Militants attack Red Cross aid convoy near Damascus
Press TV – February 10, 2016
Foreign-backed militants have attacked the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) vehicles carrying humanitarian aid to an area near the Syrian capital, Damascus.
Militants opened fire on convoys from the ICRC and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC) trying to enter al-Mazaya district in Damascus on Wednesday, Lebanon’s al-Ahed news website reported.
A number of aid workers were injured in the incident and three of them are reportedly in a critical condition.
On Tuesday, the two relief agencies delivered some 6,500 food packages to a number of villages in the town of Souq Wadi Barada.
This came as Syrian forces made fresh gains in areas north of Aleppo. Local residents from the town of Tal Rif’at, which is located around 20 kilometers from the Turkish frontier, together with government forces freed some areas from foreign-backed militants affiliated to al-Nusra Front. At least two people were injured in the operation.
Kurdish fighters also took full control of the town of Meng, located north of Aleppo, Lebanon’s al-Manar television channel reported.
Reports also said that at least 16 al-Nusra militants were killed in Russia’s airstrikes on the coastal Latakia Province.
Elsewhere in the northeastern province of al-Hasakah, a bomb planted in a car went off. Following the blast, clashes erupted between Takfiri militants and army forces, during which a number of people were killed.
The Syrian military backed by volunteer forces has recently inflicted heavy losses on foreign-backed militants during mop-up operations on different fronts. Over the past few weeks, the Syrian forces have also gained more ground against militants north of Latakia.
The conflict in Syria began in March 2011 and has reportedly claimed the lives of more than 260,000 people with millions of Syrians displaced inside and outside the war-torn country.
Occupation Captured
A week of occupation in photos
CPT | February 9, 2016
Getting school supplies through
Pictured here: School books need to pass through the checkpoint in order to get to the Ibrahimi school. Team effort between CPT and one teacher holding the barbwire. (1 Feb 2016)
ID check
Pictured here: Regular ID check for a young Palestinian man; here at the military checkpoint set up in front of the house taken over by settlers two weeks ago. Palestinians are asked to stay at a distance and to throw their ID cards on the ground for inspection. (29 Jan 2016)
Going back to work
Pictured here: Fully geared up, three IDF soldiers crossed the checkpoint to throw a sound bomb and shoot a rubber bullet to disperse a group of kids. Job done, they’re heading back to their post. (04 Feb 2016)
Rooftop shadows
Pictured here: IDF soldiers on the roof of their building in the Old City at dusk, ready to intervene. (25 Jan 2016)
Do not move!
Pictured here: Very zealous IDF soldier, threatening a Palestinian man with his gun who refused to pull his pants down in the middle of the street. (05 Feb 2016)
Full search
Pictured here: Frisks for Palestinians men are common at every checkpoints. (05 Feb 2016)
I love pictures
Pictured here: This young boy accompanies CPT every morning at Quitoun checkpoint and loves to pose for pictures, no matter what happens; it looks like it makes his day! (03 Feb 2016)
CPT mailing address: cptheb@cpt.org
Falk reprimands Ban Ki-Moon over truth about Israel’s crimes
‘The politics of deflection’ (shoot the messenger, ignore the message) exposed
By Stuart Littlewood | American Herald Tribune | February 8, 2016
With obvious relish Richard Falk, former professor of international law at Princeton and UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Occupied Palestine, has issued a well deserved slap on the wrist to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon for his naivety. It follows Israel’s furious reaction to Ban’s remark to the Security Council that “Palestinian frustration is growing under the weight of a half-century of occupation and the paralysis of the peace process”.
The usually timid Ban, suddenly emboldened, also called Israel’s illegal settlement building “an affront to the Palestinian people and to the international community”. He added: “Security measures alone will not stop the violence. They cannot address the profound sense of alienation and despair driving some Palestinians – especially young people.” Whereupon Israel’s prime minister Netanyahu, fresh from approving another 150 squatter homes on stolen Palestinian land, accused the Secretary General of giving a “tailwind to terror”.
Falk penned an open letter to Ban reminding him of his earlier attempts to get Falk dismissed from his UN job for speaking the same truths. “Having read of the vicious attacks on you for venturing some moderate, incontestable criticisms of Israel’s behaviour, I understand well the discomfort you clearly feel. What intrigues and appals me is that while I was Special Rapporteur for Occupied Palestine during the period 2008-2014, you chose to attack me personally in public on several occasions, joining with US and Israel diplomats calling for my dismissal and doing the utmost to undermine my credibility while discharging this unpaid UN job under difficult conditions.
“At the time, I was doing my best to bear witness to some of the same truths about Israel’s unlawful and immoral behavior that recently got you in similar hot water. My UN mandate was to report upon the reality of Israeli violations of international law while sustaining their apartheid regime of oppressive control over the Palestinian people.”
Referring to Ban’s concern that we are reaching “a point of no return” for the two-state solution and his reminder to the Security Council that the UN will “continue to uphold the right of Palestinians to self-determination”, Falk warns that, given present realities, self-determination must be understood as something more than just “another delusionary embrace of a diplomatically negotiated two-state solution”.
He points out that Israel’s leaders want the idea of a Palestinian state abandoned altogether and that reliance on such a discredited diplomatic path [a two-state solution] has resulted over and over again in severe encroachments on occupied Palestine and intense suffering for its people. “Clinging to the two-state mantra is not neutral. Delay benefits Israel, harms Palestine. There is every reason to believe that this pattern will continue as long as Israel is not seriously challenged diplomatically and by the sorts of growing pressures mounted by the international solidarity movement and the BDS campaign.”
Gaza: Reconstruction of 12,000 displaced families’ homes yet to begin
MEMO | February 9, 2016
Around 90,000 Palestinians remain displaced in the Gaza Strip, almost 18 months after the ceasefire that ended Israel’s ‘Operation Protective Edge’ offensive in 2014. Furthermore, the reconstruction or repair of homes of 74 percent of displaced families is yet to even start.
According to UN OCHA, living conditions for the more than 16,000 displaced families are characterised by “overcrowding, limited access to basic services, lack of privacy, tensions with host communities, risks due to unexploded ordnance and exposure to adverse weather.”
By the end of January 2016, only 15 percent of displaced families had been able to return to repaired or reconstructed homes. The repair and reconstruction of an additional 2,000 homes is ongoing, with many of these homes nearing completion.
Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip in July-August 2014 destroyed 11,000 homes and severely damaged or rendered uninhabitable an additional 6,800 homes.
Intimidating military patrol of Palestinian market
International Solidarity Movement | February 9, 2016
Hebron, Occupied Palestine – On Tuesday, February 9, Israeli forces patrolled the Palestinian market in occupied al-Khalil (Hebron), harassing and intimidating residents.
Israeli forces on their patrol through the Palestinian market
A group of soldiers marched through the souq, the main Palestinian market since the closure of Shuhada Street for Palestinians after the Ibrahimi mosque massacre in 1994. Any male adult or youth was stopped on their way to work and forced by the Israeli soldiers to lift up their shirts and trouser-pants, as well as throw their IDs on the ground. After throwing their IDs on the ground Israeli soldiers ordered the men to move back, so they could pick up the IDs from a ‘safe distance’. Most Palestinians were dismissed after this humiliating procedure, whereas some of them were detained for minutes or violently body-searched.
Violent body-search of Palestinian young man
International human rights defenders documenting the Israeli forces violations of basic human rights of Palestinians, were intimidated and harassed by the Israeli soldiers in an attempt to prevent them from documenting. Soldiers took photos of the internationals with their private phones held right in the volunteers faces and as an intmidation tactic ID-checked them.
Israeli forces taking photos of human rights defenders with their private phones
During the more than one hour patrol Israeli forces repeatedly pointed their assault rifles at the internationals as well as Palestinians.
Israeli soldier ‘ordering’ Palestinians to stop by pointing his gun
Not only adults were surprised and shocked by the sudden presence of heavily-armed soldiers right outside their houses, but also children on their way to school and work. Some children, scared by the soldiers, turned around right away after spotting the soldiers and ran back home instead of continuing their way to school or kindergarten. International human rights defenders walked several scared children past the soldiers so they could safely reach their schools and kindergarten.
Two school girls passing the heavily-armed patrol
A mother waiting with children for the school-bus right opposite a group of soldiers
Israeli minister: Egypt flooding Gaza tunnels at our request
MEMO | February 7, 2016
Israeli Infrastructure Minister Yuval Steinitz has said that Egypt’s new policy of flooding the tunnels between the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula with seawater had come at Israel’s request.
“Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is flooding the tunnels on his country’s border with the Gaza Strip with water based on a request by Israel,” Steinitz said at a seminar held Saturday in the southern city of Beer Sheva, according to Israel Radio.
“Security coordination between the two countries [Israel and Egypt] is better than ever,” the minister said at the seminar, at which participants discussed the relationship between the two neighbors.
In recent months, the Egyptian army has begun flooding the network of cross-border tunnels linking Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula to the Gaza Strip with seawater.
Subject to a years-long blockade by Israel and Egypt, the Hamas-run Gaza Strip had come to depend on the tunnel network to import desperately-needed commodities, including food, fuel and medicine.
Steinitz is particularly close to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and is a member of the latter’s influential security cabinet.
The Case for Releasing Leonard Peltier
teleSUR | February 5, 2016
Leonard Peltier has always maintained his innocence and has emphatically maintained that his continued persecution by the U.S. government is politically motivated.
Even Amnesty International, which is cautious about cases it champions, has taken up Peltier’s cause, questioning the fairness of his trial and backs assertions that political considerations likely factored into his treatment by the U.S. justice system.
So why would U.S. authorities single out Peltier and seek his unjust imprisonment?
Peltier was a leading figure within the American Indian Movement (AIM) during its peak in political activity in the 1970’s. Active in defense of his people’s interests and lands from a young age, Peltier rose quickly to occupy a prominent role within the movement.
In 1975, responding to a request by local indigenous people from the Pine Ridge reservation, Peltier traveled to South Dakota. There he worked with the community helping provide security amidst political tensions and violence between rival groups on the reservation.
FBI officials, on a deliberate mission to weaken or destroy leftist organizations, believed that AIM activists were conspiring at Pine Ridge.
“It was not an armed military camp hatching terrorist plans … It was a spiritual camp,” said Peltier.
On June 26, 1975 a massive shootout erupted, which included participants from AIM, the FBI, and paramilitaries hired by the tribal chairman who was opposed to AIM.
When the bullets stopped, two FBI agents and one indigenous man by the name of Joseph Stuntz were dead.
Despite the participation of dozens of people, only AIM members Bob Robideau, Darrell Butler, and Leonard Peltier were brought up on charges related to the deaths of the FBI officials. Robideau and Butler were arrested and charged but ultimately acquitted.
Peltier, fearing that he would not receive a fair trial, fled to Canada. He would eventually be extradited back to the United States based on the testimony of Myrtle Poor Bear, who said she saw Peltier shoot the agents.
Ms. Poor Bear would eventually recant her statements. It is alleged she was not even present at Pine Ridge on the day in question.
Peltier’s trial was held in North Dakota in 1977 and was presided over by Judge Paul Benson, an appointee of conservative President Richard Nixon.
Myrtle Poor Bear was not allowed to testify and submit to the jury that her previous statements were false. Other witnesses would later claim the FBI coerced them into testifying against Peltier. Key evidence that helped exonerate Robideau and Butler was not allowed to be introduced.
The jury found Peltier guilty and he was sentenced to two consecutive life sentences.
It would later be revealed that the prosecution hid thousands of documents related to the case, documents that could have helped prove Peltier’s innocence.
Despite all this, Peltier was denied a retrial in 1986. The judge who presided over that trial, Gerald Heaney, even expressed concern about the administration of justice
He has also been consistently denied parole, most recently in 2009, due to his insistence that he is innocent.
Peltier is now 71-years-old and is not eligible for another parole hearing until 2024. This is why his supporters, who include many notable figures and celebrities, have called for U.S. authorities to release him on humanitarian grounds. Other have specifically called on President Obama to commute Peltier’s sentence before the end of his term.
Closed military zone in Shuhada Street and Tel Rumeida extended yet another month
International Solidarity Movement | February 6, 2016
Hebron, Occupied Palestine – Since the 1st of November 2015 the Tel Rumeida area and Shuhada Street in occupied Al-Khalil (Hebron) has been declared a ‘closed military zone’. The first declaration of the closure was for one month, but since then the order has been extended several times.
The newest order from the 1st of February declares the area as closed till the 1st of March with the chance of extension.
Shuhada Checkpoint (Checkpoint 56)
The closure effects the residents of the area every single day. Every family living in the area has been given a number and was forced to register with the Israeli forces. When entering the area, through checkpoints, the residents have to show ID, give their number and often also answer questions and get bag and body searched. Friends and family of the residents are unable to visit them inside the area; even doctors or craftsmen are completely barred from entering the area.
Furthermore, the closed military zone has led to the eviction of two human rights organisations based in Tel Rumeida. These are now banned from living in their houses and working from their offices and since they are banned from the whole area are not able to observe and document the rampant Israeli human rights violations. The ‘closed military zone’ clearly intends to evict Palestinian residents in order to allow for an expansion of the illegal Israeli settlements, and by evicting human rights defenders to silence the truth on the Israeli forces harassment, attacks and human rights violations.
Ongoing colonization in Hebron: Israeli forces prepare the illegal invasion of Palestinian houses by Israeli settlers
International Solidarity Movement | February 3, 2016
Hebron, Occupied Palestine – On February 3rd 2016, Israeli occupation forces violently opened the door of houses in the vicinity of the Ibrahimi mosque by cutting the door locks with a disk grinder, and then entered these houses.
The houses are located in al-Sahla Street near the Ibrahimi mosque, settlers illegally invaded and occupied them two weeks ago, but were then evicted by the police and army the next morning.
After the Israeli army removed the door-locks of the two houses, Israeli construction workers took the external an internal dimensions of both Palestinian properties as if they are already owned by Israeli settlers. The settlers were protected during their illegal activities by large groups of soldiers.
Palestinian residents who walked trough the checkpoint in front of these houses were body-checked and harassed by the soldiers. The video below illustrates how inhumande and degrading these body-searches and ID-checks are, with soldiers ordering Palestinians to take off clothing regardless of weather and treating them without even a slight bit of dignity.
FBI cover-up? Dead Oregon rancher’s family call his shooting unjustified for a second time
RT | February 4, 2016
The family of a rancher who was shot by law enforcement during the Oregon standoff is calling the shooting death unjustified for a second time, accusing the FBI and Oregon State Police of a cover-up.
Rancher LaVoy Finicium was shot by Oregon State Police officers during an attempt to stop and arrest the leaders of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge occupation, then on its 25th day. Protesters took over the refuge’s federal building to protest the arson convictions of two other ranchers, as well as to express anger of federal land policy.
“At this point, based on additional information we have now received, it is our position that not only was the shooting death of LaVoy Finicum completely unjustified, but that the FBI and Oregon State Police may also be engaging in a cover-up, and seeking to manipulate and mislead the media and the American public about what really happened,” read a statement from Finicum’s family, obtained by the Oregonian.
The family said new information from eye witness accounts supplemented their previous accusation that the FBI and OSP could not show any justification for Finicum’s death. One of the passengers riding in the white Jeep driven by Finicum, Shawna Cox, allegedly gave a different account of what happened that day after she was released from custody.
“According to Shawna Cox, they were being fired upon right from the outset at the second stop, before LaVoy exited the vehicle. Bullets had already come through the front windshield…. there was no question that LaVoy was trying to draw gunfire away from the others in the vehicle,” read the statement.
Cox told the family that it was clear LaVoy had his hands in the air and meant to keep them there, not to pull out a firearm.
“[The] best explanation for LaVoy’s arguably furtive hand movements, and why he lowered his hands and reached for his side at one point is because he had already been shot, and he was reaching toward the area where he had been hit as an involuntary physical reflex… before being shot again and collapsing,” read the statement.
Cox told the family that after LaVoy was lying motionless in the snow, federal agents and police “unleashed a barrage of gunfire on LaVoy’s truck and its remaining occupants… Ryan Bundy, Shawna Cox and Victoria Sharp, and shot it repeatedly.”
Cox said Ryan Bundy was wounded during the attack, and that in addition to the gunfire they were “terrorized by repeated smoke and pepper bombs.” She also said law enforcement did not make “any attempt to provide any meaningful or timely medical attention to LaVoy,” according to the statement.
In its previous statement, the family said they thought LaVoy’s movements were animated and said, “there are always at least two sides to every story…they didn’t know exactly what happened.” Now with Cox’s account, they are less convinced about the FBI account.
“After re-reviewing the extended video with better technology, we want to reiterate that we are not accepting at face value the FBI’s statement that LaVoy was actually armed,” the statement said.
Finicum’s family are demanding all applicable audio recordings and sound tracks from the FBI, a full-length unedited video of the operation and complete and close-up images of LaVoy’s truck “following the siege.”
The FBI released a 26-minute aerial video, without audio, of the tactical operation, including graphic footage of the shooting on January 28. The agency said they were releasing the video to counteract inaccurate and inflammatory accusations that the agency had been involved in killing Finicum in “cold blood.” The FBI also held a press conference and issued a formal statement interpreting the video.
The Deschutes County Sheriff’s Office in Oregon, announced Tuesday that an investigation into the shooting won’t be released for another four to six weeks.
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UK Researchers: Tax Food to Reduce Climate Change
I doubt these professors have anything to fear from a food tax
By Eric Worrall | Watts Up With That? | November 19, 2016
A group of researchers in Oxford University, England have suggested that imposing a massive tax on carbon intensive foods – specifically protein rich foods like meat and dairy – could help combat climate change. […]
This proposal, from a group of people who have probably never missed a meal in their lives, is totally obscene. High income countries often have a lot of poor people who would be hard hit by increases in the price of food.
Needlessly exacerbating the risk poor people don’t get enough to eat, especially children and pregnant mothers, who are especially vulnerable to adverse health impacts from lack of protein in their diet – if this ghastly proposal is ever implemented, future generations will look upon it as a crime against humanity. – Read full article
Blog Roll
Aletho News- Seyed M. Marandi: Trump Lost the Iran War – Must Sell It as a Victory
- Iran, Saudi FMs hold phone talks as Persian Gulf states rethink US ties
- The Illusions of Western Virtue: Ursula von der Leyen and Europe’s Moral Bankruptcy
- AIPAC-backed candidates lose New York primaries as voters reject pro-genocide lobby
- The West’s Post-Soviet ‘Democracy’ Playbook
- UK suppressed intel on Sudan genocide to protect UAE ties: Report
- Starmer’s exit exposes dirty secret: UK can’t afford Ukraine War
- Putin Warns the West: Russia Is Ready
- BEN-GVIR: “ALL OF LEBANON MUST BURN” — w/ Mouin Rabbani
- There Are No Budget Constraints In New York City: “Coastal Resiliency” Edition
- If Americans Knew
- Israel’s Attacks on Gaza’s Children (Photos)
- ‘His only crime is that he is a Palestinian doctor’
- ‘Killed pursuing her dream’: Gaza girl on her way to school dies in Israeli drone strike
- Unbelievable pressure on Gaza from Israel, “Board of Peace” – Daily Update
- UN: Israel Continues to Commit Genocide and Other Atrocity Crimes by Deliberately Targeting Palestinian Children
- Bari Weiss, Free-Speech Fraud & Zionism Promoter, Would Rather Deport Than Debate
- ‘Doctor of the Poor’: Israeli Occupation Arrests Prominent Palestinian Physician
- Search for Your Church (and see if it has been targeted by the Israeli gov’t)
- Mark Levin Flying to Israel as Netanyahu Reportedly Seeks to ‘Leverage’ Levin to Trash Trump’s Iran Deal
- Watch: Zionist Brags about Israel’s Power to Get the World to Do What Israel Wants
- No Tricks Zone
- 3 New Studies Find Increasing Trends In Solar Radiation Since The 1980s – Easily Explaining Warming
- THE TRANSCEIVER PARADOX: Why Organoid Intelligence (OI) Could Become Our Ultimate Alien Predator
- German Wind Turbines Face Regulatory Shutdown Due To Excessive Noise
- New Study: Chile’s Relative Sea Level Was 3.2 Meters Higher Than Today During The Mid-Holocene
- Beyond The Pitch: Why FIFA’s World Cup Is One Of Humanity’s Best Investments
- Climate Alarmists Now Using Natural Phenomena To Support Their Claims
- New Study: Significant CO2 Fluxes From Non-Volcanic Sources Are Largely Neglected In Carbon Budgets
- Women Climate Scientists Being Harassed, Insulted By Skeptics, Claims Berkeley Earth Researcher
- Germany’s Longterm Spring Climate Data Show “No Climate Trend”
- New Study: Solar Photovoltaic, Wind Power Fail To Meet Annual Energy Demands 62% Of The Time
Aletho News 