harvesting their crops.

“Settler attacks and harassment against Palestinian olive farmers are common.”

And Friday was no exception. As the AFP reported, settlers swooped down on the groves with automatic weapons, setting olive trees ablaze and chanting “Out, Out.”

This year’s violence has been characterized as one of the worst in recent history. Despite the well-known identities of the assailants, nearly all go unprosecuted.

In a five-year study tracking 97 cases of Palestinian land vandalism, the Israeli human rights organization Yesh Din (Volunteers for Human Rights) found that police investigations did not yield a single indictment, with all cases closed due to insufficient evidence or “unknown perpetrators.”

“The law enforcement authorities are not responding to the ongoing harm done to the livelihood of Palestinian families,” said lead researcher Yior Lavne.

Savaging the cultural heritage and economic viability of a people is an odious practice. Under any other circumstance, the deliberate, purposeful desecration of land and sabotage of livelihoods would be considered a war crime. It is time the international community call what is happening in the West Bank just that.

Support Palestinian farmers through fair-trade purchase of their olive oil.

  • Rannie Amiri is an independent Middle East commentator. More article by the author can be found here.

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Children of the gravel

Gisha Logo

GISHA, 16 Sept 2010

On Saturday, May 22, 2010, Hasan, 17, was shot in the leg in the now-defunct Erez industrial area in the northern Gaza Strip: “I was collecting gravel with the other workers, when one of the Israeli soldiers in the watchtower fired a shot which hit me in the right leg. I immediately fell to the ground in great pain. Everyone started running away, except for one youngster who I didn’t know, who came and tried to help me, but he couldn’t lift me”. In the meantime, the soldiers kept firing and the boy who came to help Hasan also had to run away. Finally, Hasan was rushed to hospital. “My leg was in a cast for two months, and now I still can’t walk properly and feel pain whenever I move it. I don’t know when I will be able to walk again, even though my family needs the money, and there are no other alternatives”.

One month later, on June 7, 17-year-old Awad was shot in the same place: “At around 9:30 A.M., I bent over to pick up some gravel when I heard a shot being fired. The bullet hit me in the right knee and I fell over in great pain. Youngsters around me started running in all directions and I saw my brothers running towards me”. Awad fainted, waking up later in hospital. “Since that day, I’ve been feeling numbness in my right leg and I can’t walk on it like I used to”.

About two weeks later, on June 22, 16-year-old Abdullah was shot while working in the evacuated Israeli settlement of Elei Sinai: “It was around 6:00 A.M. I heard a shot being fired from the Israeli watchtower and I immediately fell to the ground in great pain. My brothers and cousins rushed towards me and put me on the cart and rushed me to the main road. My ankle was bleeding and I felt it going numb”. Abdullah was rushed to hospital, where he underwent an urgent operation. “I still feel pain in my right leg and I don’t know whether I will be able to walk normally again or not”.

These disturbing testimonies were recently published on the website of the Palestinian branch of Defense for Children International (DCI), which defends children’s rights worldwide. The three boys’ stories point towards the difficult economic situation in the Gaza Strip, where young people put themselves at risk and work as gravel collectors along the border fence with Israel in order to support their families. Furthermore, the testimonies illustrate how despite the “disengagement”, Israel continues to restrict movement inside Gaza. According to international organizations the restrictions are enforced in 17% of the total area of the Strip, however, the boundaries of the restricted areas are not clearly marked for the population and the terms of access to them have not been explained. (A U.N. Report on the subject shows that in the first seven months of 2010, seven residents were killed and 94 were wounded in the buffer zones). Just this week it was reported that four people were killed and several more injured by military fire near the border fence.

The testimonies show that many young people work daily collecting gravel in the Erez industrial park and the evacuated Israeli settlements in the area. Furthermore, according to their testimonies, at the moment the boys were shot they were not doing anything that could have been perceived as dangerous. Why, then, did the soldiers shoot the boys? Was everyone who was shot really suspected of being a terrorist or trying to infiltrate Israel? What rules of engagement were the soldiers following? We requested a response to the testimonies from the IDF spokesperson, but by the time of publication it had not yet been received.

Since the declaration of the easing of the closure of Gaza in July 2010, Israel has allowed about 600 trucks of construction materials into the Gaza Strip, or in other words, about 4% of need. As long as Israel continues to forbid the entry of building materials into the Gaza Strip, the informal gravel industry will continue to flourish and young people will continue to risk this dangerous option to support their families.

Goods Needs Vs. Supply 15/8/10 - 11/9/10

Goods Needs Vs. Supply 15/8/10 - 11/9/10

Industrial Fuel Needs Vs. Supply 15/8/10 - 11/9/10

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Israeli Soldiers Sexually Abuse Palestinian Children

Stephen Lendman

Stephen Lendman, 13 Sept 2010

On September 10, Israel’s YnetNews.com headlined, “IDF sexually abused Palestinian children,” headlining:

“Damning (September 9) CNN report cites uncorroborated sexual abuse charges of Palestinian children detained by IDF.” Military officials refused to “respond to abuse charges as no details (were) provided,” a spokesman saying “We cannot address general claims on the subject in the absence of a specific complaint.”

CNN’s report “featured an unidentified Palestinian boy claiming that IDF forces attempted to insert an object into his rectum,” and that dozens of officers present stood around laughing while it happened.

The network cited Defence of Children International (DCI) as its source, an independent NGO involved in promoting and protecting children’s rights globally for over 30 years, founded on the date the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) passed 10 years later.

In May 2010, it asked the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture to investigate 14 cases of sexual assault or threatened assault it uncovered – committed by Israeli soldiers, interrogators, and police from January 2009 – April 2010. The abused children were from 13 – 16 years old, detained for offenses like stone-throwing harming no one.

DCI-Palestine expressed alarm about sworn affidavits children provided, explaining instances of sexual assault or threatened assault to obtain confessions. In 2009 alone, DCI reviewed 100 sworn affidavits attesting to the following:

– 97% of children said their hands were tied during interrogations;

– 92% said they were blindfolded or hooded;

– 81% said forced confessions were made;

– 69% said they were beaten or kicked;

– 65% said they were arrested from midnight to 4AM;

– 50% said they were verbally abused;

– 49% cited threats or inducements;

– 32% were forced to sign confessions in Hebrew they didn’t understand;

– 26% cited painful position abuse;

– 14% were in solitary confinement;

– 12% were threatened with sexual assault; and

– 4%, in fact, were sexually assaulted.

It included grabbing boys by the testicles until they confessed, and threatening others as young as 13 with rape unless they admitted to “throwing stones at Israeli settler vehicles in the occupied West Bank.”

DCI suspects these figures “may understate the extent of the problem,” a conclusion substantiated in an earlier article titled “Palestinian Children Under Occupation,” accessed through the following link:

http://sjlendman.blogspot.com/2010/07/palestinian-children-under-occupation.html


In its April 2008 report, the Palestinian Ministry of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs said over 7,000 children had been arrested since September 2000, the start of the second Intifada. About 360 were still held, some as young as 10, treated as harshly as adults, in violation of international law requiring special treatment for children.

Of these, 145 had been sentenced, 200 awaited trial, and 15 were being administratively held without charge for offenses as trivial as stone-throwing. The report also said about 500 youths arrested turned 18 in prison. About 75 were ill and not treated, and nearly all had been tortured or abused by beatings, hooding, painful shackling, and sleep deprivation for several days in the shabeh position.

It involves binding their hands and feet to a small chair, at times from behind to a pipe affixed to the wall, painfully slanted forward, hooded with a filthy sack, and played loud music nonstop through loudspeakers.

The article includes more on their treatment during detention and under occupation, clear evidence of state-sponsored brutality, flagrantly violating international law, Israel’s specialty.

DCI-Palestine cited a 15 year old boy’s experience after being arrested in September 2009 at 2AM at home:

“While sitting on the ground near the truck, a person speaking Arabic approached me and grabbed my hands and ordered me to stand up and accompany him. He grabbed me so violently and pulled me. He forced me to walk with him for about 20 meters, and I could see from under the blindfold that we stopped behind a military jeep. He slapped me hard twice and grabbed my testicles so hard and started pressing them. Then, he asked me whether I threw stones and Molotov cocktails and I said I did not.”

“He started shouting and saying ‘liar,’ your mother’s c..t.’ He started beating me all over my body and once again grabbed my testicles and started pressing hard. ‘I won’t let go of your testicles unless you confess,’ he said to me. I felt so much pain and kept shouting. I had no other choice but to confess” to stop the pain.

Every year, around 700 children are arrested, most for stone-throwing, then interrogated with no lawyer or family member present, prosecuted, and sentenced. Over 80% signed forced confessions, one-third written in Hebrew they don’t understand. After conviction in military, not civil, court, most are imprisoned in violation of Fourth Geneva’s Article 76. Its provisions include assuring “Proper regard….paid to the special treatment due to minors,” one of many laws Israel violates, children abused like adults.

When confronted with hard evidence, Israel denies it, saying it respects and observes international law, when, in fact, it’s abusively and consistently in violation.

On May 10, Haaretz writer Amira Hass covered the child abuse story, headlining “Over 100 Palestinian minors reported abuse in IDF, police custody in 2009,” saying:

“69 minors complained of being beaten, four minors reported being sexually assaulted, and 12 said they were threatened with sexual assault.” She added that most were intimidated, abused, and maltreated in custody, before and during interrogations. In addition, they got no food or water for many hours and were forced to name others to stop being mistreated.

DCI-Palestine legal advisor Khaled Kuzmar said many parents don’t complain to authorities, having no “confidence in the system that abuses them.” It’s true. Police and military officials rarely investigate, and when do it, absolve abusers, victims not Jewish afforded no justice.

Like always, an IDF Spokesman dismissed “claims of deliberate deviation from procedures for arresting and interrogating minors, (saying their) arrests are carried out in keeping with international law; the arrests of suspects under 16 years old in the West Bank requires a military lawyer’s approval….Minors are brought before a judge within a relatively short period.”

He lied, including about quick resolution before a judge. In fact, children and adults are often held for weeks or months before appearing for trial or accepting a plea bargain, Israel’s corrupted injustice system for anyone not Jewish – even children as young as 9 or 10.

Stephen Lendman

Stephen Lendman

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.progressiveradionetwork.com/the-progressive-news-hour/

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Notes from Besieged Gaza

Stephen Lendman

Stephen Lendman, 24 August 2010

On June 17, Israel’s Cabinet issued a six point plan, agreeing to ease access for civilian goods entering Gaza without loosening inflexible security measures to restrict them. So what’s changed? Not much. Increased truck traffic has been modest at best. The consumer ban was partially lifted, permitting previously prohibited items like ketchup, chocolate and children’s toys.

Yet, banned products still include vitally needed industrial and construction items, unrelated to security concerns Israel claims, bogusly calling them “dual use.” As a result, the promised ease is unfulfilled. Strangling Gaza economically continues. Raw materials, spare parts, essential equipment, and numerous other non-military related goods are denied. In addition, no policy change eased people movement into and out of Gaza, those inside effectively imprisoned, exports still banned, and humanitarian flotillas threatened with forcible interdiction, in some cases their cargos and personal possessions stolen to prevent essential goods and cash donations from being delivered.

In an August 22 Common Dreams article, Ann Wright headlined,” “Israeli Soldiers Sell Gaza Flotilla Passengers’ Computers and Steal Hundreds of Thousands of Dollars in Cash,” saying:

“An Israeli newspaper has revealed that four to six computers (among the hundreds seized from Mavi Marmara passengers were) sold by an Israeli First Lieutenant to three junior military personnel. On August 18, a second officer was arrested in connection with the theft.”

Labor Party MK Eitan Kabel called the revelation “embarrassing, humiliating and infuriating,” but there’s more. “Israeli commandos also took cash and credit cards from passengers,” an estimated $1,000 or more from each, or at least $750,000, donations intended for Gazans. Four passengers alone had $68,000 stolen, money needy Gazans didn’t get.

Other items were also taken, including cell phones, cameras, and electronic equipment, supposedly kept safe but not returned when passengers were released. No one so far has been held accountable, nor for the cold-blooded murder of up to 15 passengers, three commissions investigating them, including:

– the UN Human Rights Council (HRC), hopefully a second Goldstone Commission;

– Israel’s Turkel Commission, the Netanyahu government’s arranged whitewash; and

– a second Ban Ki-moon appointed UN commission with former Colombian president Alvaro Uribe vice-chairman, a man tainted by corruption, scandal, and links to his country’s drug cartels and paramilitary death squads, responsible for murdering thousands of trade unionists, campesinos, human rights workers, independent journalists, pro-democracy advocates, and others opposing Colombia’s narco-state terrorism and ties to US imperialism – his appointment outraging activists demanding justice, not coverup and denial.

In an August 17 open letter, Besieged Gaza, Palestine, its members listed below, wrote Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, urging he demand Ban Ki-moon remove Uribe, saying:

“Mr. Prime Minister, it is an insult to the memory of those killed (including nine Turkish citizens on Turkey’s Mavi Marmara) to have their blood ‘redeemed’ by a man who has a record of violations against human rights and international law. (He was) an accomplice in corruption and crimes against humanity….(He) supported the displacement of Afro-Colombian families from their ancestral territories in La Toma, Suarez, and kept silent against the denial of their economic and territorial rights. (He’s also) a devoted Zionist, committed to the myth and fabrication of ‘Israel’s security.’ ”

It’s obscene to assign this man “a duty to uncover crimes against humanity against citizens of your own country,” ones he intends to suppress. (We) urge you now to take action (against him and defend) justice and accountability for Palestine through boycotting apartheid Israel, severing all diplomatic ties with it, and imposing sanctions against it until it complies with international law and ends its occupation, colonization and apartheid in Palestine.”

Signed,

Palestinian General Federations of Trade Unions
University Teachers’ Association in Palestine
Palestinian Students’ Campaign for the Academic Boycott of Israel
The Union of Palestinian Women’s Committees
Association of Al-Quds Bank for Culture and Information
General Union of Public Service and Commercial Workers
General Union of Health Service Workers
General Union of Agriculture Workers
General Union of Food Production Workers
General Union of Petrochemical and Gas Workers
Progressive Trade Union Front in Palestine
General Union of Municipality and Local Councils Workers
General Union of Tourism Workers
Arab Cultural Forum (and)
One Democratic State Group

Relentlessly, Israeli Attacks against Gaza Continue

Under siege and regular assaults, Israeli crimes of war and against humanity persist. On August 17, mortar attacks destroyed homes in the town of Abasan. Also, Israeli tanks and bulldozers entered Farrahin, east of Khan Younis in southern Gaza. Residential homes were attacked.

On August 19, Israeli artillery shelled areas near Gaza City. No injuries were reported. Tanks and combat forces make regular incursions, area air space violated daily. Farmers are attacked on their land, fishermen at sea. On August 18, air attacks bombed tunnels, an area near Gaza City, and a central Gazan building belonging to the Al Qassam Brigades. The pattern repeats provocatively, mostly against civilians, always in violation of international law Israel disdainfully spurns.

B’Tselem Update on Gaza’s Polluted Water

Headlined, “Water supplied in Gaza unfit for drinking; Israel prevents entry of materials needed to repair system,” B’Tselem reports that “Almost 95 percent (of Gaza’s water) is polluted and unfit for drinking,” a topic addressed in two earlier articles, accessed through the following links:

http://sjlendman.blogspot.com/2010/08/palestinians-denied-access-to-water.html

http://sjlendman.blogspot.com/2010/08/gazas-poisoned-water.html

The UN Environment Programme, Palestinian Water Authority, Coastal Municipalities Water Utility, and international aid organizations issued the above warning, estimating “it will take at least 20 years to rehabilitate Gaza’s underground water system, and any delay” will cause further deterioration, perhaps requiring “hundreds of years” to fix.

The crisis arose “following over-pumping” of Coastal Aquifer water, an amount double what’s needed to replenish it. As a result, it’s permeated with salt water and other contaminants. Also, Cast Lead destruction, wastewater disposal into the Mediterranean for lack of enough power to treat it, and poor maintenance, from prohibited spare parts and equipment, caused more pollution and greater salinity.

Majed Ghanem, Gazan Coastal Municipalities Water Utility quality control director, said a late 2009 examination showed 93% of 180 wells tested had chloride levels four to eight times higher than WHO maximums and nitrate levels six times higher, making the water unsafe to drink. It also looks and smells bad, the Palestinian Water Authority saying almost 40% of Gazan diseases are water related.

Children lacking potable water are vulnerable to malnutrition, diarrhea, and stunted physical and cognitive development, even death. Agriculture is also harmed, both its quality, quantity and safety.

Under siege, essential materials and equipment needed to improve water quality, safety, and taste are banned, including pumps, pipes, generators, computers, cement and other construction items, as well as enough fuel, chloride, and spare parts. The ability to rehab infrastructure and wastewater treatment facilities is also prevented, Israel’s bogus easing doing nothing to relieve Gaza’s growing humanitarian crisis, one the Netanyahu government wants intensified, not relieved, part of his slow-motion genocide agenda against all Palestinians and Israeli Arabs.

A Final Note

On August 22, the IDF named Major-General Yoav Galant as new chief of staff, succeeding Lieutenant-General Gabi Ashkenazi who’ll step down in February, tainted by scandal over charges of hiring a publicist to smear a rival candidate, police and Defense Minister Ehud Barak calling them untrue, but the damage apparently was done.

As head of Israel’s Southern Command, Galant ran Cast Lead, responsible for extensive war crimes over a 23-day rampage of disproportionate slaughter and destruction, mainly against non-combatants, infrastructure unrelated to military necessity, and other civilian targets.

He embraces the Dahiya Doctrine, named after the Beirut suburb destroyed in the 2006 Lebanon war through similar disproportionate destruction to achieve military and political objectives.

During Cast Lead, Galant wanted to “send Gaza decades into the past,” with no regard for international law or the safety and welfare of non-combatants. Next February, he’ll perhaps lead it against all Palestinians and other regional targets, embracing the same strategy used on Gazans.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.progressiveradionetwork.com/the-progressive-news-hour/.