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Detention at Kandahar, Bagram and Guantánamo

By Andy Worthington | November 8, 2010

On September 18, I was delighted to be asked to attend “Eid Without Aafia,” and to conduct a live interview with former Guantánamo prisoners Shafiq Rasul and Ruhal Ahmed…

In the first of the three videos, I asked Shafiq and Ruhal about the brutal conditions in the US prison at Kandahar airport, where they were taken following their capture in Afghanistan in November 2001, after they had survived a notorious massacre of prisoners in container trucks and a stay in the Northern Alliance’s brutal and overcrowded Sheberghan prison. I also asked them what they knew about the US prison at Bagram airbase, where Aafia Siddiqui was held, and asked them about the isolating effect of not only being prohibited from receiving any visitors, but of not even receiving letters from their family — or only receiving letters that were heavily censored.

In the second video, Shafiq and Ruhal talked about the despair they felt in Guantánamo when it became clear that the British government had no intention of helping them. I also spoke about how torture is both illegal and counter-productive, and asked Shafiq and Ruhal to explain how the use of torture can lead to false confessions, which allowed them to explain how, in Guantánamo, they eventually made false confessions after being subjected to the “frequent flier program,” a program of prolonged sleep deprivation that involved being moved from cell to cell every few hours, being held in isolation for five months, where they were given very little food, being short-shackled in painful stress position for two to three days at a time, when they were obliged to urinate and defecate on themselves, and being subjected to extremely loud music.

In the third video, Shafiq and Rasul explained how their treatment in Guantánamo led them to think of committing suicide, and, following up on how they were forced into making false confessions, I noted how false confessions don’t necessarily lead to prisoners being released from Guantánamo. I also asked Shafiq and Ruhal to explain more about the circumstances that led to their release, and Shafiq explained how, on the date that they were supposedly filmed at a training camp with Osama bin Laden, he was attending university in the UK (although he also explained that British agents suggested that he might have traveled on a false passport).

I also asked Shafiq and Ruhal to discuss how receiving medical treatment at Guantánamo was entirely dependent on cooperation with the interrogators (in other words, making false confessions). This allowed them to explain how Omar Khadr, the Canadian who was just 15 years old when he was seized (and who was recently convicted in a trial by Military Commission), was one of the many prisoners deprived of medical treatment because he would not make false confessions, even though his wounds were “horrific,” and they couldn’t understand how he was still alive. They explained that they regularly heard him crying in an isolation cell, and also explained that he had been subjected to the “frequent flier program,” adding that, although he is now 24 years old, he “still has that child mentality,” In a moving finale, Ruhal reflected on the barbarity of separating Aafia Siddiqui from her children, and on how they may have been used in an attempt to secure her compliance, as the authorities at Guantánamo had no qualms about abusing child prisoners.

 

November 9, 2010 Posted by | Deception, False Flag Terrorism, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

Israeli occupation authority extends administrative detention of Mayor’s wife

Palestine Information Center – 09/11/2010

RAMALLAH — The Israeli occupation authority (IOA) has extended the administrative custody, without charge, of Muntaha Al-Tawil, the wife of El-Bireh Mayor and Hamas leader Sheikh Jamal Al-Tawil, for three months.

Taghrid Jahshan, the legal advisor to the women’s society for female political prisoners, said that Muntaha was detained on 8/2/2010 for a six months period that was renewed for three months and now is facing a third renewal of three more months ending 8/2/2011.

The lawyer said that she was in contact with the Israeli Hasharon jail and received the news on the phone, adding that she contacted the woman’s husband and told him of the new development. The lawyer expressed concern over the continued detention of Muntaha without charge and holding her away from her husband and four children.

Muntaha is studying social service at the open Quds University and is a member of many human rights groups that defend prisoners’ rights.

The Israeli military judge approved the detention of Muntaha depending on the so-called secret file tabled by the internal security apparatus. The defendant and her lawyer are not allowed to read contents of the file on the pretext of preserving sources of the information in it.

The prosecutor said that Muntaha poses  a danger to the security in her area of residence.

November 9, 2010 Posted by | Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | Leave a comment

Why won’t the Tampa Trib tell you what people in Nashville know about Steve Emerson?

By John Sugg | Creative Loafing | November 2, 2010

Steven Emerson, a self-styled terrorism expert, is a guy who had a profound and caustic impact on Tampa for more than a decade. Emerson has had much less of an impact on another city, Nashville, although his corrosive brand of often-inaccurate smear jobs recently slithered into Tennessee.

Still, Nashville’s citizens know a whole lot more about Emerson than folks in Tampa, despite his relatively recent arrival on the Tennessee hate-Muslim soapbox, where he jostles for the limelight with loopy religious fanatics and just plain old-fashioned Southern bigots.

Why that imbalance of knowledge about Emerson? The answer lies in a horrible miscarriage of journalism committed over many years by The Tampa Tribune, a series of atrocities the Trib could easily correct by just providing a dash of fair and accurate reporting, something history indicates the newspaper won’t do. Nashville should be grateful that it has a newspaper, The Tennessean, which unlike the Trib will fearlessly dig out the truth.

In tandem with his vassal reporter at the Tampa Trib, Michael Fechter, Emerson waged a decade-long jihad against a professor at the University of South Florida, Sami Al-Arian, accused by Emerson and Fechter of being a terrorist mastermind. Emerson and Fechter were backed by a shadowy network of former federal agents and foreign spooks, notably a disinformation specialist for Israel’s ultra-right Likud party named Yigal Carmon and a controversial ex-FBI official named Oliver “Buck” Revell – and a lot of money whose origins have never been revealed.

However, where their information came from was clear. As the great Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz explained before Al-Arian’s 2005 federal trial: “Israel owns much of the copyright for the case; a well-informed source termed the prosecution an ‘American-Israeli co-production.’ The Americans are running the show, but behind the scenes it was the Israelis who for years collected material (and) transmitted information…” How did they transmit information? In part, via “secret evidence” slipped to our federales, evidence and accusers Al-Arian wasn’t allowed to confront (who needs that nasty old Sixth Amendment?). But reporters were also conduits for scurrilous “intelligence” claims. Fechter himself wrote that “former and current senior Israeli intelligence officials” loaded his stories with information. Those allegations, many ludicrous on their face, were rejected by a federal jury, despite a highly prejudiced judge and rulings that, if they had been issued against Martin Luther King Jr. would have prevented him from mentioning Jim Crow in his defense.

Over the years, while a Weekly Planet and Creative Loafing editor, I had a great deal of fun exposing Emerson, and the prevarications by Fechter and the federal government. I tried to put into context what the anti-Muslim crusaders were up to. I joined a rather elite cadre of journalists that had tangled with Emerson – including famed investigative reporters Seymour Hersh, Robert I. Friedman and Robert Parry, who provided me with insight into Emerson’s real agenda.

Emerson filed two bogus lawsuits against me, the Weekly Planet (AKA Creative Loafing) and an AP reporter who had told me about questions he had had over the provenance of a document Emerson gave the news service. We obtained a court order that would have forced Emerson to produce real proof of his allegations – and he knew we were digging into who he really was and who paid his bills – so he ran away from the fight he started; the good guys (me, for example) prevailed.

It’s noteworthy that a number of dispassionate analysts had observations similar to mine. New York University scholar Zachary Lockman, for example, (as quoted on “Right Web”) wrote in 2005: “[Emerson’s] main focus during the 1990s was to sound the alarm about the threat Muslim terrorists posed to the United States. By the end of that decade Emerson was describing himself as a ‘terrorist expert and investigator’ and ‘Executive Director, Terrorism Newswire, Inc.’ Along the way, critics charged, Emerson had sounded many false alarms, made numerous errors of fact, bandied accusations about rather freely, and ceased to be regarded as credible by much of the mainstream media . The September 11 attacks seemed to bear out Emerson’s warnings, but his critics might respond that even a stopped clock shows the right time twice a day.”

Again, it’s sadly significant that the Trib never even provided such mild doses of context about its primary source, Emerson, in its inflammatory, intentionally erroneous and misleading, and often racist diatribes against Al-Arian. The Trib still gives Emerson ink – never questioning his claims and guilt-by-association-and-innuendo tactics, and never vetting his background, associations, financing and motives.

Some insight on Emerson’s millions has now been provided by The Tennessean, Nashville’s daily newspaper. MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann, citing the Tennessean’s reports, on Oct. 26 awarded Emerson his nightly “Worst Person in the World” citation. Olbermann expressed regret that the network had previously used Emerson as a chattering head on terrorism topics. (Similarly, CBS did not renew its contract with Emerson after he claimed that the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing had “a Middle Eastern trait” because it was carried out “with the intent to inflict as many casualties as possible.” That was a big “Oops.”)

The Tennessean reported that Emerson collects money through a non-profit, the Investigative Project on Terrorism Foundation, and then funnels that money to his for-profit SAE (as in Steven A. Emerson) Productions. Quoting Ken Berger, president of Charity Navigator, a nonprofit watchdog group, the Nashville paper reported: “Basically, you have a nonprofit acting as a front organization, and all that money going to a for-profit. It’s wrong. This is off the charts.”

That little bit of information on Emerson, contained in one report, is far more than the Trib told you about Emerson over a decade – despite Emerson using the Trib to provoke a legal firestorm that is still ongoing.

You do recall the firestorm, right? Emerson and Fechter launched a series of attacks on Muslims. No amount of hyperbole and vitriol-spewing was considered excessive by the Trib or Emerson. Fechter, for example, darkly hinted that the FBI found documents about MacDill Air Force Base among Al-Arian’s papers, insinuating some dastardly design. Nope. Al-Arian had twice been invited to speak to large groups of military and intelligence officers, and the sinister documents were, well, just the hand-out materials. Fechter, following the lead of his guru, Emerson, also tried to blame the Oklahoma City bombing on Arabs, an egregiously false story the Trib has never seen fit to correct. Emerson, meanwhile, said in February 1996 that Palestinian advocates at USF were involved in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Emerson promised proof “in the near term.” The proof never came, and the Justice Department said it had no records supporting the allegation.

You think the Trib might have called Emerson on that one? Hahaha.

The former head of the criminal division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Tampa, Robert O’Neill, twice concluded during the 1990s there was no evidence to prosecute Al-Arian, according to my multiple sources in the Justice Department. I don’t like quoting anonymous sources so I’ll be clear: O’Neill, now the U.S. Attorney for Florida’s Middle District, himself told me he had looked at the evidence and found no reason to prosecute. In 1998, the then FBI counterterrorism chief Bob Blitzer also told me “no federal laws were broken” by the Tampa Muslims.

Yet, after 9/11, propelled by hate-Muslim diatribes from Bill O’Reilly (who had been funneled highly slanted information by Fechter) and the fear by Jeb Bush that the University of South Florida would conclude a settlement with Al-Arian that would prove embarrassing to the Bushite regimes in Washington and Tallahassee, the federal government indicted Al-Arian. The trial concluded with the government failing to win a single guilty verdict against Al-Arian or his co-defendants, an immense disaster for the Bush Justice Department.

Al-Arian later plea bargained in order to preclude another trial on counts on which the jury didn’t reach a verdict – although notably no more than two jurors felt he was guilty on even those “hung” counts.  Al-Arian’s plea bargain stipulated that he had had no involvement in terrorist activities. Rather, he had provided some minor support to people who might have become terrorists, although it’s clear from the trial that any such activities by Al-Arian occurred when they were legal. The plea agreement supposedly ended all business between Al-Arian and the federal government. However, due to legal chicanery by a rogue federal prosecutor in Virginia, Gordon Kromberg – who has been called a doppelganger of Emerson – Al-Arian remains entangled in federal courts and on house arrest.

According to my federal sources, the Al-Arian case cost our government at least $50 million, and, no, the Trib and Emerson didn’t offer to pay part of the bill (you and I had that honor). And, with so many FBI agents chasing a guy whose “guilt” was mostly in exercising his First Amendment rights, the FBI missed another fellow flitting around Florida, a real terrorist with blood on his mind, Mohammed Atta.

The final chapters in the Trib’s pogroms against Muslims had a sadly humorous angle. Fechter, who had long been a tool of Emerson’s, finally got slightly honest and went to work for his mentor. And Fechter dumped his wife and children and shacked up with one of the federal prosecutors who tried Al-Arian. I don’t recall where Fechter got his journalism training, but he must have skipped the classes on journalistic objectivity and not sleeping with your sources.

So, The Tennessean’s articles might have provided an excellent opportunity for the Trib to revisit and maybe heal a terrible wound it was complicit in inflicting in Tampa. On Friday, I asked Trib Managing Editor Richard “Duke” Maas if he had such an inclination – heck, I inquired, aren’t you interested in what The Tennessean wrote about a guy who had so much impact on Tampa and your newspaper? Well, not really, Maas responded, sounding more irritated than journalistically curious. He added that Fechter had left the newspaper, which I gather meant he felt the Trib was thereby absolved of responsibility.

If you happen to have a spare backbone, you might send it to the pathetic folks at The Tampa Tribune.

John F. Sugg was editor of the Weekly Planet in the 1990s, and group senior editor of Creative Loafing Newspapers until he retired in 2008.

November 7, 2010 Posted by | Islamophobia, Subjugation - Torture, Wars for Israel | Leave a comment

PA: Israel raided thousands of homes in October

Ma’an – 07/11/2010

RAMALLAH — The Palestinian Authority Ministry of Detainees’ Affairs said Israeli forces detained 403 Palestinians and raided 2148 homes across the West Bank during October.

In a report released Saturday, the ministry said Israeli soldiers intimidated and assaulted residents, destroying the contents of homes during the raids.

Of those detained, 95 percent had been assaulted in front of their families and were beaten en route to detention centers in Israeli military jeeps.

Among those detained, 130 were minors. Most of the minors detained were from Hebron and Jerusalem, the ministry said, adding that they were mostly sentenced to between one and six months, and ordered to pay large fines.

Sixty children from Jerusalem and one child from Hebron were placed under house arrest. In cases where a child broke the conditions of house arrest, a family member was arrested, the report said.

Most detainees were interrogated in Israeli settlements before they were transferred to official detention centers. The ministry documented 50 cases of raids inside the prisons. Under the pretext of searching for cell phones, guards used tear gas and sticks to beat prisoners and destroyed their personal belongings, the ministry said.

Israeli rights groups say Palestinians tortured in Israeli detention

On Tuesday, two Israeli rights groups released a report accusing Israel of “state sanctioned ill-treatment of interrogees” in at least one detention facility in Petah Tikva, in central Israel.

According to the joint B’Tselem and HaMoked report, testimonies from 121 detainees “indicate a clear pattern of activity by the authorities,” which “constitutes cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment.”

According to the collected testimony, “violations include cruel detention conditions in sealed cells, in isolation and disgraceful hygienic conditions, continuous cuffing of detainees’ hands in the interrogation room in a way that makes it impossible for them to move, sleep deprivation, and other methods that harm the detainees physically and mentally.

The report noted that “the use of any one of these means, certainly their combined use, constitutes cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment, and in some instances, torture. All are strictly forbidden under international law and Israeli law.”

Further, the groups said testimonies suggested that children were treated no differently than adults by soldiers and detention center authorities, despite their legal status as minors.

November 6, 2010 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

Israeli government documents show deliberate policy to keep Gazans at near-starvation levels

By Saed Bannoura – IMEMC News – November 06, 2010

Documents whose existence were denied by the Israeli government for over a year have been released after a legal battle led by Israeli human rights group Gisha. The documents reveal a deliberate policy by the Israeli government in which the dietary needs for the population of Gaza are chillingly calculated, and the amounts of food let in by the Israeli government measured to remain just enough to keep the population alive at a near-starvation level. This documents the statement made by a number of Israeli officials that they are “putting the people of Gaza on a diet”.

Calculation sheet from newly-released documents (image from Gisha)
Calculation sheet from newly-released documents (image from Gisha)

In 2007, when Israel began its full siege on Gaza, Dov Weisglass, adviser to then Prime-Minister Ehud Olmert, stated clearly, “The idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger.” The documents now released contain equations used by the Israeli government to calculate the exact amounts of food, fuel and other necessities needed to do exactly that.

The documents are even more disturbing, say human rights activists, when one considers the fact that close to half of the people of Gaza are children under the age of eighteen. This means that Israel has deliberately forced the undernourishment of hundreds of thousands of children in direct violation of international law and the Fourth Geneva Convention.

This release of documents also severely undermines Israel’s oft-made claim that the siege is “for security reasons”, as it documents a deliberate and systematic policy of collective punishment of the entire population of Gaza.

Gisha’s director said, in relation to the release of documents, “Israel banned glucose for biscuits and the fuel needed for regular supply of electricity – paralyzing normal life in Gaza and impairing the moral character of the State of Israel. I am sorry to say that major elements of this policy are still in place.”

In its statement accompanying the release of the documents, Gisha wrote:
The documents reveal that the state approved “a policy of deliberate reduction” for basic goods in the Gaza Strip (section h.4, page 5*). Thus, for example, Israel restricted the supply of fuel needed for the power plant, disrupting the supply of electricity and water. The state set a “lower warning line” (section g.2, page 5) to give advance warning of expected shortages in a particular item, but at the same time approved ignoring that warning, if the good in question was subject to a policy of “deliberate reduction”. Moreover, the state set an “upper red line” above which even basic humanitarian items could be blocked, even if they were in demand (section g.1, page 5). The state claimed in a cover letter to Gisha that in practice, it had not authorized reduction of “basic goods” below the “lower warning line”, but it did not define what these “basic goods” were.

Commentator Richard Silverstein wrote: “In reviewing the list of permitted items for import, you come to realize that these are the only items allowed. In other words, if an item is not on the list, it’s prohibited. So, for example, here is the list of permitted spices: Black pepper, soup powder, hyssop, sesame. cinnamon, anise, babuna (chamomile), sage. Sorry, cumin, basil, bay leaf, allspice, carraway, cardamon, chiles, chives, cilantro, cloves, garlic, sesame, tamarind, thyme, oregano, cayenne. Not on the list. You’re not a spice Palestinians need according to some IDF dunderhead. And tomatoes, potatoes, cucumbers, lettuce, toys, glassware, paint, and shoes? You can forget about them too. Luxuries all, or else security threats.”

Despite the disturbing nature of the documents, which show a calculated policy of deliberate undernourishment of an entire population, no major media organizations have reported the story.

The full text of the released documents, and the original Freedom of Information Act request filed by Gisha, can be found on Gisha’s website at the link below:
Related Link(s): http://www.gisha.org/index.php?intLanguage=2&intItemId=…N=113

November 6, 2010 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | Leave a comment

UK official: Gaza situation is unbearable

Ma’an – 06/11/2010

BETHLEHEM — British Foreign Office spokesman Martin Day on Thursday called on Israel to allow Gaza borders to open for exports to ease an unbearable situation in the Strip.

In July, British Prime Minister David Cameron sparked outrage in Israel when he said Israel’s blockade of Gaza had turned the coastal enclave into a “prison camp.” Israeli President Shimon Peres accused Cameron of anti-semistism.

Asked if the response to Cameron’s remarks made him wary of criticizing Israel, Day replied that he would say frankly that the social, economic and political situation in Gaza was unbearable. In an interview with Ma’an Radio, he said the UK welcomed Israel’s decision to allow more goods into Gaza, and hoped it would be fully implemented.

Day said the British government believed settlements were a major obstacle to achieving peace, and that the UK continuously relayed this to Israel. All settlement activity, including in East Jerusalem, contravened international law and should be frozen to create an atmosphere for successful negotiations, he said.

The goal of British Foreign Secretary William Hague’s visit to the region Tuesday was to continue international efforts to restart negotiations between Israel and the PLO, which stalled over Israel’s settlement activity, he said.

The spokesman said the UK was committed to establishing a Palestinian state on 1967 borders with Jerusalem as the capital of both Palestine and Israel.

November 6, 2010 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

UN body accuses US of rights abuses

American officials face barrage of criticism from Human Rights Council over Guantanamo and torture allegations.

Al-Jazeera – 05 November 2010

The United States has for the first time faced the United Nations Human Rights Council over accusations of human rights violations.

Council members in Geneva, Switzerland, levelled a barrage of criticisms at the US administration on Friday, calling for the closure of the Guantanamo Bay prison and for investigations into alleged torture by US troops abroad.

The council’s first review of the US human rights record was part of a gradual examination of the performance of all 192 UN members over a four-year period.

Iran’s delegation accused the US of violating human rights though covert CIA operations “carried out on pretext of combating terrorism”.

European countries said Washington should ban the death penalty. Mexico urged it to halt racial profiling and the use of lethal force in controlling illegal migration over its border.

Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim nation, called on Washington to better promote religious tolerance.

‘Grossly violating rights’

Commenting on the council’s criticisms, Antonio Ginatta of the New York-based group Human Rights Watch said: “US officials were often reduced to restating current practices that grossly violate human rights, like the death penalty, poor prison conditions and sentencing youth offenders to life without parole.”

Amnesty International said that the US must also hold accountable those responsible for torture.

“These recommendations must be at the heart of rebuilding the United States’ human rights record,” it said in a statement.

The US vigorously defended its human rights record, with Harold Koh, a US state department legal adviser, telling the UN council: “Let there be no doubt, the United States does not torture and it will not torture.”

He said: “Between Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo we have conducted hundreds of investigations regarding detainee abuse allegations and those have led to hundreds of disciplinary actions.”

The Guantanamo Bay prison, maintained by the US in Cuba and which currently holds 174 detainees, has been highly controversial.

Barack Obama, the US president, had pledged to close the facility within a year of taking office, but missed that deadline.

Earlier, Koh responded to countries who bemoaned the failure to close the prison, saying that “the president cannot close Guantanamo alone”.

He said any such move would require help from Congress, the US courts and foreign allies willing to take in released inmates.

US criticised

The US has come under renewed pressure over human rights with the revelation that George Bush, the former US president, personally authorised the waterboarding of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged 9/11 mastermind.

According to The New York Times, which obtained an advance copy of the ex-president’s book Decision Points, Bush responded “damn right” when the CIA sought permission to use waterboarding.

The practice of waterboarding, a form of simulated drowning, has been described as torture and Obama outlawed it shortly after coming into office.

Al Jazeera’s Kristen Saloomey, reporting from the UN headquarters, said there was a “real attempt” to distance the Obama administration from practices used under Bush.

“This will probably not satisfy the critics however, in particular in the arena of drone attacks and these new allegations of torture which came out through WikiLeaks recently, where it is alleged that the US turned a blind eye to abuses by Iraqi forces,” she said.

‘Rogue regimes’

Bush had shunned the UN Human Rights Council, saying it did not need to be scolded by countries such as Syria and Cuba whose own records on human rights were poor.

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the Republican Representative who is set to chair the House Foreign Affairs Committee when a new US Congress convenes in January, echoed those views on Friday.

She said that the 47-member Human Rights Council was “dominated by rogue regimes”.

“Serial human rights abusers like Cuba, Iran, North Korea, and Venezuela all hijacked the platform to attack the US for imaginary violations,” she said.

“The US should walk out of this rogues’ gallery and seek to build alternative forums that will actually focus on abuses and deny membership to abusers.”

But Michael Posner, the US assistant secretary of state for democracy and human rights, told a news briefing after the council debate that the US got “a fair hearing”.

“This is part of an ongoing process to engage with the Council and the UN,” he said.

The council will issue its recommendations on Tuesday and the US delegation will indicate which of them are acceptable before reporting back in March when a final report is adopted.

November 6, 2010 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | Leave a comment

UK troops tortured Iraqis ‘systematically’

Press TV – November 6, 2010

Lawyers of over 200 Iraqi civilians have presented the High Court in London with “credible” evidence of their “systemic” torture and abuse by British forces.

The evidence showed that British troops tortured those incarcerated in “the UK’s Abu Ghraib” by denying them food and water, depriving them of sleep and exposing them to mock executions at secret facilities, including one near Basra in southeastern Iraq.

The documents also revealed that prisoners were physically and sexually abused, kept in long-term solitary confinement, forced to kneel in painful positions for up to 30 hours at a time, and subjected to electric shocks at the Basra facility run by the Joint Forces Interrogation Team (JFIT) among others.

Michael Fordham QC, for the former inmates, said, “there are credible allegations of serious, inhumane practices across a whole range of dates and facilities concerning British military detention in Iraq.”

The Public Interest Lawyers (PIL), which represents the Iraqi civilians, said the torture techniques were used in all 14 British military detention centers in Iraq but the majority were reported in three facilities.

The Ministry of Defense has already admitted that British troops were involved in the torture and murder of a number of Iraqi civilians.

The murders include the case of a man who was kicked to death on board an RAF chopper, another who was shot by a soldier after being involved in a traffic incident and a teen who was pushed to his death into a river.

Those murders only added to the 2003 scandal over the death of the 26-year-old Iraqi hotel receptionist, Baha Mousa, who was killed while in the custody of Britain’s 1st Battalion the Queen’s Lancashire Regiment.

It emerged that Mousa had been hooded and beaten severely during interrogation by British soldiers, which left him with 93 injuries, including broken ribs and nose that led to his death.

Now lawyers are calling for a public inquiry into the cases of hundreds of Iraqis, who were tortured in British detention facilities in Iraq as well as an investigation to determine which people in the top military or political ranks are responsible for the authorization of such techniques.

This comes as the MoD has said it will lead the investigation itself with the Liberal Democrat armed forces minister Nick Harvey arguing “a costly public inquiry would be unable to investigate individual criminal behaviour or impose punishments”.

But Fordham said the proposal will be “the military investigating the military” and against the UK’s obligations under the European convention on human rights.

According to Phil Shiner, the lawyer representing the former inmates, “It is nonsense to suggest, as the MoD does, it is a case of just a few bad apples.”

“People at the highest level knew what was going on, it goes up to the very highest level and is not something that just happened after we went into Iraq,” he said.

November 6, 2010 Posted by | Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | Leave a comment

Britain Caves To Israeli Pressure; Agrees To Revoke ‘universal Jurisdiction’ Law

By Saed Bannoura – IMEMC News – November 04, 2010

In his visit to Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories this week, British Foreign Secretary William Hague reported being ‘ambushed’ by Israeli officials who cancelled a high-level security briefing with Hague in response to a British threat to arrest an Israeli official for war crimes.

Hague said he resented this move by Israel, since the British coalition government had already agreed to change the ‘universal jurisdiction law’ which allows for the prosecution of foreign citizens who have engaged in crimes against humanity.

Israeli officials have faced increasing threats of arrest by a variety of countries which use the universal jurisdiction law. According to Amnesty International, the law of universal jurisdiction is a requirement for all states who are signatories to the Convention against Torture and the Inter-American Convention, which states that whenever a person suspected of torture is found in their territory, they must submit the case to their prosecuting authorities for the purposes of prosecution, or to extradite that person.

Most recently, Israeli Cabinet Minister Dan Meridor had to cancel a trip to England November 1st after British intelligence officials warned him that he could face an arrest warrant upon entry into the UK.

Meridor is just the latest in a string of Israeli officials who have been cited for potential war crimes, including former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, former Israeli defence minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, former Defense chief-of-staff Moshe Ya’alon, former air force chief Dan Halutz, and former Minister of Foreign Affairs Tzipi Livni, among others. Most were cited for the ongoing Israeli military occupation of Palestine, and attacks against Palestinians, while Ariel Sharon was cited for his role in the Sabra and Shatila massacre in Lebanon in 1982.

The British Foreign Secretary’s trip to the region this week was also criticized by Israeli officials due to the Secretary’s decision to meet with Palestinians who recently lost their homes to violent Israeli settler takeovers in East Jerusalem.

November 4, 2010 Posted by | Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | Leave a comment

Education in Palestine in world spotlight

The impact of the Israeli occupation on Palestinians’ right to education has previously not received enough attention. (Khaleel Reash/MaanImages)
Eva Bartlett | IPS | October 31, 2010

GAZA CITY – The focus on people’s movements in Palestine continues to gain momentum with growing non-violent demonstrations in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem, and with a Palestine-wide call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel.

Years of the non-violent demonstrations throughout the occupied West Bank against Israel’s separation wall have finally generated some media interest in the issue of the wall and annexation of Palestinian land. Yet the behind-the- scenes work of Palestinian unions, Palestinian and international BDS groups, video conferences bridging Palestine to the outside world, and the struggle of Palestinian students to access an education continues largely unnoticed by the cameras.

In July, 2010, the United Nations IRIN news reported that roughly 39,000 Palestinian children from Gaza would not have schools to attend, following the destruction or severe damage of some 280 schools and kindergartens during the 2008-2009 Israeli war on Gaza, and the continued inability to repair or rebuild due to the severe Israeli-led siege on Gaza and lack of construction materials.

The UN also reports that 88 percent of UNRWA schools and 82 percent of government schools operate on a shift system as a result, still resulting in serious overcrowding.

On the heels of popular protests against the G-20 summit in Toronto, and branching from the annual World Social Forum (WSF), the first World Education Forum (WEF) in Palestine began Oct. 28 and in regions throughout historic pre-1948 Palestine. From Jaffa to Nazareth, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and the Gaza Strip, forums on education and Palestinian culture continued until Oct. 31.

Dubbed ‘Education for Change’, the forums included global points of focus on education – including adult literacy and gender equity in early education – but delved further into Palestine-specific topics: occupation and emancipation; the psychological needs of Palestinian students traumatised by occupation and war; keeping Palestine’s history and culture prominent in educational programmes; the physical and bureaucratic roadblocks to higher education within and outside of Palestine; and the innovative means Palestinians use to educate themselves under six decades of occupation.

“Education is not only a basic human right, one that cannot [be] postponed or neglected during conflict or emergency, but also has a key role to play in protecting and sustaining the lives of children and youths,” says Dr. Mazen Hamada of Gaza’s Al-Azhar University and one of the WEF Gaza organisers. “The effect of siege on Gaza Strip has exceeded the economical, agricultural, heath and environmental levels to reach also the educational sector. The academic achievements of the students at all levels has decreased after the last war on Gaza, and the number of students not attending their classes has increased.”

Hamada notes that the siege’s simple act of banning paper and educational materials needed for schools affects students’ ability to study. He adds, “Because of the siege, many parents are unemployed and are not able to cover the tuition of their children at universities and schools. And university students aren’t able to continue their studies abroad, nor are professors able to participate in international conferences or obtain further training outside.”

The WEF-Palestine, over its four days of forums and events addressed these problems, while reiterating the need to include Palestinian culture and history in curriculum and activities.

“When I was a student, we studied Egyptian history and geography, we never even saw a map of Palestine in school,” says Abu Arab, 30, of his studies in Gaza under Egyptian control. “Palestinian culture wasn’t a part of the education programme then, especially since the Israelis could censor any information they didn’t want studied.”

“Ironically, I learned more about Palestine when I was in prison,” says Abu Basel. “I was imprisoned by the Israelis when I was 16 and hadn’t yet finished high school. Since they kept me for nine years, I had to finish my studies in jail.”

Like many Palestinians, Abu Basel used his time in prison to study from others who had an education. “Some had finished university, some had their Masters, some had studied abroad. We’d study together, like workgroups. We also studied Palestinian history and learned about Zionism.”

Specific to the WEF-Palestine is the problem of access: with all of Palestine’s borders controlled by Israel and Egypt, other means of communication and participation are vital. With group participation from Japan, Canada, Latin America, Africa, and Europe, the WEF-Palestine included video conferences and live streaming on the Internet, as well as interactive workshops, visits to important areas and cultural sessions.

In Gaza, participants joined a popular demonstration in Gaza’s northern Beit Hanoun, as well as meeting fishermen whose livelihoods have been destroyed by the siege and by attacks from Israeli gunboats in Gazan waters.

For farmers living in the buffer zone, the need to enhance education and international understanding is not simply a question of their children’s futures but also of their livelihoods, routinely destroyed by Israeli invasions.

The Garrara elementary school in southeastern Gaza is but one of many schools suffering from multiple problems under siege and under attacks by Israeli soldiers along the border. “We are under one kilometre from the border and the students experience regular firing from Israeli soldiers,” says Umm Mohammed, teacher at the school. “Many of our students have classmates who were killed or injured by these attacks, and that affects their psychological state and ability to study,” she says.

The school itself is still in shambles after the Israeli war on Gaza, and many of the students study in tents year-round.

The WSF a decade ago set out to promote notions of sustainable development, fair trade, and social justice. The WEF-Palestine by virtue of necessity focuses on the urgent educational issues at hand, but likewise harnesses the knowledge of grassroots activists, civil society groups, and educators, citing education as means of resistance, for peace and equality.

Al Azhar’s Dr. Hamada is positive about the outcome. “The WEF is a good opportunity to exchange information and experiences between Palestinians and other international educational organisations towards improving the educational system and teaching methodologies in Palestine,” he says.

As the statement from WEF-Palestine reminds everyone, “Transforming the world and liberating humanity from colonialism, racism and exploitation requires a struggling and educated population. Therefore education is an indispensable tool for liberation.”

November 2, 2010 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Solidarity and Activism, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

UN: Gaza construction materials delayed

Ma’an – 02/11/2010

GAZA CITY — Less than 200 truckloads of food and commercial goods were slated to enter the Gaza Strip on Tuesday morning, Palestinian liaison officials said.

The goods, crossings official Raed Fattouh said, would be transported via the southernmost crossing Kerem Shalom, and would be transferred into Gaza along with limited amounts of industrial diesel and cooking fuel.

According to reports by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, current import levels – controlled by new terms of siege established by Israel following a global outcry in June – remain less than 40 percent of pre-siege levels.

The latest report on the crossing from the UN body said the import of construction materials, which remain strictly controlled by Israeli officials, and banned, except for projects under international supervision – remains limited.

Projects spearheaded by the UN Relief and Works Agency, the main body charged with the care of Palestinian refugees in the Near East, have been delayed by Israeli border officials, the report said.

Of the 1.7 percent of building projects approved for Gaza, OCHA said, Israeli officials have only allowed a small fraction of the supplies necessary for reconstruction into the coastal enclave.

Citing capacity constraints of the conveyor belt at the northern bulk goods crossing, Karni, the report said only 39 of 226 truckloads of materials requested by UNRWA for the projects, mainly clinics and schools, have entered Gaza.

November 2, 2010 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

State-sanctioned torture in Israeli detention

Ma’an – 02/11/2010

RAMALLAH — PA Minister of Prisoners’ Affairs Issa Qaraqe released new information Monday revealing cases of child torture under Israeli interrogation.

The announcement came one day ahead of the release of an Israeli rights group document charging Israel with “state sanctioned ill-treatment of interrogees” in at least one detention facility in Petah Tikva, in central Israel.

Qaraqe outlined the case of 13-year-old sixth graders Muhammad Tare Abdul Latif Mukhaimar, and Muhammad Nasser Ali Radwan from the central West Bank town of Beit Ur At-Tahta. Both were detained by Israeli forces in July, he said, and related their stories of torture to officials.

Mukhaimar and Radwan said they were taken by Israeli border guards patrolling sections of Highway 443, a previously settler-only road which was installed with additional checkpoints when an Israeli court decision mandated that it be opened for Palestinian use. When he was forced into a patrol car, Mukhaimar said he was kicked in the legs and beaten with rifle butts until he fell to the floor. The boy said he was then blindfolded and moved to the detention center.

According to the joint B’Tselem and HaMoked report, testimonies from 121 detainees “indicate a clear pattern of activity by the authorities,” which “constitutes cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment.”

Taken to the same detention facility detailed in the report, Mukhaimar said he and Radwan were locked by border guards naked in the facility bathroom and kept there for two days with the air conditioning on.

He was so thirsty, he said, that he and Radwan drank the toilet water. Whenever they became sleepy guards would bang on the door to the room and wake them up, he added.

“The most awful thing that happened, was when the soldiers went to the bathroom, they peed on us and did not use the toilet,” Mukhaimar said, adding that one of the soldiers videotaped the incident.

The two said that after at least 48 hours in the washroom, they were transferred to the Binyamin settlement detention facility, where they were questioned from 10 p.m. until 3 a.m. They were then transferred to the Ofer prison for three months then to Remonim prison. They remain in custody pending trial.

Testimonies from the two children were in line with revelations in the report from the rights groups, which said violations against detainees “begin from the moment of their arrest and continue until the detainee’s transfer from the facility.”

According to the collected testimony, “violations include cruel detention conditions in sealed cells, in isolation and disgraceful hygienic conditions, continuous cuffing of detainees’ hands in the interrogation room in a way that makes it impossible for them to move, sleep deprivation, and other methods that harm the detainees physically and mentally.

“Nine percent of the witnesses related that the interrogators used physical violence against them in the interrogation room.”

The report noted that “the use of any one of these means, certainly their combined use, constitutes cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment, and in some instances, torture. All are strictly forbidden under international law and Israeli law.”

Qaraqe said the ministry will file a complaint against the Israeli soldiers involved in the torture of Mukhaimar and Radwan, and their ill-treatment was denounced in the Monday cabinet meeting of the Palestinian Authority.

A statement from the cabinet said “the repressive practices and measures by the occupation authorities” against children were in “violation of international law, human rights conventions relating to children.” Ministers called on rights institutions and the UN to “shoulder its legal and humanitarian efforts to protect our children and our prisoners from brutal Israeli practices against them in prisons and detention centers.”

State sanctioned ill-treatment

Findings of the rights group report, however, indicated there was little hope for justice at the Israeli courts.

Since 2001, the report noted, “Palestinians interrogated by ISA agents have filed 645 complaints to the Ministry of Justice regarding the manner in which they were interrogated. Not one of the complaints led to a criminal investigation against the interrogator.”

The rights groups said the continued use of torture and ill-treatment against Palestinian detainees is justified by the state “by claiming the actions are necessary to thwart serious acts of terrorism.”

However, analysts with the groups said “This claim does not warrant violation of the absolute prohibition on torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment,” and added that “Israel’s attempts to divert the public debate to what it refers to as the ‘ticking-bomb dilemma’ is artificial.”

Analysts cite the testimonies of detainees like Mukhaimar and Radwan who were not suspected of serious offenses. Some of the witnesses interviewed for the report were accused of acts political or religious in nature, it said, and prison sentences ranged from a few months to two years at most.

“The ill-treatment of the detainees continued after their interrogation ended,” the report continued, “refuting the claim that the means of interrogation chosen were intended to thwart acts of terrorism.”

November 2, 2010 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

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