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NEWS, VIEWS, ANALYSIS - 1st October 2009
Lawyers
seek arrest of Israeli defence minister in UK for alleged war crimes
Ian Cobain and Ian Black, The Guardian, 29 September 2009
Palestinian families apply for international arrest warrant for Ehud
Barak over military offensive in Gaza.
A
regional arms control pact is the only way to rein in Iran
Amin Saikal, The Age, 30 September 2009
Threats from the US or Israel will just harden the Iranians' resolve.
.................................................
Dividing
war spoils
Salman Abu Sitta, Al Ahram Weekly, 17 - 23 September 2009
Israel's robbery of Palestinian property reaches new heights with
Likud's latest illegal laws and subterfuges.
The
Knesset passed a law on 3 August which allows the sale of "Absentee"
Palestinian refugees' land to exclusively Jewish individuals and
institutions anywhere in the world. Thus, the legal right of the
original Palestinian owner to his land would be severed through
creating a barrier between the owner and his property. The passing of
the new law represents an audacious initiative by the current Israeli
government that no previous Israeli government dared contemplate.
Israel sells off
refugees' hopes
Jonathan Cook, The National, 14 August 2009
According
to international law, Israel holds the property of more than four
million Palestinian refugees in custodianship, until a final peace deal
determines whether some or all of them will be allowed back to their
400-plus destroyed Palestinian villages or are compensated for their
loss.
But last week, in a violation of international law and the
refugees' property rights that went unnoticed both inside Israel and
abroad, Benjamin Netanyahu, the prime minister, forced through a
revolutionary land reform.
The new law begins a process of creeping privatisation of much of
Israel's developed land, including refugee property, said Oren
Yiftachel, a geographer at Ben Gurion University in Beersheva.
Suhad
Bishara, a lawyer from the Adalah legal centre for Israel's Palestinian
minority, said the law had been carefully drafted to ensure that
foreigners, including wealthy sheikhs, cannot buy land inside Israel.
"Only Israeli citizens and anyone who can come to Israel under the
Law of Return - that is, any Jew - can buy the lands on offer, so no
'foreigner' will be eligible."
.................................................
Spain
excludes Israeli Settlement University from international Solar
Decathlon Europe 2010 to be held in Madrid
Architects & Planners for Justice in Palestine (APJP),
Press Release, 21 September 2009
The "University Center of Ariel in Samaria" (AUCS) has been excluded
from the Solar Decathlon, an international university competition
promoting sustainable architecture.
http://www.sdeurope.org/index.
The self-styled "Ariel University Centre of Samaria" claiming to
represent Israel, though situated in the illegal settlement of Ariel in
the occupied West Bank, was one out of 20 architecture teams
short-listed from university entries last April to compete for the
Solar Decathlon-Europe 2010. The Spanish Government together with the
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid organizes this most
prestigious
competition for sustainable architecture in the world.
.................................................
Courage
and resistance at Aida refugee camp
Dina Elmuti writing from Aida refugee camp, occupied West
Bank, Live from Palestine, 28 September 2009
The
unbearable nonviolence of Bil'in
Adam Keller, September 19, 2009
Night
raids in Bilin target activists
Interview, The Electronic Intifada, 29 September 2009
Jerusalem
Palestinians defining their own future
Jerrold Kessel and Pierre Klochendler, The Electronic
Intifada, 29 September 2009
Occupied East Jerusalem (IPS) - Almost a year ago a barely noticed
event took place in Sawarha, a Palestinian neighborhood in the
Israeli-occupied part of the city.
On that November day, Israeli Jerusalemites were voting in a new mayor
and a new city council.
On that same day, in this neighborhood home to 25,000, people were
ignoring the Israeli-run elections. Instead, they were focused on
electing their own local council.
Even though Israel annexed the
eastern sector of the city in 1967, Palestinians have had no right to
vote in Israel's national elections. But Israel allows them to vote in
the five-year municipal elections as "residents of Jerusalem."
..............................
In Israel, intermarriage viewed as treason Jonathan Cook, The Electronic Intifada, 25 September 2009 A local authority in Israel has announced that it is establishing a special team of youth counsellors and psychologists whose job it will be to identify young Jewish women who are dating Arab men and "rescue" them. The move by the municipality of Petah Tikva, a city close to Tel Aviv, is the latest in a series of separate - and little discussed - initiatives from official bodies, rabbis, private organizations and groups of Israeli residents to try to prevent interracial dating and marriage. .............................. Arrest of Palestinian children on the rise Mel Frykberg, The Electronic Intifada, 25 September 2009 Defence for Children International- Palestine Section (DCI) has released a statement that the number of children detained in Israeli jails and temporary Israeli army detention centers this year has risen by 17.5 percent compared with 2008. "The average number of Palestinian children held in Israeli detention in 2009 remains high, at 375 per month compared with an average of 319 in 2008," says DCI. Under Israeli administrative detention, Palestinians can be held for six months without trial, and this can be renewed at the end of that period for another six months. "It interrupts their education when they are detained for weeks and months without being brought to trial," says Moussa. Most Palestinian children are held for stone-throwing. Israeli Military Order 378 carries a maximum penalty of 20 years imprisonment for this, five years less than the average murder sentence in Israel. .............................. The risks of de-contextualizing Gaza war crimes Goncalo de Almeida Ribeiro, Vishaal Kishore and Nimer Sultany, The Electronic Intifada, 26 September 2009 Despite expressly claiming to take into account the historical background to the Gaza events, the report, by its very nature, singles out a particular set of facts, and a limited period of time as the primary locus for investigation. In part this is justified. The conflict in Gaza involved levels of violence that are more or less exceptional. Yet, we fear that such a high-profile report, crafted specifically to address what is perceived to be an extreme or peculiar period of time in the lives of Palestinians under occupation, might have significant negative consequences. Particularly, we maintain that such a report, by focusing on one "drastic" period in the Israeli occupation, might in fact have the effect of overshadowing or downplaying the harsh and ongoing reality of the last 43 years of Israeli occupation. Israel demands PA drop war crimes suit at The Hague Amos Harel and Avi Issacharoff, Ha'aretz, 27 September 2009 Tensions are mounting between Israel and the Palestinian Authority following Ramallah's call on the International Court at The Hague to examine claims of "war crimes" that the IDF allegedly committed during Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip. The issue is already weighing in on the relations between the leadership of Israel's defense and security establishment with their counterparts in the West Bank, and is part of a growing list of Israeli complaints about the behavior of PA officials. Meanwhile, Israel has warned the Palestinian Authority that it would condition permission for a second cellular telephone provider to operate in the West Bank - an economic issue of critical importance to the PA leadership - on the Palestinians withdrawing their request at the International Court. Patrick Henry's call Miko Peled writing from Kibbutz Zikkim, Live from Palestine, 28 September 2009 Those who still believe in a negotiated settlement with Israel on the basis of two states should read the following lines from Patrick Henry's famous speech: "It is natural for men to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth ... Are we disposed to be of the number of those who having eyes, see not, and having ears, hear not ..." .............................. ................... Hate thy neighbour 60 Minutes, 18 September 2009 LIAM BARTLETT: Palestinian doctor Mustafa Barghouthi says Israel is controlling almost every aspect of Palestinians lives. There are now 300,000 Israeli settlers - they look down on Palestinian towns through barbed wire and boom gates. To protect the settlers, Israel controls the movement of Palestinians. To travel from one town to another, there can be humiliating delays at checkpoints. There are hundreds of them. By contrast, the Israelis use a network of new highways, built for settlers only. DR MUSTAFA BARGHOUTHI: If I am caught driving on any of these roads, although I am a member of parliament in Palestine, I would be sentenced to six months in jail. LIAM BARTLETT: Automatically? DR MUSTAFA BARGHOUTHI: Automatically. --------------------- LIAM BARTLETT: The UN says this is disputed territory... ..that you captured. NADIA MATAR: The UN is biased, uh uh uh, pro-Arab - we know that. Leave it and where should we go? Where should we go? Back to Auschwitz? Where do you want us to go? This is our homeland. .............................. Nigel Parry's Hebron Diary A closer look at Hebron's "Jewish community" .............................. VIDEO: Water convoy to villages in the south Hebron hills - 26.09.09 Some 100 Israeli activists left Tel Aviv and Jerusalem to bring water to several isolated villages in the South Hebron Mount. These villages suffer more than anywhere else from Israel's racist water policy, as they lack connection to water pipes, and suffer from army attacks on what few water wells and deposits they have. Meeting with Palestinian partners, activists mounted water trucks and tractors and traveled the dessert until they reached a physical block on the road, put there by the army to make Palestinians' lives harder. A mass direct action, backed by a bulldozer hired for the cause, broke the road open and allowed water trucks to pass. ................................................. False promise of integration for Palestinian soldiers in Israel Jonathan Cook, The Electronic Intifada, 28 September 2009 Demands from Israel's chief commander this month that all Israeli citizens should be required to perform national service has turned the spotlight on a rarely discussed group of soldiers: members of Israel's Palestinian minority. Though no official statistics are available, an estimated 3,000 of Israel's 1.3 million Palestinian citizens have broken one of their society's biggest taboos and are currently serving, often as combat troops on the front line of the conflict with their Palestinian kin, in the occupied territories. In calling for mandatory national service, Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi observed that those Israelis who refused to serve could not expect "civil equality." Dr. Rhoda Kanaaneh, a Middle East expert at New York University, is dismissive of the view that military service allows Palestinian soldiers to integrate fully into Israeli society. "A surprising number I interviewed tried to compare themselves to Muslim-Americans or African-Americans serving in the US military. They said that through army service they expected to become Israeli like other Israelis." Dr. Kanaaneh says this promise of integration never materializes. In her book she reaches a harsh conclusion: "In the end, the military, like all other [Israeli] state institutions, is a tool the dominant majority wields to preserve Jewish privilege." ****************************** |
:::::NEWS,
VIEWS,
ANALYSIS::::: 7 May 2009::::::
7 May 2009
A PLAY that has been condemned by Jewish groups and some theatre critics as anti-Semitic will this month be performed at the State Library of Victoria. The cast of the eight-minute Seven Jewish Children, by English playwright Caryl Churchill, includes Sydney-based Anglo-Jewish actor Miriam Margolyes and Max Gillies, husband of high-profile Melbourne Jewish identity Louise Adler...
www.theage.com.au/news/entertainment/arts/bollocks-actor-defends-play/2009/05/07/1241289313892.html
Youth protest construction of illegal outpost; settlers throw burning rags at internationals
7 May 2009
Israeli soldiers detained five Israeli citizens working as peace activists protesting the establishment of an on illegal settlement east of Hebron in the West Bank. Protesters built small booth, mirroring a hut constructed on the land last month by Israeli settlers on Palestinian-owned land. According to the group Youth Against Settlements, the settlers are trying to impose a “de facto” situation on the land and create an illegal settler outpost on the area and effectively annex the land.
www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=37659
Israel savages UN report on Gaza attacks
May 07, 2009
ISRAELI officials lashed out yesterday at a UN report accusing the Jewish state of "negligence or recklessness" in attacks on UN facilities in the Gaza Strip during its war with Hamas in January. "The spirit of the report and its language are tendentious and entirely unbalanced," the Israeli Foreign Ministry said.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who reportedly accused Israel of lying about the damage it caused to UN facilities in the three-week conflict, nevertheless rejected the report's call for a full and impartial investigation into the war.
www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25439637-15084,00.html
Sheikh Jarrah residents charged with refusing to leave their homes
May 5, 2009
The court cases of Maher Hannoun and Afed El Fatah Gawi, charged with contempt of court for refusing to leave their homes, were yesterday postponed until the 17th May. Hannoun, 51, and El Fatah, 87, are residents of the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in occupied East Jerusalem where a spate of houses are threatened with eviction in Israel’s latest attempted purge of the Palestinian people.
palsolidarity.org/2009/05/6504
UK Embassy cancels Israel move, cites settlements
4 March 2009
The British Embassy in Israel has canceled plans to relocate to new offices because one of the owners is believed to be involved in building Jewish settlements in the West Bank, an official said on Wednesday...
The decision reflects growing U.K. pressure on Israel to abide by its international pledges to freeze settlement building in the West Bank and dismantle unauthorized outposts. The Palestinians seek the West Bank as part of a future independent Palestinian state.
"The U.K. government has always regarded settlements as illegal, but what has happened in recent months is that we are looking for ways to make a difference on this issue," Kaufman said. "We see them as an obstacle to peace."
www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-8386210,00.html?gusrc=gpd
Villages ask Norway to divest from Leviev’s Africa-Israel over settlements
6 May 2009
The West Bank Palestinian villages of Bil’in and Jayyous and 11 national and international networks from Europe, Palestine, Israel and the US have sent letters calling on Norway to comply with its ethical guidelines and divest from its pension fund holdings in the company Africa-Israel, owned by the controversial diamond magnate Lev Leviev. The villages of Bil’in and Jayyous cited the devastating impacts of the construction of Israeli settlements by Africa-Israel and another Leviev-owned company, Leader Management and Development, on their villages’ agricultural land.
http://adalahny.org/index.php/press-releases
UN chief seeks compensation from Israel
May 7, 2009
UNITED Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has accused Israel of lying about attacks on United Nations facilities during its Gaza offensive and demanded compensation. Mr Ban said a UN investigation had found conclusively that Israeli weaponry was the cause of attacks on several schools, a health clinic and the world body's Gaza headquarters.
www.theage.com.au/world/un-chief-seeks-compensation-from-israel-20090506-avak.html?page=-1
The sinking standing of the UN
6 May 2009
Late last week, according to the BBC Arabic news website, a report was submitted to the United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon about the scale of destruction Israel inflicted on UN installations in Gaza. This was also mentioned on a BBC news bulletin on May 1, but I could find little trace of this story anywhere else. The brief news item stated that the UN report contained secret information supplied by Israel about an incident in which over 40 Palestinian civilians were massacred when Israeli shells fell “outside” a UN school where many Palestinians were taking shelter.
The secretary general is reportedly considering how much of the information he can release....
www.jordantimes.com/?news=16429&searchFor=Ban%20Ki%20Moon
Nobel Laureate Accuses Israel of 'Ethnic Cleansing'
Nobel peace laureate Mairead Maguire on Tuesday accused Israel of "ethnic cleansing" policies in annexed east Jerusalem, where the municipality plans to tear down almost 90 Arab homes. (AFP)"I believe the Israeli government is carrying out a policy of ethnic cleansing against Palestinians here in east Jerusalem," said Maguire, who won the 1976 Nobel prize for her efforts at reaching a peaceful solution to the violence in Northern Ireland.
"I believe the Israeli government policies are against international law, against human rights, against the dignity of the Palestinian people," she said at a news conference.
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/04/22-1
:::::NEWS,
VIEWS,
ANALYSIS::::: 2008::::::
AUDIO:
Failing in Gaza
Phillip Adams interviews Sara Roy, LNL, Radio National, ABC
Report, PCHR
Forty five percent of working
age adults in the Gaza Strip are now officially unemployed, and Gaza
has de-developed into one of the most aid dependent communities on
earth.
The
Palestinians: Warehousing a 'surplus people'
Jeff Halper, ICAHD
Warehousing is the starkest of
political concepts because it represents the de-politicization of
repression, the transformation of a political issue of the first degree
into a non-issue, a regrettable but unavoidable situation best dealt
with through relief, charity and humanitarian programs.
.............................................
VIDEO: Olive
harvest in the village of Nilin
Nilin
village resists Israel's land confiscation
Report, The Electronic Intifada
Resisting
military service
Omer Goldman, daughter of a former Mossad chief, tells why she prefers
jail to the military draft
Igal Sarna, The Sunday Times
.............................................
Palestinians compelled to 'favour' Israel
Jonathan Cook, The National
Last month the Israeli branch
of Physicians for Human Rights released details of 32 cases in which
sick Gazans admitted they were denied permits after refusing to become
informants.
How I Lost My Fulbright Scholarship
Osama Dawoud, Counterpunch
Not many people in the Gaza
Strip spend their time thinking about Utah's Great Salt Lake. I have
been dreaming of it for months. This year, I was awarded a Fulbright
scholarship to the University of Utah to study in the department of
civil and environmental engineering. But I will not be attending this
fall. On the basis of secret evidence conveyed by the Israeli
government, my American visa was canceled.
.............................................
Daniella
Weiss: 'The Arabs are a filter through which we find our way to land'
Donald Macintyre, The Independent
Daniella Weiss's activism is
right-wing, in defence of a Greater Israel, including the West Bank,
and she openly strives for the annexation of that territory. So where
exactly do the Arabs fit into the Weiss vision? 'What will be with the
Arabs is what it was with all the nations that were here all through
history; they came and went... They are a sort of - I am going to use a
very, very dangerous word - a sort of filter through which our nation
finds its way towards the land.'
.............................................
Israeli
Palestinians: The Unwanted Who Stayed
Jonathan Cook, The Link - Volume 41, Issue 4
The recording of 'nationality'
is a serious matter in Israel. In most countries, anyone who is a
citizen is usually also a national. I am, for example, both a British
citizen and a British national. In fact, I assumed these two words were
virtual synonyms until I arrived in Israel. But here they most
definitely are not. My wife's passport records her nationality as
Israeli, but that is actually a legal fiction.
Here, recorded by the
Population Registry, her nationality is 'Arab.' Other Israelis have a
nationality selected from more than 130 categories - some of them
obscure - chosen by the Interior Ministry, including Jew, Hebrew,
Samaritan, Assyrian and Ethiopian. Pretty much everything, in fact,
apart from 'Israeli.' Why?
For a simple reason. Israel is
a Jewish state, or, put another way, a state of the Jews. In other
words, it belongs to Jews: it is their homeland, their birthright from
more than 2,000 years ago. It does not belong to Israeli citizens, a
fifth of whom are Palestinian. It cannot because then the Palestinians
in Israel - and their relatives in exile - would also have a claim on
the title deeds to the land. So a distinction must be made between
citizenship and nationality to exclude them. That is why my wife can be
an Israeli citizen but not an Israeli national. She has rights to live
in Israel but no stake in 'ownership' of her state, because only Jews
can 'own' the state.
Infant, militant killed in Gaza missile
strikes
A one-year-old Palestinian girl and a senior munitions expert for the
Hamas Islamist movement have been killed in separate missile strikes in
the Gaza Strip, medical officials and Hamas sources say.
ABC News, 1 March 2008
Diaspora Down Under:
the Story of Palestinians in Australia
By Rawan Abdul-Nabi and Randa
Abdel-Fattah
Often enough when we visit our families and friends in Palestine, in
the Arab world, and across the shatat, having made a journey that has
crossed more than one ocean and more than one continent, we are often
lauded for our travelling stamina.
This Week in Palestine, 29
February 2008
Israeli siege creates drinking water crisis
in Gaza
Report, Al Mezan, 29 February 2008
An Israeli airstrike aimed at the ministry of interior building in Gaza City also destroyed the nearby Palestinian Medical Relief Society (PMRS) head office in Gaza and killed a 5-month-old baby in a residential building in the same area.
Palestine Medical Relief Society, Ramallah, 28 March 2008
Children among 19 killed as Israel pounds Gaza
by Sakher Abu El Oun
Israel pounded Hamas-run Gaza on Thursday, killing 10 militants, four children and four civilians, as Prime Minister Ehud Olmert vowed to make the Islamists pay a heavy price for rocket attacks.
Middle East Times, February 28, 2008
Palestinians suffer as the world fails Gaza
Michael Shaik, The Age, January 28, 2008
The Meaning of Peace
Randa Abdel-Fattah, New Matilda, 30 January 2008
The catastrophic conditions in Gaza should provide the impetus for real action to finally be taken to hold Israel to account. UN Special Rapporteur John Dugard, has said that while "there are other regimes, particularly in the developing world, that suppress human rights, there is no other case of a Western-affiliated regime that denies self-determination and human rights to a developing people and that has done so for so long." According to Dugard, the West's commitment to the human rights of the Palestinian people is a test by which its commitment to human rights is to be judged.
Gaza escape: too little, too late
Ed O'Loughlin, Sydney Morning Herald, January 26, 2008
But many Gazans have already discovered that the Rafah escapade is providing, at
best, only an illusion of freedom. This week, after months blockaded by Egypt and Israel, many Palestinians took advantage of the breach in the wall to try and take up jobs or studies in Egypt and abroad. Many - if not all - were turned back at checkpoints on the way to the Suez canal because they did not have Egyptian entry stamps from the Rafah border crossing. A crossing which, by agreement with the US and Israel, cannot reopen without Israel's permission.
.....................................
George
Habash's contribution to the Palestinian
struggle
As'ad AbuKhalil, The Electronic Intifada,
30 January 2008
Cancer
patient becomes 72nd victim of Israeli siege in
Gaza
Ma'an News, 20 January 2008
Woman
Gives Birth in Street at 3am After Soldiers Delay
her at Checkpoint
Tel Rumeida, Hebron January 8th,
2008
At 3am on Monday January 7th, Ahmad Sider was born in the
street ten metres from an Israeli checkpoint in Hebron, after Israeli
soldiers
prevented his mother from passing for 25 minutes.
Funeral
of Palestinian teenager killed by Israeli
forces in Bethlehem
Ma'an News, 28 January
2008
.....................................
Power
to the (PALESTINIAN) People!
Jeff Halper, 23 January 2007
I am not a Palestinian; I
am not one of the oppressed. I only hope I can use my privilege in an
effective
way in order to redeem the gift the people of Gaza have given all of
us: the
realization that the people do have power and can prevail even in the
face of
overwhelming power. We may each express our responsibility towards the
people
of Gaza in whatever way most suits us, but as the privileged we must do
something. We owe the Palestinians and the Palestinians writ large at
least
that.
VIDEO: FREE
GAZA DEMO - London, 26/01/08 - In support of
relief convoy
Palestinian
children play across a section of the
destroyed border wall
between Rafah, in the southern
Gaza Strip and Egypt, Thursday, Jan. 24, 2008
Ending
the Stranglehold on Gaza
Eyad al-Sarraj and Sara Roy, January 28, 2008
Since
June, Israel has limited its exports to Gaza to nine basic materials.
Out of
9,000 commodities (including foodstuffs) that were entering Gaza before
the
siege began two years ago, only 20 commodities have been permitted
entry
since.
VIDEO: UN
security council fails to address
Gaza
Al Jazeera English, Kristen Saloomey, January
22, 2008
VIDEO: Palestinians
break out from Gaza seige
Al Jazeera English, January 23, 2008
Palestinians have
poured into the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing through holes blown
along
the border wall between the Gaza Strip and Egypt. Al Jazeera's Jacky
Rowland
reports from Gaza, where, due to the border breach, she is joined by
Amr
el-Kahky, Al Jazeera's Cairo correspondent.
VIDEO: Preparations
begin to close Rafah
crossing
Al Jazeera English, January 28,
2008
As preparations begin to close the Egypt-Gaza border, John
Cookson speaks to
Palestinians on both sides of the Rafah crossing.
.....................................
Adalah
Seeks Establishment of an Independent
Investigatory Committee on the October 2000 Killings
Adalah: The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in
Israel, 30
January 2008
Little
Arafat
Saady
Abu-Hatoum, 25 January, 2007
One of the creche workers opened
your son's bag and found out that he is called Arafat and he is an
Arab. She
spoke about it with her relatives, who also have children in the
creche, and in
response they removed their children from the creche because there is
an Arab
child there.
VIDEO: Inside
Story - Bush wants peace in 2008
.....................................
Gaza
Humanitarian Situation Report | 18-24 January
2008
United Nations Office for the Coordination of
Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)
Clean
Environment, Clean Future
Maen Areikat, This Week in Palestine, 26 January 2008
Whether by increased dumping in the West Bank of waste generated in
Israel,
or by obstructing the import of necessary materials to maintain or
construct
wastewater treatment plants in the Gaza Strip, Israeli occupation
policies have
contributed to the damage caused to Palestinian natural resources.
Among the
most recent is the September 2007 Israeli cabinet decision to disrupt
fuel and
electricity to the Gaza Strip.
VIDEO: The
US, Israel and missiles
Kimberly Halkett, Al Jazeera English, October 17, 2007
As preparations are being made for the latest peace conference, some
wonder
how effective the US can be in its role as peace-broker, given its
close
military ties to Israel.
Courting
the Jewish vote
Antony Loewenstein, 25 October 2007
For Australian Jews
this election is about a variety of issues and Israel is just one of
them. Like
all citizens, concerns about health, education, foreign policy and
industrial
relations are paramount, but Israel is central.
Reaping the
occupation's fruit
by Amira
Hass in Haaretz
If the plot of land belonging to Dr. Salam
Fayad, the
Palestinian prime minister, were located 50 meters west of its present
location, in the level part of the village of Deir al-Ghusun, it would
now be growing thorns and thistles. If it were located 50, or at most
100 meters, to the west, Fayad's plot would have found itself on the
other side of the separation fence, on the other side of Gate 609,
which soldiers open and close three times a day to allow entrance to
those who have managed, after investing considerable efforts, to get
permits in order to get to their land. More...
................................
VIDEO: Palestinian
olive farmers face threat of attack by
settlers
David Chater in Hebron, Al Jazeera English,
22 October 2007
Blair
admits he is shocked by discrimination on the
West Bank
Donald Macintyre in Hebron, The
Independent, 13 October 2007
................................
Peace
Now at the Checkpoint
Yossi Bartal, Alternative Information Center, 16 October
2007
Peace Now and their male oriented leadership have always
attacked the refuseniks movement and kept on proudly committing war
crimes in
the occupied Palestinian territories in the name of national unity and
obedience to the law. One can just hope that they will stop being seen
by the
world as a part of the peace movement in Israel.
Another take on
Peace Now from settler media Arutz Sheva in Hebron
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FueN7k0Ya8I
................................
IDF
and Shin Bet close Gaza to Israeli
journalists
Gideon Levy, Ha'aretz, 14 October
2007
Anyone who expected such an intolerable reality to stir a
protest was proven wrong. In any case, the readers do not want to read
about
it, the government and army do not want them to know and the
journalists are
not yearning to tell.
Treachery
for treatment
Salah
Al-Naami, Al-Ahram Weekly, October 13, 2007
Avner, a former top
Shin Bet officer, admitted in an interview with the Israeli newspaper
Maariv
published last Friday that officers in charge of enlisting agents are
ordered
not to hesitate in exploiting any human condition, no matter how
severe, in
order to enlist the largest number possible of Palestinian informants.
................................
'I
didn't suggest we kill Palestinians'
Ruthie Blum, The Jerusalem Post, October 10, 2007
Arnon
Soffer arrives at our meeting armed with a stack of books and papers.
Among
them is a copy of an interview I conducted with him three and a half
years ago
("It's
the demography, stupid," May 21,
2004), and print-outs of angry responses the geostrategist
from
the University of Haifa says he continues to receive "from leftists in
Israel and anti-Semites abroad, who took my words out of context."
The passage that aroused the most ire was as follows: "When 2.5
million people live in a closed-off Gaza, it's going to be a human
catastrophe.
Those people will become even bigger
animals than they are today, with
the aid of an insane fundamentalist Islam. The pressure at the border
will be
awful. It's going to be a terrible war. So, if we want to remain alive,
we will
have to kill and kill and kill. All day, every day."
A lot has
happened since Soffer made that statement, most notably the very
withdrawal
from Gaza he was referring to and so championed. In fact, the impetus
for the
pull-out has been attributed, at least in part, to Soffer's
decades-long
doomsaying about the danger the Palestinian womb posed to Israeli
democracy.
"That statement caused a huge stir at the time, and it's amazing to
see how many dozens of angry, ignorant responses I continue to receive
from
leftists in Israel and anti-Semites abroad, who took my words out of
context. I
didn't recommend that we kill Palestinians. I said we'll have
to kill them."
................................
Jewish
West Jerusalemites object to Arab-Jewish
school
Or Kashti, Ha'aretz, 22 October
2007
One woman from the neighbourhood where the school is built
tells Ha'aretz "I've got nothing against Arabs, but why do they have to
go
to school with Jews?" Another resident says "It's the mixing between
Jews and Arabs that's the problem. The rest pales in comparison."
Getting
your victims to love you
Azmi Bishara, Al Ahram Weekly, October 2007
If you want
to understand the magnitude of the Palestinian tragedy and the depths
of their
dilemma take a look at the recent decree issued by the Israeli Ministry
of
Education which in essence asks Jewish and Arab schoolchildren to sign
the
Israeli declaration of independence as part of the celebrations marking
the
60th anniversary of the state of Israel.
................................
Palestine
misses qualifier due to Gaza travel
ban
Stephen Fontenot, San Antonio Express-News,
10/29/2007
The Palestinian soccer team missed its World Cup
qualifying game in Singapore because of Israeli travel restrictions.
Eighteen
of the squad's players and officials live in the Gaza Strip.
Court
hearing against Swiss anti-apartheid activists
turns into further show of solidarity
Tuesday 30
October 2007
Today the four activists that ran onto the football
playground with banners ("Free Palestine -- Boycott Apartheid")
during the football qualifying match of Switzerland against Israel
stood
accused in the court of law of Basel, Switzerland.
:::::NEWS, VIEWS, ANALYSIS:::::11 October 2007::::::
Israel
the roadblock to peace in Middle
East
Ghada Karmi, The Age, October 11, 2007
..............................
VIDEO: Settlers
attack local Palestinians and Human Rights
Observors in Hebron
ISM, 4th October
2007
The final day of the Jewish holiday of Sukkot descended into
violence in Tel Rumeida, Hebron on Thursday, as a group of settlers
attacked
local Palestinians and two international Human Rights Workers (HRWs).
Al-Tuwani
Reflection: Water
Eileen Hanson, Christian Peacemaker Teams, Hebron
Twenty years ago the settlement of Ma'on was established on land
belonging to
families living in Tuwani. Many of the cisterns traditionally used by
families
from Tuwani and neighboring villages have been taken over by settlers.
Palestinians are either physically unable to access them, or fear
violence if
they approach what was once their family's land and cistern.
It is
clear just by looking as the contrasting lifestyles of Tuwani and the
settlers
at Ma'on that settler use of water is completely out of tune with the
environment here. Worst of all, it is destroying the possibilities for
others
to sustain even the simplest life here.
People in Tuwani do not want
water to fill up swimming pools. They simply want enough water for
their flocks
and their families to have enough to drink and bathe. Local
Palestinians
continue to live a life close to the land and respectful of the
resources. It
is the settlers who refuse to admit that they are living on the edge of
the
desert and adapt accordingly.
Tony
Blair to visit Hebron
Ma'an News, October 10, 2007
The Middle East Quartet
Envoy, Tony Blair, is to visit the southern West Bank city of Hebron on
Wednesday for meetings with Mayor Khalid Al-Isaily and Governor Hussein
Al-Ara.
..............................
Support Khaled Mudallal's right to education - University
of Bradford
student trapped in Gaza - visit www.letkhaledstudy.co.uk
Khaled
al-Mudallal is a Palestinian and a Business and Management student at
the
University of Bradford. He needs to return to Bradford urgently to
begin the
third year of his degree course.
UK
boycott not the issue
Uri
Ram, YNet, 6 October 2007
Regardless of whether there is a
boycott or not, there is no room here for the joy expressed by the
education
minister and top education officials. What are they so happy with? The
fact
that universities in the territories are unable to function?
Are
they pleased over the fact that universities in Israel can continue to
teach,
with no interruption, democratic and enlightened traditions as if a few
kilometers away a regime of oppression and expulsion has not been in
place for
40 years now?
A
shameful silence
Priyamvada
Gopal, The Guardian, 5th October, 2007
The organisation we look to
for the protection of free speech has shut down debate on Palestine.
..............................
Celebrating
Peace or Camouflaging Apartheid? Boycott
the Jericho-Tel Aviv Public Event on October 18th!
PACBI, October 4, 2007
We believe this event is being
organized to promote a "peace" agreement that is devoid of the
minimal requirements of justice, and that will leave the Palestinian
people as
disenfranchised as previous agreements have.
'Even
the main organizer admits that the event isn't
really about peace.'
Dion Nissenbaum, San Hose
Mercury News, 9 October, 2007
"Ours is not a message of
peace and love and coexistence," said Daniel Lubetzky, the 39-year-old
Jewish businessman who's behind the OneVoice concerts. "It's a message
of
let's not let this get worse," he said. "We are fed up. We don't love
each other. You leave us alone and we leave you alone and let's just
have a
state and get that done before it gets ugly."
..............................
Mohammed
al-Dura lives on
Gideon Levy, Ha'aretz, Sunday, 7 October 2007
There
should be a tempest, a great and mighty one, but one focused on an
entirely
different issue: Why is the IDF continuing to kill children at such a
frightening pace, and why doesn't Israel take responsibility for this
and
compensate the families of those killed? But no one is conducting
"investigations" about this.
Parallel
lives
Dalia Karpel,
Ha'aretz Friday Magazine, October 5, 2007
One of the study's
most shocking findings is that the soldiers enjoyed the intoxication of
power
no less than the kick they got from the violence.
"At one point
or another of their service, the majority of the interviewees enjoyed
[inflicting] violence," Yishai-Karin observes in the thesis. "They
enjoyed the violence because it broke the routine and they liked the
destruction and the chaos. They also enjoyed the feeling of power in
the
violence and the sense of danger."
The callousness of some of
the soldiers produced extreme indifference to the Arabs' suffering: "We
were in a weapon carrier when this guy, around 25, passed by in the
street, and
just like that, for no reason, he didn't throw a stone, did nothing -
bang, a
bullet in the stomach - he shot him in the stomach and the guy is dying
on the
sidewalk and we keep going, apathetic. No one gave him a second look."
There were some tough soldiers who developed an ideology holding that
even minor events necessitated a brutal response. "A 3-year-old kid, he
can't throw, he can't hurt you no matter what he does, but a kid of 19
can.
With women I have no problem. With women, one threw a clog at me and I
kicked
her here [pointing to the crotch], I broke everything there. She can't
have
children. Next time she won't throw clogs at me. When one of them [a
woman]
spat at me I gave her the rifle butt in the face. She doesn't have what
to spit
with anymore."
The articles included do not necessarily reflect the position of CJPP.
:::::NEWS, VIEWS, ANALYSIS::::: 1 October 2007:::::
VIDEO: Abdel
Bari Atwan debates with Ra'anan Gissen
Abdel Bari Atwan had his visa held up by Minister Kevin Andrews
Atwan
allowed to enter Australia
The Age, September 14, 2007
Festival director Michael Campbell said he was in the process of
cancelling
the Palestinian author's appearances this weekend when he received the
news.
VIDEO: Maysoon
Zaid on Al Jazeera English
Maysoon Zaid says she needs
a sense of humour. She is a woman, she's Muslim, she has cerebral
palsy, and
she is a Palestinian living in New York. She is also considered one of
the most
successful young comedians of her generation.
....................................
The
Israeli army closes Jerusalem to
worshippers
Ghassan Bannoura - IMEMC News, September 14,
2007
The Israeli army stopped hundreds of Palestinian worshippers
who were trying to enter the holy city of Jerusalem on the first Friday
of
Ramadan.
Palestinian
Human Rights Worker Arrested at Qurtuba School in
Hebron
ISM, Tel Rumeida, Hebron September 12th,
2007
The army have consistently failed to prevent settler
children from from stoning Palestinian kids as they use the pathway. A
large
presence of international HRW's is needed daily to insure safe passage
to the
school. The school was attacked and set on fire on the 6th of
August.
Flying
Checkpoints: What's the Point?
Eileen Hanson, Christian
Peacemaker Teams, At-Tuwani, September 11, 2007
After waving a
pick-up truck along, one soldier pointed the laser guide of his
automatic
weapon at the abdomen of the young boy riding in the back of the truck.
The boy
said something, and then the laser point moved, appearing next on the
child's
face. It was then I thought I could see the point, tragic and awful as
it is.
It isn't about finding weapons or stolen cars. It's not about finding
the bad
guy. It's a display of power. Checkpoints are a way of reminding
everyone, even
the kids, who's in charge. If that's the point, then these flying
checkpoints
certainly do that.
UN
report highlights conflict over resources in West Bank
IRIN, Hebron Hills,
West Bank, 11 September 2007
Israel, as opposed to the
international community, does not view its settlements as a violation
of the
Fourth Geneva Convention as it maintains the West Bank is not occupied
land.
Mapping
an occupation: Interactive Map of the West Bank
....................................
Despite a
Backlash, Many Jews Are
Questioning Israel
Tony Karon, September 13, 2007
Thirteen
years ago, there certainly was no organization around like "Birthright
Unplugged," which aims to subvert the "Taglit-Birthright
Program," funded by Zionist groups and the government of Israel, that
provides free trips to Israel for young Jewish Americans in order to
encourage
them to identify with the State.
Anarchism,
Bil'in, and Israel's Supreme
Court
Dennis Fox, September 10, 2007
Many
Israelis I met during my recent visits - students, professors,
friends, taxi
drivers, many others, mostly on the liberal-to-left Zionist mainstream
- were
fully aware of Israel's failure to live up to its democratic
pretensions but
seemed incapable of moving further. Anarchists Against the Wall, on the
other
hand, freed of allegiance to state or religion, had a clearer awareness
that
injustice is something to try to eradicate rather than endure.
....................................
Olmert
delays Palestinian prisoner release
ABC News, Reuters, September 16,
2007
The
New Israeli Defense Minister
Abbas'
Village League
Arjan El Fassed, The Electronic Intifada,
September 10, 2007
Palestinian
Diaspora: With or against
collaboration?
Laith Marouf, The Electronic
Intifada,
September 14, 2007
Palestinians see clearly that Abbas -- who
embraces Israeli leaders while refusing to talk to other Palestinian
factions
-- was the author of the Oslo agreement that never even mentioned the
word
"occupation," and is now discussing a new "agreement of
principles" that will cancel the right of return, legitimize Israeli
settlements and threaten other basic rights.
The articles included do not necessarily reflect the position of CJPP.