Illegal settlement agriculture in the Jordan Valley – The case of Carmel Agrexco
Alhaqhr | December 1, 2014
Illegal settlement agriculture in the Jordan Valley – The case of Carmel Agrexco
Virtual Field Visit: Illegal quarrying in the West Bank – The case of Hanson
Israeli group files war crimes complaint against Abbas at ICC
MEMO | December 1, 2014
Shurat HaDin – Israel Law Center formally requested the International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor open an investigation into alleged war crimes committed by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
The claim is regarding “reports of Fatah-affiliated armed groups firing significant numbers of rockets on Israel from Gaza during Operation Protective Edge war along with Hamas. Rocket fire on civilians is a war crime under international law”, a statement published on the group’s website said.
“We argue that Mahmoud Abbas is vicariously liable for the Fatah armed groups’ actions on July 10, 25 and 27, and August 8. As their responsible superior, Abbas exercises effective command and control of the terror organisation,” they continued.
Shurat HaDin said Abbas can be tried at the ICC because he is a Jordanian citizen and the Kingdom is a member of the court in The Hague.
It added: “If Shurat HaDin does not win this case, it is ready to go after Abbas for terrorist attacks during the Second Intifada should he ever decide to have the Palestinian Authority join the ICC’s Rome Statute.”
Shurat HaDin head Nitsana Darshan- Leitner said that the organisation “will not allow Fatah to carry out rocket attacks on Israeli population centres, while hypocritically advocating Palestinian membership in the ICC. Abbas falsely believes that alleged crimes against Arabs are the only ones that should be prosecuted.”
Islamic Jihad slams PA-Israel security coordination as unity gov’t expires
Al-Akhbar | November 30, 2014
The national consensus government declared by Hamas and Fatah this summer has finished its interim term, Hamas spokesman said Sunday, as the Islamic Jihad movement urged the Palestinian Authority (PA) to stop security coordination with Israel.
Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said in a press conference in Gaza City that the unity government’s six-month term had expired, and that dialogue should be resumed on a national level to discuss the future of the government.
“Any decision on whether the government should be disbanded or continued or be reshuffled must be made only through national dialogue and consensus,” Abu Zuhri said, adding that Hamas “isn’t interested in incitement, but rather seeks to maintain national unity.”
The Palestinian national unity government was formed following a reconciliation deal signed by Palestinian political rivals Hamas and Fatah in April.
The deal sought to end years of bitter and sometimes bloody rivalry between Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, and Fatah, which dominates the West Bank-based PA.
Palestinian parties agreed in September that the unity government would assume immediate authority over Gaza, however the government has so far failed to make any real changes on the ground in Gaza.
Abu Zuhri went on to criticize the PA for making what he called “politically motivated arrests.”
So far in November, 80 Palestinians have been detained in the West Bank for their political affiliation, he said, adding that 70 of them were still in PA custody.
“Hamas denounces the escalating violations and criminal acts by the PA security services against supporters of Hamas and the Palestinian resistance,” he added, calling on PA President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah to stop the detention campaign.
Similarly, the Islamic Jihad movement urged Abbas on Sunday to release all political detainees and refrain from detaining any Palestinian over their political affiliation.
Besides the recent wave of detentions, the movement said the security coordination between the PA and Israel has become a “real danger” to the Palestinian national unity.
Islamic Jihad spokesman Yousef al-Hasayna said in a statement that the appreciation expressed by the Israeli authorities regarding the PA’s readiness to continue coordinating with the occupation forces on the security level “is a strike to the nationalistic values of the Palestinian security services” and “is in contrast with the values and beliefs of the Palestinian people.”
“Israel is using this coordination to oppress the Palestinians and make sure no uprising will erupt in the West Bank and Jerusalem,” al-Hasayna said.
“The only one benefiting from this coordination is the Israeli occupation.”
Gaza reconstruction
Ongoing differences between Hamas and the PA have kept tensions high in Gaza.
Earlier this month, a senior United Nations official warned that another conflict will engulf Gaza unless stability in the territory is achieved rapidly.
“I do not see the national consensus government effectively governing Gaza,” Robert Turner, director of operations for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) in Gaza, said.
“If we do not have political stability, a national Palestinian government, and at least an easing of the blockade, yes there will be another war,” Turner told reporters.
For 51 days this summer, Israel pounded the Gaza Strip by air, land and sea.
More than 2,160 Gazans, mostly civilians, were killed and 11,000 injured during seven weeks of unrelenting Israeli attacks in July and August.
The assault ended with an Egypt-brokered ceasefire agreement that calls for reopening Gaza’s border crossings with Israel, which, if implemented, would effectively end the latter’s years-long blockade of the embattled territory.
However, the Zionist entity had repeatedly blocked the entry of building material, prompting the UN in September to broker another deal. The reconstruction of Gaza has yet to begin.
The Palestinian Authority has estimated that the rebuilding Gaza will cost $7.8 billion.
UN chief Ban Ki-moon said during a visit to the Gaza Strip in October that the devastation he had seen was “beyond description” and “far worse” than that caused in the previous Israel-Gaza conflict of winter 2008-2009.
According to the UN, as many as 80,000 Palestinians homes were damaged or destroyed during the days of hostilities, a higher figure than was previously thought, and over 106,000 of Gaza’s 1.8 million residents have been displaced to UN shelters and host families.
Israel routinely bars the entry of building materials into the embattled coastal enclave on grounds that Palestinian resistance faction Hamas could use them to build underground tunnels or fortifications.
For years, the Gaza Strip has depended on construction materials smuggled into the territory through a network of tunnels linking it to Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.
However, a crackdown on the tunnels by the Egyptian army after it overthrew then-President Mohammed Mursi has effectively neutralized hundreds of tunnels, severely affecting Gaza’s construction sector.
Economists in Gaza have estimated that as many as 400 trucks of equipment – from concrete to building materials and machinery – are needed every day for the next six months to meet the demand, but so far only around 75 trucks have made deliveries.
“I know there is frustration at the pace of reconstruction,” Turner said, adding that efforts were underway to fully implement a mechanism negotiated by the UN’s special coordinator in the Middle East, Robert Serry, to speed up the flow of goods.
Alaa Radwan, head of the Popular Committee for Monitoring the Reconstruction of the Gaza Strip, made a simple calculation: “Given the pace at which construction materials are currently entering Gaza, it will be at least 20 years” before the damage caused by this summer’s war is repaired.
While Hamas and people in Gaza have lamented the slow flow of goods, Turner was optimistic that the volume could be greatly increased if political stability could be brought to bear and if Egypt and Israel fully lifted their combined blockade.
“I do not believe the crossings are a problem,” Turnor said. “All the technical problems can be addressed. The question for me is that the political choke points be addressed.”
“If the political will exists… expanding the crossing to 800 trucks a day is just a matter of paying for the expansion.”
The crisis between Hamas and Fatah has been delaying the flow of reconstruction material into war-battered Gaza because the opening of border crossings, both under Israeli and Egyptian control, is conditional on PA personnel being stationed there.
According to the UN-brokered deal, all materials going into Gaza should be extremely monitored, including GPS tracking and video surveillance of their storage, to ensure nothing goes missing and ends up being used for “military purposes.”
On top of the slow pace of reconstruction and the bureaucracy, Fatah’s failure to pay employees of Gaza’s former Hamas government has further escalated tensions between the two rivals.
Moreover, the situation in Gaza was thrown into doubt early November after bombs targeted the houses of some 10 senior Fatah officials in Gaza.
Even though Hamas leaders rushed to denounce the attacks and called upon security services in Gaza to investigate into the attacks and bring those responsible for it to justice, the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority security services accused Hamas of having knowledge of the blasts before they happened.
Hamas top member, Khalil al-Hayya, however, slammed the accusations as “groundless” and “baseless,” saying whoever was behind the blasts was trying to thwart reconciliation and ensure the Palestinian Authority did not re-extend its control over Gaza.
Hayya also warned against using the incident as an excuse to avoid reconciliation, calling on all sides to uphold their responsibilities towards the national good.
(Al-Akhbar, AFP, Ma’an)
Texas Cop Places Woman in Chokehold for Video Recording
UPDATE: Texas Cop Loses Job for Chokehold on Woman, 2nd Cop Disciplined for Ordering Footage Deleted
By Carlos Miller | PINAC | November 30, 2014
A Texas cop placed a woman in a chokehold because she was video recording some type of police activity in the parking lot of what appears to be a fast food restaurant after she refused to provide identification.
It started when Corpus Christi Sergeant J.E. Lockhart stormed up to Lanessa Espinosa, who was standing a good distance away from the investigation, accusing her of interfering – after a nearby cop from another agency accused her of being a “jailhouse lawyer.”
“There is a probable cause for us to be out here,” Lockhart said. “I want to know who you are, so I’m requesting your ID. You fail to ID, I’m going to take you into jail. And that’s law.”
“What’s my charge?
“You’re not being charged with anything.”
“Then I don’t have to show you my ID, sir.”
“You’re involved in an investigation. You want to interfere with an investigation, you’re going to jail for interfering with a police officer in performance of his investigation. Do you understand that? DO YOU UNDERSTAND THAT?”
Espinosa understood that Lockhart was out of line, so she said she was in fear for her safety and took a step back, which was when another cop placed her in a chokehold.
Espinosa turned the camera on herself as she was getting chokehold by the cop from the other agency, whose agency has not been determined because Corpus Christi runs into four counties and I haven’t been able to make the patch out.
That cop then turned her over to Lockhard, who handcuffed her.
Espinosa has not responded for comment from PINAC over the incident, but public records show she was not arrested.
UPDATE:
The video of a Texas woman getting placed in a chokehold and handcuffed for refusing to provide her identification ended up going viral where it was covered by a local television news station at the top of the news hour Monday night.
However, KIII-TV reporter Bill Churchwell finished the segment by providing misinformation about the law when it comes identifying yourself to police, informing viewers that citizens are required to identify themselves whether or not they have been lawfully arrested.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
The Texas Failure to Identify law makes it a crime for people to refuse to identify themselves if they have been lawfully arrested or if the person provides false information if they have been lawfully detained.
However, when news anchor Joe Gazin asked Churchwell about this law, the reporter stated the following:
“Well that is required whether you are a witness or involved in an incident, you are required to tell officers who you are,” Churchwell said.
Churchwell is most likely getting his information from police without bothering to look at the actual statute, which is a big mistake because we all know police are clueless about the laws they are supposed to enforce.
But that is the norm for mainstream media reporters who don’t want to risk questioning their local police department and therefore lose access to the daily information that enables them to report the news without putting in much effort.
However, it didn’t take long for a viewer to set the record straight on KIII-TV’s Facebook page about the law.
Blogger ExCop-LawStudent, a former Texas cop turned law student, also elaborated about the law on his blog.
In the video, a police officer with an unknown police department† claims that Lanessa Espinosa is a “jailhouse lawyer” because she actually knows what the law says. She pointed out that she did not have to identify herself unless she was “being charged.” At that point Corpus Christi Senior Officer‡ J.E. Lockhart comes up and demands ID and tells her that he will arrest her if she doesn’t provide ID.
The problem is that § 38.02, Texas Penal Code, does not authorize an arrest for failure to ID on a mere detention unless the person provides a fictitious name. We’ve covered that several times, here, here, here, here (also in Corpus), here, here, here, and here.
There are several things wrong with the video. First, the officer from the unknown department is choking Espinosa with an arm-bar choke hold. If you look at the video at 1:12, you’ll see the officer’s forearm cutting directly over Espinosa’s adam’s apple in the same manner that killed Eric Garner in New York. The arm-bar choke hold is almost universally viewed as deadly force, and completely inappropriate here when the crime is at best, a misdemeanor under the officer’s mistaken idea of the law.
Second, it is a false arrest. Even more so, it is an arrest because she is exercising her right not to provide identification when he knows (or should have known) that the arrest is unlawful, and that he intentionally denied her of her freedom when he knew (or should have known) that his conduct was unlawful. Folks, that the definition of Official Oppression, § 39.03, Texas Penal Code, and is a Class A misdemeanor.††
Some states have what are called “stop and identify” laws, which requires citizens to identify themselves if they have been detained, but Texas is not one of those states, which is why it only requires a citizen to identify themselves if they’ve been arrested.
There is no state where citizens are legally required to provide identification merely because a cop demands it unless the cop has detained you because he had a reasonable suspicion that you committed a crime.
That doesn’t mean cops won’t demand your identification because they do it all the time, many times under intimidating threats of arrest, which is why we must remain recording in these situations.
And if a cop tells you he has the right to ask you for your identification, tell him you have the right not to provide that identification. … Full article
Thousands march in Manila against military accord with ‘imperialist’ US
RT | December 1, 2014
Thousands of anti-war protesters marched in the Philippine capital calling for an end to close military ties between “warmongering” Washington and Manila. They also accused Filipino President Benigno Aquino III of being a “US puppet.”
Protesters came decked out in traditional garb, many carrying fake bolo knives and rifles. Others hoisted torches and placards in the air as they marched through the streets of the densely populated city.
Gathering underneath an overpass at a busy intersection, the protesters burned a poster depicting Aquino as a puppet of Uncle Sam.
Pete Pinlac, a trade union leader and march organizer, said the protest was a way for the people to express their discontent with Washington’s “imperialist” ways.
“To Barack Obama, we say this: we are a peaceful nation so let the Philippines loose. We do not want your warmongering. We do not want your imperialist ends. We do not want your hegemonic purposes,” he said.
The protesters called for the abolition of the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) and the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) with the USA.
The controversial VFA allows the US government to retain jurisdiction over US military personnel accused of committing crimes in the Philippines, unless those crimes are deemed to be of “particular” importance to the Philippines.
Activists argue the agreement gives US troops immunity from prosecution and makes them second-class citizens in their own country.
The EDCA was signed in April and represents the first major military accord inked between the two countries since the US withdrew troops stationed on a naval base in Subic Bay in 1992. Although the 10-year agreement allows US forces to operate out of certain areas, it does not allow Washington to establish a permanent military base.
Sunday’s protest coincided with Bonifacio Day, which pays homage to Andres Bonifacio, the “Father of the Philippine Revolution.”
Hearing collapses in Egypt trial of 494, including Irish teen
Reprieve | December 1, 2014
A mass trial hearing for almost 500 people collapsed this morning in Cairo, with the judge failing to attend and defendants unable to enter a court packed with masked pro-Government supporters.
Reports from the makeshift courtroom in Tora prison suggest that there was no judge in attendance throughout, and the room was full of supporters of the Government – many wearing masks in an apparent attempt to intimidate defence lawyers. The families of the 494 defendants were reportedly barred from entering the room, while the prisoners themselves were not called in.
The group of 494, arrested in August 2013 in a sweeping crackdown on protests, includes several juveniles being tried in violation of Egypt’s Child Laws – among them Irish teenager Ibrahim Halawa, who was 17 at the time of his arrest. Mr Halawa has reported being tortured and denied medical attention during his 18-month detention.
The 494 face potential death sentences, in the latest in a series of mass trials that has attracted condemnation from the UN, US, and Egyptian rights groups.
Today’s hearing has been postponed for another month – continuing a long hiatus in effect since August this year, when a three-judge panel resigned mid-hearing citing their ‘unease’.
The proceedings come days after another court handed down sentences totalling 340 years to 78 children in a mass trial at which their lawyers were not allowed to be present.
Maya Foa, head of the death penalty team at legal charity Reprieve, which is assisting Mr Halawa, said: “The chaos at today’s hearing shows this mass trial for what it is – a mockery of justice. The defendants and their families were shut out of the room, but masked Government supporters were allowed to attend in droves – and the judge didn’t even turn up. Meanwhile, these 494 people have already spent 18 months in prison, and been told they could face death at any time. The international community must intervene now to prevent this travesty from going any further.”
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Fallen Icon: Sir David Attenborough and the Walrus Deception
By Paul Homewood | Not A Lot Of People Know That | January 19, 2022
In 2019 Netflix in conjunction with WWF broadcast Frozen Worlds, an episode in the Our Planet series and narrated by David Attenborough. The scenes it showed shocked and horrified viewers around the world.
After a brief introduction about the recent loss of Arctic summer sea ice and the ‘inevitable’ devastation this will cause for Arctic animals, it shifts to a series of amazing shots of tens of thousands of walrus, crowded cheek-by-jowl on a beach in Siberia.
The camera pans out to a rocky cliff, which several walrus are attempting to climb. Then suddenly, one after another, the walrus are shown falling off the cliff to their deaths on the rocky shore below.The scenes are shown in slow motion and repeated in order to maximise the shock effect.
As the scenes unfold, Attenborough coolly informs viewers that the walrus would not normally be there, but out on the sea ice instead. But because of man-made global warming, the poor walrus have been forced onto land in crowded conditions, where they will inevitably suffer and die.
But was it all as simple as Attenborough portrayed? … continue
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