‘Israel flotilla raid was unlawful’
Al Jazeera | September 23, 2010
The UN Human Rights Council’s fact-finding mission has accused Israeli forces of violating international law when they raided a Gaza-bound aid flotilla.
The three UN-appointed human rights experts said in a report released on Wednesday that Israeli forces showed “incredible violence” during and after their raid on the aid flotilla that left eight Turkish activists and one Turkish-American killed.
The UN probe said there was “clear evidence to support prosecutions” against Israel for “wilful killing” and torture committed when its troops stormed the aid flotilla last May.
Israel’s military response to the flotilla “betrayed an unacceptable level of brutality” and violated international law “including international humanitarian and human rights law.” The three-member panel said.
“The conduct of the Israeli military and other personnel towards the flotilla passengers was not only disproportionate to the occasion but demonstrated levels of totally unnecessary and incredible violence.”
The report is scheduled to be debated by the Human Rights Council on Monday.
The report also rejected Israel’s stance that its forces acted in self-defence when they raided the flotilla, arguing that even those who did not attempt to stop Israeli soldiers from boarding the aid ships “received injuries, including fatal injuries.”
“It is apparent that no effort was made to minimise injuries at certain states of the operation and that the use of live fire was done in an extensive and arbitrary manner. The circumstances of the killing of at least six of the passengers were in a manner consistent with an extra-legal, arbitrary and summary execution.”
Israel’s reaction
Israel rejected the report as “biased” and “one-sided.”
“The report… is as biased and as one sided as the body that has produced it,” the statement said.
“Israel… is of the opinion that the flotilla incident is amply and sufficiently investigated as it is. All additional dealing with this issue is superfluous and unproductive.”
Israel insisted that it acted in line with international law, arguing that it had the right to retaliate against ships attempting to breach its blockade of the impoverished Gaza Strip.
However, the panel said that since Gaza was suffering from a humanitarian crisis on the day of the deadly raid, for this reason alone, Israel’s blockade is unlawful and cannot be sustained in law.
Hamas welcomed the report and told Al Jazeera that the findings show that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories violates human rights.
“More should now be done, the commander who led the raid should be taken to International Criminal Court.” Hamas said.
The fact-finding mission, chaired by Karl Hudson-Phillips, former judge of the International Criminal Court in The Hague, had travelled to Turkey, Jordan and Britain to interview witnesses and officials for the probe.
Desmond de Silva, former chief prosecutor of the Sierra Leone War Crimes Tribunal, and Shanthi Dairiam, as Malaysian human rights expert, are the other members of the panel.
Al Jazeera slams ISAF over arrests
Al Jazeera | September 22, 2010
Al Jazeera has called on the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) to immediately release two of its cameramen arrested in Afghanistan over the last 72 hours.
In a statement issued on Wednesday, Al Jazeera said the arrests were “an attempt by the Isaf leadership to suppress its comprehensive coverage of the Afghan war”.
The two Al Jazeera cameramen detained are Mohamed Nader and Rahmatullah Nekzad.
According to Nader’s wife, he was picked up from his home in southern Kandahar by Isaf troops on September 22.
 |
Rahmatullah Nekzad was arrested by Isaf in Afganistan |
She said she was woken up when the troops raided their home during the night. The troops then proceeded to arrest her husband, removing him from his bedroom, she said. The troops also confiscated some of their valuables.
Nekzad, the other cameraman working for Al Jazeera in a freelance capacity, was arrested two days earlier under similar circumstances in Ghazni province.
Isaf, though, in statements described both as “suspected Taliban media and propaganda facilitator[s]”.
“The insurgents use propaganda, often delivered through news organisations as a way to influence and in many cases intimidate the Afghan population,” Isaf wrote to Al Jazeera.
“Coalition and Afghan forces have a responsibility to interdict the activities of these insurgent propaganda networks. Individuals detained as a consequence will be investigated and if substantiated will remain in detention awaiting Afghan judicial review.
“Each case will be investigated and reviewed in accordance with standard Isaf and USFOR-A procedures,” the statement said.
Al Jazeera response
Al Jazeera, however, strongly rejected the claims and insisted the two were innocent.
“There are two very important issues here, one is the vagueness of the allegations against this cameraman: what exactly is the allegation of being ‘a propagandist’ – how do you define that?” Anthony Mills, from the International Press Institute in Geneva, told Al Jazeera.
“If it just means that as a cameraman he was doing his work as a journalist filming the violence which we know has been wrecking that country in recent years – I think one has to be really careful before jumping to these kinds of accusations and arresting the cameraman.”
If there are no concrete criminal charges behind the arrest, then they should be released immediately, Mills said.
The arrests follow a recent pattern of escalation by Isaf and coalition forces to target Al Jazeera journalists in Afghanistan.
Recently, Al Jazeera’s Afghan bureau chief Samir Allawi was threatened and pressed to change the editorial line.
Al Jazeera, however, said it will continue to maintain its coverage on the basis of fair and impartial journalism in line with its Code of Ethics and will not bias its coverage in favour of any party or coalition despite pressures being imposed on it.
As part of their work, cameramen and crew need to contact all sides of those involved in a particular issue, which in this case includes Isaf forces, the Afghanistan government as well as the Taliban.
These contacts should not be seen as a criminal offence but rather as a necessary component of the work that journalists undertake, the channel said.
Complaint lodged in case of 16-year-old girl used as a human shield
Defence for Children International – September 22, 2010
Ramallah – On Monday, 20 September 2010, DCI-Palestine and Adalah lodged a complaint with the Israeli Military Advocate General (MAG) arising out of the use by Israeli soldiers of a child as a human shield.
DCI-Palestine and Adalah have received credible evidence that at 3:30am, on 18 February 2010, a 16-year-old girl (D.A.) was used as a human shield by units of the Israeli army whilst conducting operations in the old city of Nablus, in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.
It is alleged that in the early hours of 18 February, Israeli soldiers broke down the door to the family home and stormed the house. According to sworn affidavits collected by DCI-Palestine the soldiers came to arrest the girl’s older brother, M.A. (17) and accused him of possessing a weapon. The soldiers beat M.A. and their younger brother, K.A., who is 15. Meanwhile, the girl was ordered to fetch her brother’s I.D. card and was followed by two soldiers into the bedroom. When D.A. entered her brother’s bedroom one of the soldier’s pointed his weapon at her and told her to stand in the corner. ‘I was shivering in fear,’ recalls D.A. ‘I gave the I.D. to one of the soldiers and one of them ordered me to sit on the bed. They pointed their weapons at me and one of them sat beside me. Some of them were taking pictures of the house with a digital camera.’ The soldier sitting next to D.A. on the bed then stood up and ordered her to lift the mattress to see what was underneath. ‘You lift the mattress and we step away,’ said one of the soldiers. ‘I did so while I was quivering because I was very scared. They moved three metres back towards the door while aiming their weapons at me.’ D.A. was crying and shivering the whole time but was not strong enough to lift the mattress. Eventually the soldiers ordered her to leave it and ordered her to search the closets and other items in the room whilst pointing their weapons at her. After the search was over the soldiers took D.A.’s brother away.
The practice of using human shields involves forcing civilians to directly assist in military operations or using them to shield an area or troops from attack. Both of these circumstances expose civilians to physical, and sometimes, mortal danger. Civilians are usually threatened and/or physically coerced into performing these tasks, most of the time at gunpoint. The practice is illegal under both international and Israeli domestic law.
Since April 2004, DCI-Palestine has documented 15 cases involving Palestinian children being used as human shields by the Israeli army. Fourteen of the 15 cases, occurred after the Israeli High Court of Justice ruled the practice to be illegal in October 2005, suggesting that the army is not effectively implementing the Court’s decision.
| # | Name | Date of incident | Age at incident | Nature of incident |
| 1 | M.B. | 15 Apr 04 | 13 | Tied to the bonnet of a military jeep for four hours during clashes. |
October 2005 Israeli High Court rules that the use of civilians as human shields is illegal |
||||
| 2 | A.E. | 26 Feb 07 | 15 | Forced at gunpoint to walk in front of soldiers during clashes. |
| 3 | J.D. | 28 Feb 07 | 11 | Forced at gunpoint to walk in front of soldiers and enter an abandoned house in search of combatants. |
| 4 | I.M. | 11 Apr 07 | 14 | Forced to sit for 15 minutes on the bonnet of a jeep during clashes. |
| 5 | O.G. | 11 Apr 07 | 15 | Forced to sit for 10 minutes on the bonnet of a jeep during clashes. |
| 6 | R.N. | 11 Jul 07 | 14 | Wounded whilst being forced to evacuate a house. |
| 7 | A.S. | 04 Jan 09 | 14 | Detained for 10 days and forced to search houses during war in Gaza. |
| 8 | A.A. | 05 Jan 09 | 15 | Detained close to military operations for four days during war in Gaza. |
| 9 | A.A. | 05 Jan 09 | 16 | Detained close to military operations for four days during war in Gaza. |
| 10 | N.A. | 05 Jan 09 | 17 | Detained close to military operations for four days during war in Gaza. |
| 11 | K.A. | 05 Jan 09 | 15 | Detained close to military operations for four days during war in Gaza. |
| 12 | H.A. | 05 Jan 09 | 12 | Detained close to military operations for four days during war in Gaza. |
| 13 | Majed R. | 15 Jan 09 | 9 | Forced at gunpoint to search bags thought to contain explosives during war in Gaza. |
| 14 | D.A. | 18 Feb 10 | 16 | Forced at gunpoint to search for a weapon. |
| 15 | S.A. | 16 Apr 10 | 14 | Forced at gunpoint to walk in front of soldiers during clashes. |
DCI-Palestine and Adalah reiterate that full and impartial investigations meeting international standards must be carried out in all cases involving the use of children as human shields, and that the Israeli army must be given adequate training and supervision to ensure compliance with the 2005 ruling of the Israeli High Court of Justice.
Related information:
• 11 March 2010 – Ha’aretz Newspaper – Two IDF soldiers charged with using 9-year-old ‘human shield’ in Gaza war
Israel Makes Meeting Another Arab a Crime
The ‘vague’ law is used to lock up activists
By Jonathan Cook | Palestine Chronicle | September 22, 2010
A vague security offence of ‘contact with a foreign agent’ is being used by Israel’s secret police, the Shin Bet, to lock up Arab political activists in Israel without evidence that a crime has been committed, human rights lawyers alleged this week.
The lawyers said the Shin Bet was exploiting the law to characterise innocent or accidental meetings between members of Israel’s large Arab minority and Arab foreign nationals as criminal activity.
The chances of such contacts have increased rapidly with advances in new technology and opportunities for Israel’s Arab citizens to travel to the wider Arab world, said Hussein Abu Hussein, a lawyer who represents security detainees.
The lawyers’ criticisms come at a particularly sensitive moment, as Israel has been widely accused of hounding two prominent political activists. Both were arrested on the grounds that they spied for the Lebanese militant group Hizbollah.
One, Omar Said, was released last week after a plea bargain in which the Shin Bet reduced a serious security charge of “aggravated espionage” to “contact with a foreign agent”.
The evidence it revealed suggested that Said had attended the meeting in Egypt unaware that his contact was a possible Hizbollah agent and that he had turned down an alleged offer to spy for the organisation.
Amnesty International has termed the continuing prosecution of the other defendant, Ameer Makhoul, as “pure harassment”.
As he was freed, Said, from Kfar Kana, near Nazareth, accused Israel of persecuting activists whose politics it does not like.
Abir Baker, a lawyer with the Adalah legal centre, said cases such as Said’s were intended to have a “chilling effect” on Israel’s Arab community, which comprises one-fifth of the population.
She said his arrest should be seen in the context of efforts by Israel to limit the right of Arab citizens to strengthen cultural and political ties to the rest of the Arab world.
Several of Israel’s Arab political parties, including the one Said belongs to, have been trying to inform the Arab world about the minority’s campaign for democratic reforms to end Israel’s status as a Jewish state.
A 2008 law removed the diplomatic immunity from Arab members of the Israeli parliament to visit Arab countries defined as enemy states.
One MP, Said Nafaa, who is to be tried over a visit to Syria with a party of Druze clerics in 2007, faces charges of contact with a foreign agent for meetings he held with Syrian politicians.
“There are laws to stop us from visiting countries classified as enemy states such as Syria and Lebanon, but Israel uses this particular offence to make us afraid to talk to any Arab national, whether at international conferences or online,” said Baker. “Israel wants to make us invisible.”
Khaled Ghanayim, a law professor at Haifa University, said misuse of the offence of contact with a foreign agent had grown with the right wing’s ascendance in Israel.
“Paradoxically, the Soviet Union advanced a similar policy for decades to prevent Jews in the Eastern bloc from meeting Israeli Jews. Israel and the West denounced that policy as a violation of their human rights, but today Israel is doing the same to its Arab citizens.”
Abu Hussein said the offence was particularly hard to challenge because, uniquely in Israeli criminal law, the onus to prove that the meeting did not harm state security rested with the defendant, not the prosecution.
The Shin Bet was unavailable for comment. But the agency is believed to be concerned that Hizbollah, which fired thousands of rockets into Israel during a month of hostilities in 2006, is trying to recruit spies among Israel’s Arab community.
According to the Shin Bet’s website, Hizbollah is particularly keen to identify the sites of Israeli security facilities in the north that might be targeted in a future confrontation and gauge the Jewish public’s mood.
Gideon Ezra, a former deputy head of the Shin Bet and now a member of parliament, said: “The state of Israel does not seek to put people in jail, but to carry out proper investigations. There is always a gap between what is known at first and the final outcome.”
Baker, who is studying the use of the “contact” offence, said there was a clear pattern in which the Shin Bet started its investigation with a serious security violation, such as transferring information to the enemy, which carries a life sentence, in addition to the allegation of contact.
“That way an impression is created with the public and the media that the suspect was harming state security.”
As the investigation proceeded, she said, the Shin Bet typically dropped the serious charge and sought a plea bargain on contact with a foreign agent. The charge carries a sentence of up to seven years in jail.
Defendants, faced with secret evidence and limited rights as security prisoners, were under pressure to agree, Abu Hussein said.
Baker said it was difficult to be sure exactly how often the law was being used but pointed to several notable recent cases.
In 2005, Sheikh Raed Salah, the head of the main wing of the Islamic Movement in Israel, and Suleiman Aghbaria, mayor of the city of Umm al Fahm, served jail terms of 30 months and 46 months, respectively, after agreeing a plea bargain.
The Shin Bet’s case that the pair belonged to a terrorist organisation, Hamas, and supplied it with weapons, collapsed during the trial.
In the most recent case, both Said and Makhoul claimed they were tortured while they were held without access to a lawyer.
Ghanayim said it was notable that both men were publicly involved in activities to challenge Israeli policies. Makhoul is known to have angered the Shin Bet by leading demonstrations against Israel’s attack on Gaza in winter 2008 and by heading calls for a boycott of Israel.
In the past the Shin Bet has warned that it would use all the powers at its disposal to “thwart” political activities it regarded as a threat to the state’s legitimacy.
Baker said use of the law against contact with a foreign agent had begun shortly after the start of the second intifada in 2000 to prevent Arab citizens meeting Palestinians in the occupied territories.
Last year, in a case that attracted wide attention in Israel, Rawi Sultani, a 24-year-old activist from Tira in central Israel, was sentenced to five and a half years after attending an international Arab summer camp in Morocco at which he was approached by a Hizbollah agent.
Mr Sultani was originally accused of conspiring to assassinate Gabi Ashkenazi, Israel’s chief of staff. The charge was dropped but he was convicted of giving information to the enemy by revealing that he had visited a gym used by Ashkenazi.
– Jonathan Cook is a writer and journalist based in Nazareth, Israel. His latest book is “Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East” (Pluto Press). His website is www.jkcook.net.
Israel denying PLC member access to hospital
Ma’an – 20/09/2010
RAMALLAH — Israeli authorities are preventing a sick Palestinian lawmaker from accessing health care, a former European parliamentarian said Monday.
Palestinian Legislative Council member Khalida Jarrar was advised by doctors to undergo urgent brain scans more than two months ago, after tests at a Ramallah hospital revealed concerning results, former European Parliament vice president Luisa Morgantini said.
The former EU official said Jarrar was advised to go to Amman, Jordan immediately as Palestinian hospitals were not equipped to administer the scans required. However for more than six weeks, Israeli security services have prevented Jarrar’s travel due to “security reasons,”
Jarrar’s lawyers obtained an official letter dated 17 August from Israel’s Civil Administration in the West Bank, which stated there was “no security reason” to prevent the lawmaker’s travel abroad. However, Jarrar said on 30 August she attempted to cross the Allenby Bridge into Jordan and Israeli soldiers prevented her passage, citing “security reasons.”
Jarrar is a lawmaker affiliated with the Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and has never been incriminated in, or related to, any violent act, Morgantini added, noting that depriving Jarrar of her right to health showed “only one of many tragic and dark sides of the Israeli military occupation.”
Morgantini appealed to the European Parliament to request that Israel authorities allow Jarrar to access urgently needed medical attention in Jordan, and “to guarantee health and life rights to the Palestinian people.”
Israel to cut off East Jerusalem villages
Ma’an – 19/09/2010
JERUSALEM — Israel began construction on Wednesday to separate Palestinian neighborhoods in occupied East Jerusalem from the rest of the city, a local committee leader said.
Head of the anti-settlement committee in the Shu’fat refugee camp Khader Salamah said Israeli authorities had erected 9- 12-meter concrete blocks around the military checkpoint at the camp’s entrance, isolating Ras Al-Khamis, neighboring the camp.
The construction would increase the suffering of the 15,000 residents of the camp, particularly elderly or sick residents and schoolchildren, Salamah said.
Israel’s planned construction extended to the Dahiyet As-Salam, Ras Shahadah and Anata villages, which when completed would affect the daily life of around 40,000 residents, Salamah said, adding that residents had instructed a lawyer, Dani Zaidman, to begin legal proceedings against Israeli authorities who had confiscated lands without notifying Palestinian owners.
The local committee was preparing to notify President Mahmoud Abbas and the PLO negotiations department of the consequences of Israel’s plan to isolate Palestinian neighborhoods. Israeli authorities were also at the final stages of constructing a new checkpoint at the entrance to Shu’fat refugee camp similar to the main checkpoints in the separation wall at Qalandiya and Hizma, Salamah said.
During the Jewish holiday Yom Kippur on Friday and Saturday, Israeli forces set up cement road blocks at the entrances to several suburbs of Jerusalem, including Al-Isawiya, northeast of Jerusalem and Sur Bahir in the south.
Fierce clashes had erupted on Thursday at Al-Isawiya, during which nine Palestinians were injured, including a paramedic, and six Palestinians were detained, medic Mohammad E’Beid said.
The Occupation’s Many Faces
By Joharah Baker for MIFTAH | September 14, 2010
There is an overriding reality that cannot be dismissed here in Palestine. Israel controls just about every aspect of our lives. No matter how we try to turn it around, candy coat it or look at it from a “different perspective” this is the truth and the main reason why no partial agreement will ever hold.
One only has to travel in the occupied Palestinian territories to know this to be true. Over the Eid Al Fitr – the Muslim holiday following the month of Ramadan – the Qalandiya checkpoint between Ramallah and Jerusalem (itself only a recent reality) was jam packed to kingdom come. People spent literally two, three and four hours trying to make their way out of a one-kilometer area because the Israelis had decided to block all traffic going out of Ramallah towards Jerusalem. It did not matter that people had plans, needed to get back to their children and parents or in the worst case scenario, get to a hospital. As the iron gate opened in the separation wall at Qalandiya, a group of young Israeli soldiers stood with their weapons cocked and smirks across their faces as they watched desperate Palestinians trying to inch their way out of the mess. Rather than the [Israeli] authority responsible for the chaos trying to alleviate the situation, instead young Palestinian men exited their cars and tried to direct traffic.
It is not only the traffic and checkpoints Israel controls. Palestinians across the West Bank are plagued by water shortages. In my Ramallah-area village, the water is cut off four of the seven days a week. Families have to ration out the water usage because if tanks are emptied there is absolutely no way to fill them again until the water comes back on. This is not because there is no water in the West Bank, contrary to common belief. According to a report issued by the Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem, Israel controls and exploits 80 percent of ground water from the Mountain Aquifer, which is the largest water source in the region. The remaining 20 percent is basically leftovers distributed among the Palestinian population.
To give a more concrete idea of just how much Israel controls the water resources and distributes it to its own people’s benefit, according to the World Health Organization in 2008, the minimal daily consumption per capita should be 100 liters. In Israel, the per capita consumption reaches 242 liters while the Palestinians consume an average of 73 liters a day. In some places, the WHO says, Palestinian consumption is as low as 37 liters.
Settlers illegally living on Palestinian land have no shortage of water. Just pass by a Jewish settlement, past the lush greenery and the swimming pools and it’s more than obvious that Jewish settlers never have to think about whether they will have enough water to shower or not. Reports have indicated that in places like the Jordan Valley, Jewish settlers use up to six times more water than Palestinians living in the same place.
So, when the Palestinians say they are not continuing with peace talks if Israel continues building in settlements, this is hardly an unreasonable demand. On the contrary, this is the least of the least they can demand given the detrimental effects settlements have had and continue to have on the Palestinians.
Right now, as the negotiating parties head to Sharm Al Sheikh for the second round of peace talks launched in Washington on September 2, Israel is already casting blame on the other side. It is calling the Palestinians’ demand that Israel renew it settlement freeze – already severely riddled with flaws – an “all or nothing strategy” which could ultimately derail any peace efforts. Israel is portraying the Palestinians as the intransigent party for their very legitimate demand of halting settlement construction. Many Palestinians even see this as way too little and a lot too late, saying the leadership should demand nothing less than a complete halt to settlement construction and a dismantlement of settlement structures in accordance with international law.
However, Israel has no plans of relinquishing its settlement enterprise in the West Bank for one reason, which is its control of the land and consequently of the oppressed people living on it. Since its occupation of the West Bank in 1967 Israeli governments have encouraged settlement growth by offering enticing economic incentives such as subsidized housing and reduced utility expenses. By keeping a presence in the West Bank through its settlements, the bypass roads, separation wall and the checkpoints such as Qalandiya, it maintains complete control over the populace, all under the false guise of its own security.
While Israel continues its rants about how the Palestinians are unreasonable and are placing obstacles in the way of peace, it is worthwhile to remind the world what it is like to live under occupation. Control and oppression is multi-faceted. Israel’s military presence and confrontations with the occupying army are definitely important features of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem but they are not the only ones. The overall control Israel wields over Palestinian lives is suffocating because it is so comprehensive. Leaving and entering the country is controlled by Israel, entering Jerusalem, working inside the Green Line, exporting and importing goods, building a house, tending to your land (if you have access to it) and even the amount of water you are allowed to consume are all controlled by the mighty hand of Israel’s occupying power.
So, before blame is laid or the world judges us too quickly, let us all remember the overriding reason we are at the negotiating table at all. Then after the occupation is duly mentioned, just imagine spending four hours trying to get home from a 45 minute trip only to find no water for your shower.
Joharah Baker is a Writer for the Media and Information Department at the Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of Global Dialogue and Democracy (MIFTAH). She can be contacted at mid@miftah.org.
Canada Colludes in Suppressing Palestinians
By Yves Engler / Dissident Voice / September 17th, 2010
Current peace negotiations between Israeli and Palestinian officials are unlikely to end, let alone reverse, Palestinian dispossession. The power imbalance between the sides is simply too great. While Canada could be part of the solution, so far it has been part of the problem.
The largest Palestinian political force, Hamas, has been excluded from these U.S.-sponsored talks, while the electoral mandate of the Palestinian representative, Mahmoud Abbas, expired 20 months ago. Abbas, who arbitrarily extended his term as Palestinian Authority President, is heavily dependent on countries such as the U.S. and Canada, and this has undermined his negotiating position.
After Hamas won Canadian-monitored and facilitated legislative elections in early 2006, Stephen Harper made Canada the first country to cut its assistance to the Palestinian Authority. The goal was to sow division among Palestinians, and it worked. Immediately after the Palestinian unity government collapsed in mid 2007, the Canadian International Development Agency contributed $8 million “in direct support to the new [Abbas-led] government.”
Ottawa pumped millions of dollars into training a Palestinian security force “to ensure that the PA [Palestinian Authority] maintains control of the West Bank against Hamas,” as Canadian ambassador to Israel, Jon Allen, was quoted as saying by the Canadian Jewish News.
U.S. Lt.-Gen. Keith Dayton, in charge of organizing the 10,000-member Palestinian force supported by Canada, never admitted that he was strengthening Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah against Hamas, but to justify his program Dayton argued that Iran and Syria funded and armed Hamas. Bolstering Fatah to counteract the growing strength of Hamas was the impetus for Dayton’s mission, yet the broader aim was, and is, to build a force to patrol Israel’s occupation.
“We don’t provide anything to the Palestinians,” noted Dayton, “unless it has been thoroughly coordinated with the state of Israel and they agree to it.” For instance, Israel’s internal intelligence agency, the Shin-Bet, vets all of the Palestinian recruits.
Brigadier-General Michael Herzog, chief of staff to Defence Minister Ehud Barak, explained the Israeli military’s position: “We’re very happy with what he’s [Dayton] doing.”
The Israelis support Dayton’s force because it keeps the population in the West Bank under control. On August 25, Abbas’s security force suppressed a demonstration in Ramallah against the current negotiations, which are taking place without preconditions and while Israel continues to build the wall as well as Jewish settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Similarly, 20 months ago, “Dayton’s men” (as they are derisively called by Palestinians) disrupted demonstrations in the West Bank against Israel’s 22-day assault on Gaza that left 1,400 dead.
The new Palestinian security forces are primarily trained in Jordan at the U.S.- built International Police Training Center (created to train Iraqi security). In October 2009 the Wall Street Journal reported, “[Palestinian] recruits are trained in Jordan by Jordanian police, under the supervision of American, Canadian, and British officers.”
In the West Bank, 18 Canadian troops work with six British and 10 U.S. soldiers under Dayton’s command. “The Canadian contribution is invaluable,” explained Dayton. Canadians are particularly useful because “U.S. personnel have travel restrictions when operating in the West Bank. But, our British and Canadian members do not.” Calling them his “eyes and ears” Dayton said, “The Canadians … are organized in teams we call road warriors, and they move around the West Bank daily visiting Palestinian security leaders, gauging local conditions.”
Ottawa has invested heavily in Dayton’s mission. In January 2007, then foreign affairs minister, Peter MacKay, offered an immediate $1.2-million for Dayton’s mission, and during a joint press conference in Jerusalem, then U.S. secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, said Dayton “has a Canadian counterpart with whom he works very closely.” When Foreign Affairs Minister, Maxime Bernier, traveled to Israel in January 2008, he met Dayton, and last October Canada’s chief of defence, Walt Naynczyk, visited Canada’s “road warriors” during a trip to meet Israeli military officials.
Part of the U.S. Security Coordinator office in Jerusalem, the Canadian military mission in the West Bank (dubbed Operation PROTEUS) now includes RCMP officers as well as officials from Foreign Affairs, Justice Canada and the Canadian Border Services Agency. According to deputy Foreign Affairs Minister, Peter Kent, Operation PROTEUS is Canada’s “second largest deployment after Afghanistan” and it receives “most of the money” from a five-year $300 million Canadian “aid” program to support the security apparatus of Abbas’ Palestinian Authority.
As the weaker side, Palestinians need countries like the U.S. and Canada to pressure Israel to return land it occupies against international law. Unfortunately, the current negotiations have begun with Canada and the U.S. undermining Palestinian unity and strengthening the long-suffering population’s most compliant leaders.
Yves Engler is the author of The Black Book of Canadian Foreign Policy
Novel gets to truth of Sabra and Shatila
Matthew Cassel, The Electronic Intifada, 17 September 2010
 |
Israel’s invasion of Lebanon and subsequent 22-year-long occupation has been the focus of three acclaimed Israeli films in recent years: Lebanon, Waltz with Bashir and Beaufort tell the story of this era from the perspective of the occupiers. All young men serving in the Israeli army, the films’ protagonists question their roles in Lebanon. However, this narrative perspective leads the viewer to empathize with the occupier and thus do little other than reinforce a simplistic falsification of Israel’s history as a country always conflicted when waging necessary wars of self-defense. This is the narrative that continues to dominate the Western media.
Not one of these films makes the slightest attempt to humanize Israel’s victims or tell the story from their perspective. In contrast, UK author Mischa Hiller’s first novel, Sabra Zoo is told through the eyes of a young man named Ivan. Sabra Zoo follows the adventures of this son of a Dutch mother and Palestinian father who serves as an officer in the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in Beirut during the most intense period of Israel’s invasion of Lebanon.
Ivan’s thrilling story starts in the weeks following the evacuation of the PLO after more than a decade of being based in Lebanon and ends soon after the Israeli invasion of Beirut. The evacuation of the PLO was followed by the infamous massacres at the Sabra and Shatila Palestinian refugee camps in southern Beirut committed 28 years ago this week by right-wing militias allied with Israel. Because of his multicultural background and European passport, Ivan acts as an interpreter for foreign nongovernmental organization (NGO) workers in Sabra and Shatila and also runs packages and undertakes other menial yet dangerous tasks for a presumed PLO operative working covertly in West Beirut.
Sabra Zoo leads the reader through various aspects of Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon in the midst of the country’s 15-year-long civil war. Yet Hiller attempts to ground the story through its protagonist. As an 18-year-old, Ivan acts like many other young men, constantly preoccupied with thoughts of sex and alcohol. At points throughout the story, however, Ivan’s character comes across as insensitive and unbelievable for the way he jumps from the horrors faced by people in the camps to his more immediate obsession with getting laid.
Yet, like most who witness war at a young age, Ivan shows a wisdom that others only get much later in life, if ever at all. He’s deeply disturbed through his exposure to Palestinian children and families affected by cluster bombs and other ordnance and is distraught when he has to translate the doctors’ unfortunate prognoses to patients and their families. But he never shies away. Ivan shows incredible courage, learning to deal with the siege and attack while continuing his various jobs.
Ivan’s character is also able to offer readers a glimpse of Western perception of the war through the eyes of foreign NGO workers and journalists with whom he collaborates throughout the story.
A foreign cameraperson covering the war tells Ivan while editing video of cluster bomb victims that doing so is a “‘waste of time.'” He explains: “‘People in the West don’t want to see too much reality over dinner. All the gory stuff gets edited out in London or New York … I think if they showed the real effects of war we wouldn’t have it anymore.'” Through this character, Hiller presents a universality that any Western journalist who has covered conflict in this region is aware of: the horrific effects of war as seen on the ground are much different than the sanitized imagery the media sells in the West.
However, throughout the book Hiller leaves the reader frustrated by not narrating who fired the cluster bombs, even making it difficult to understand who is laying siege to Beirut. The most problematic part comes when Hiller introduces the reader to the Nakba, or “the catastrophe” as Ivan translates it while working with refugees in the camp, with no mention of the ethnic cleansing that took place by Zionist militias who forced 750,000 Palestinians to leave their homes in what is today considered Israel. Sure to mention that “back home was Palestine,” the story goes no further to describe the circumstances in which Palestinians, soon to be massacred in refugee camps, had to leave their homes in the first place. While a reader familiar with the history of this region can easily deduce that Israel is responsible for the Nakba, firing cluster bombs and laying siege to Beirut, others might be left wondering. This is a novel and not a history text book, but as an historical novel, such context is important.
Despite this, Sabra Zoo makes viscerally clear the brutality of Israel’s invasion, unlike the skewed history presented in Waltz with Bashir, which also focuses on the massacres. Waltz’s portrayal of mostly benign Israeli soldiers who merely fired a few shots on their way to Beirut and then lit flares over the camp, mostly oblivious to the massacring happening below, is contradictory to both history and Hiller’s narrative. When Israel finally entered Beirut after a brutal assault that killed nearly 20,000 Lebanese and Palestinians and injured many more, the PLO had already left and thus the invading army faced practically no resistance at the Lebanese capital. “‘Who will resist them now?'” asks Ivan’s PLO friend, frightened after the fighters had left and turned their weapons over to the Lebanese authorities. Hiller’s narrative exposes the utter cowardice of Israel’s invasion of a city unable to defend itself as well as its responsibility for one of the most gruesome events of recent decades.
Retelling the story of an event that took place 28 years ago may seem trivial to some who want to remain focused on the present and future, rather than with events of the past. But before Beirut — now one of the world’s most popular tourist destinations — becomes a city that can be enjoyed by foreigners and its inhabitants alike, those who have devastated it before with impunity and are threatening to do so again must first be brought to justice. Sabra Zoo is recommended reading for anyone hoping to better understand Israel’s invasion of Beirut and Palestinian refugees’ long struggle for justice that continues to this day.
Matthew Cassel is based in Beirut, Lebanon and is Assistant Editor of The Electronic Intifada. His website is http://justimage.org.
Israeli army assassinates Hamas leader
TULKAREM — Israeli forces entered the home of a Hamas leader in Tulkarem on Friday morning and shot him three times in the neck and chest before withdrawing, family members said.
Medics at the Thabit Thabit Hospital in Tulkarem confirmed that 38-year-old Iyad As’ad Shelbaya, a known Hamas leader, was dead, killed by three bullets to the neck and chest.
Shelbaya lived in the Nur Shams refugee camp east of Tulkarem. Security sources said he was assassinated during a raid on his home at 2:30 a.m. on Friday morning.
Officials said several armored vehicles entered the area to carry out the assassination. Palestinian forces were said to have coordinated with the Israeli military in getting Shelbaya’s body from his home to the hospital.
Accounts from family members say Shelbaya’s brother Mohammed was abducted by soldiers earlier in the morning, and forced to show officers the way to Iyad’s home.
Once at the home, witnesses said soldiers placed explosives at the main door, destroying the entry way and entering the home.
Several soldiers were then described entering the home, at which point three gunshots were heard. Medics confirmed three shots killed the man, one in the neck and two in the chest.
Shelbaya’s body was then removed from the home.
Mohammed told Ma’an that he heard his brother Iyad calling from his bedroom when the soldiers entered the home, asking “Who is it? Who is it? Who is it?”
“He asked the question three times, and that was followed by three bullets. He was alone sleeping in the house, his wife was visiting family in Jenin,” he said.
See photos of the scene of the assassination here.
An Israeli military spokesman confirmed the death, but gave a different version of events.
“During an arrest raid in the Palestinian village of Nur Shams, one suspect began running for the force,” the spokesman said. “He did not comply with soldiers who requested that he halt.”
The spokesman said that soldiers “felt threatened” by the behavior of the man, and “fired on the suspect.”
Israeli rights group says military report not likely
A field worker for the Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem who investigated the scene called the slaying “unjustified.”
Speaking with Ma’an less than 12 hours after the attack, Eid As-Sa’di said Israeli statements as to how the death occurred were implausible.
“It would have been possible to arrest him, or just as easily to injure him,” he said.
The rights worker said that the room where Iyad was shot was no more than three meters by three meters, and expressed skepticism over the report that the known Hamas leader had come running at troops, that soldiers had had time to warn him to stop, and then shoot.
As-Sa’di said that an investigation by B’Tselem was ongoing, and said details of the event were still emerging.
Dozens detained overnight
During the raid on the camp, nine other Hamas affiliates were detained from their homes.
Security sources identified those detained as: Mohmmad Abu Al-Kheir, Kamal Masharqah, Tayseer Jaber, Sheikh Mahmoud Al-Ghoul, Ashraf Fouda, Nedal Abu Helal, Nedal Abu Tharefah, Mohammad Abu Deiyah and Ahmad A’sa’s.
Fourth assassination in nine months
On 26 December 2009, Israeli forces entered the city of Nablus, proceeded toward the homes of Raed Sakarji, 38, Anan Subih, 33, and Ghassan Abu Sharkh, 40, in two cases entered the homes and shot the men, and in a third, executed Abu Sharkh in front of his home.
A statement from the Israeli military said soldiers “entered Nablus in an attempt to locate and arrest the men suspected of involvement in the murder of Meir Avshalom Hai this past Thursday.” The statement said the deaths were provoked by the suspects.
Testimony from witnesses, and blood evidence in hallways and bedrooms, showed the men were shot in their homes.
“We were sleeping in our bedroom, not bigger than six square meters, when Israeli soldiers began yelling ‘get out, get out.’ I thought I was dreaming. When I heard the Israeli soldiers and their police dogs outside the room, that was when I realized it was real,” Tahani, the wife of Raed Sarakji told Ma’an at the time.
Tahani said her husband told soldiers he would get out of the house, so they started shooting through the door and the windows. “He fell between my hands bleeding. I started crying ‘they killed him, they killed him.’ Then soldiers broke the door and got in. He was already dead, but they continued to riddle his body with bullets to make sure he was killed.”
A similar account was given by the cousin of Ghassan Abu Sharkh, “Everything happened very quickly… when we opened the door and saw the soldiers, two masked collaborators pointed to my brother Ghassan who was walking down the stairs. Before I knew it he was being shot. I couldn’t really make sense of what was going on at all. Then an Israeli officer asked me whether the dead man was Ghassan, and I said yes. ‘Good, then ask everybody to leave the house,’ the officer said.”
“I was standing close to Ghassan when they killed him. They could have detained him very easily. He passed to join my brother Nayif who was killed by Israeli forces a few years ago [2004].”
The third account was given by Farid Subih, 45, whose younger brother, Anan Subih, 33 was killed.
“At 3 a.m., dozens of Israeli troops surrounded our four-storey building. They blew open the the main gate then started shooting randomly and throwing grenades in all directions. Anan was inside, and he asked everybody to leave the building to avoid being hurt.”
He continued, “We headed to the nearby house of the Al-‘Amoudi family. Then soldiers entered the house with police dogs, and they started throwing more grenades, and a fire erupted in the warehouse full of plastic chairs and sponge material.
“My brother was not armed, but we could see soldiers continue to ransack the house. For three hours, we didn’t know what was going on. After the soldiers left, we found Anan dead … bullets tore all his body and bones.”
According to the Israeli military, “When he was killed, Annan Tzubach [Subih] was armed with a handgun and hiding two M16 assault rifles, an additional handgun, and ammunition.” The same statement, however, said that “During an attempt to arrest him tonight [Saturday], Annan was killed after an exchange of fire with the IDF while he was found in a hiding place along with weapons and ammunition.”
Seven civilians killed in US raid near Fallujah
Al-Manar TV – 16/09/2010
At least seven Iraqi civilians were killed during a joint US-Iraqi raid in the outskirts of Fallujah on Wednesday, in the deadliest incident involving U.S. occupation troops since the United States declared an end to its combat operations in Iraq on Aug. 31.
Iraqi officials said eight civilians were killed, while the U.S. occupation military claimed four suspected members of al-Qaeda in Iraq and two civilians died in a firefight that erupted as forces tried to capture a presumed member of the group who allegedly was responsible for attacks in the region.
Despite the official end of the U.S. combat mission, about 4,500 U.S. Special Operations forces remain in Iraq.
Iraqi officials in Anbar province said U.S. and Iraqi troops began raiding houses at 3 a.m. in Jubil, about 30 miles west of Baghdad. Among the dead, they said, were a 70-year-old man and three of his sons, who were all asleep in their yard when they were killed by a grenade. A fourth son died at a hospital, the Iraqi officials said.
Troops also entered a second house in the area and killed Yaseen Kassar, a former Iraqi military commander, Iraqi officials said, as well as two people in a third house.
It was not immediately clear whether the troops had been looking for Kassar or any of the other people killed.
“The security situation in Fallujah may deteriorate because of what happened today,” said Abdulfattah Izghear, a local city council member. “We asked U.S. troops and the Iraqi government to explain this unjustified action and this naked aggression against civilians.”
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who is in charge of the Iraqi Special Forces, ordered an investigation into the incident, the state-run network al-Iraqiya reported.
Featured Video
Broke Princes: Saudi Arabia’s Powder Keg
or go to
Aletho News Archives – Video-Images
From the Archives
Registered Israeli foreign agent driving contrived campus antisemitism crisis
By Wyatt Reed | The Grayzone | December 17, 2023
Lawsuits accusing top US universities of harboring antisemitism all originate from one source: a corporate law firm that fielded the pro-settler ex-US ambassador to Israel, and which was registered as a foreign agent of an Israeli principal as recently as 2021.
The firm now represents professional Israel lobby activists posing as victimized “Jewish students” and seeking to crush the free speech rights of Palestine solidarity activists. … continue
Blog Roll
Aletho News- Israeli Soldiers Inadvertently Prove Their Own Genocidal Guilt
- Ukraine arrests woman who exposed Azov battalion’s ‘torture chamber’
- Did Israel lose the midterms?
- How Iran defeated Trump’s Israel First GOP
- De-escalating the conflict: What the OSCE, the UN, and Europe are (not) doing to prevent war
- Desperate For A Renewed Iran War, Israel Dusts Off The WMD Deception.
- US Elections Offer Choice Between ‘Bad and Worse’ as Both Parties Serve War Lobby – ex-UN Expert
- Ghalibaf warns US government not to betray voters who rejected war
- Broke Princes: Saudi Arabia’s Powder Keg
- Albania’s Crisis: Rama, Israeli Investments and the Demand for Accountability
- If Americans Knew
- An error has occurred; the feed is probably down. Try again later.
- No Tricks Zone
- New Study: The Net Fossil Fuel Contribution To Rising Atmospheric CO2 Has Been Zero For 500 Years
- Germany’s Green Energy Transition Becoming Increasingly Expensive…Another 6 Trillion Euros!
- Sudden Stratospheric Warming, Powerful El Niño Combination May Lead To Extreme Europe Cold, Energy Crisis!
- Two New Studies Find Thwaites Glacier Melt Cannot Be Driven By Human Activity Or A Warming Ocean
- E-Cars Reduce CO2 Emissions By Only 41% Compared To Internal Combustion Engine Vehicles
- Predictions Made By Renowned Climate Professor Over Past Decades Have Been Proven To Be Poor
- New Study Suggests Large Regions Of The Pacific Ocean Have Been Cooling For The Last 80 Years
- Germany’s Green Energy Debacle: High Energy Costs Force Kahla Porzellan to Close After 182 Years!
- New Study: 50 Years Of The Most Aggressive ‘Net Zero’ Policies Can Only Affect The Global Climate By 0.03°C
- US September “Heat” Was No Record…Many Records Set Decades Ago
