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“It is time for us to put an end to this occupation”

Hassan Mousa and Jody McIntyre writing from Nilin, occupied West Bank, Live from Palestine, 18 December 2009

Hassan Mousa being arrested during a demonstration at the wall. (Activestills)


Situated just west of Ramallah, the Palestinian village of Nilin has lost huge swathes of land to Israel’s settlements and its wall in the occupied West Bank. In a year and a half of resisting construction of the wall, five villagers have been murdered by the Israeli military while demonstrating. Hassan Mousa is a coordinator of the Nilin Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements and the uncle of Ahmed Mousa, an 11-year-old boy who was the first villager from Nilin to be killed by the Israeli army.

The following is Hassan Mousa’s story as told to The Electronic Intifada contributor Jody McIntyre:

On 29 July 2008, while the apartheid wall was still in the planning stages, there was an evening demonstration here in Nilin. We wanted to send a message to the Israeli settlers who were already living on and stealing our land, that this wall is being built at your request, so you must pressure your government to stop construction, and put an end to the suffering of the Palestinians living here. We knew that they were saying the wall was being built for security, but we believe that it is purely a land grab and an extension of the existing illegal settlements built on our land since 1967. So that was the message of the demonstration, that you can never have security while others are suffering.

At the time, there was no real presence of soldiers, just a single jeep parked far away from the place of the demonstrators. When they suddenly heard the sound of the demonstration coming toward the planned site of the wall, the jeep drove up very close. The young people started moving the children and old people back toward the village, as they were understandably concerned for their well-being.

As my nephew Ahmed was walking back his sandal slipped off his foot. He put his bag down to get it but the bullet was faster. According to eye-witnesses, three soldiers got out of the jeep; the first shot a sound bomb, the second shot a round of rubber-coated steel bullets, and the third shot directly at the head of my nephew with a live bullet. He was shot deliberately. The people nearby tried to rescue him — they said that while they were carrying him toward the ambulance, pieces of his brain slipped down onto their shoulders. It was a serious experience for them … they couldn’t understand how brutal and savage the soldiers had been, to kill a ten-year-old child.

Ahmed died immediately, but the paramedics needed to wait until they arrived at the hospital for an official confirmation. When the news of his death came out in the media, the Israeli army announced that there had been a case of killing in Nilin, but that it had been a result of internal conflict between families in the village. They actually said that he was killed by another Palestinian!

The Palestinian Authority decided to conduct an autopsy, and it was found that he was killed by a live bullet. After that, the army admitted to killing him, but didn’t bother to give a reason. We are in the process of taking the army to court now.

Ahmed was a very active person among his friends, and loved by all. He was helpful and obedient to his parents. He never harmed anybody. For me, he was my favorite nephew, and his parents knew that. I used to tell them not to shout at him, because he was so sweet. His death truly affected me, and I have his poster displayed in my house. But the image of Ahmed is in my heart.

Ahmed Mousa being carried through his funeral. (Activestills)

Ahmed’s mother was especially hurt by his loss. She was pregnant at the time. She already had four sons, and was hoping that God would bless her with a daughter. After the medical checkup she was told, “Congratulations, you will have a daughter.” But after he died, she said “Oh God! I want a son so I can name him Ahmed.” I told all the nurses in the town to be close to her after Ahmed’s death so she could keep her baby. It was very difficult for her, and she would often faint, completely unaware of her surroundings. But thanks to the women around her, she managed to overcome the problems and give birth to a beautiful daughter.

The news came to his brothers as a huge shock, because they had been playing together in their uncle’s house just an hour earlier. Ahmed told them he wanted to go home to take something from the fridge, left the house, and went towards the demonstration.

It was very difficult for his brothers. Sometimes they make a mistake and call one another Ahmed, because they are so familiar with his name. At first they couldn’t enter his room. At night they would dream about him, and wake up in the morning to tell their father that they had seen Ahmed and he was happy.

Now that time has passed they have gotten used to the idea of his death, but they keep his pictures on the walls of their room and on the computer. If you go to his house, you feel as if Ahmed is still present. He was very dear to them.

At the funeral, I told the people that Ahmed’s blood planted the seeds for thousands of people to follow in his footsteps, and more than a year and a half later, this has been proven. Four more have died since, because they decided to follow in his footsteps.

Killing Ahmed did not suppress our demonstrations, it made our demonstrations stronger. The Israeli army soon realized that the murder of Ahmed was a very basic mistake in Nilin.

The second martyr, Yousif Amira, was from the same neighborhood as Ahmed, and on the morning of Ahmed’s funeral he asked the people, “If I am martyred, will you make a huge funeral for me as you did for Ahmed?” That same day he was killed near the entrance of Nilin. He spent three days brain-dead, and then died. We accomplished his wish of a huge funeral, with sweets thrown from rooftops as his body was carried through the streets.

The blood of Ahmed has aroused a patriotic passion in Nilin and awareness that the wall is illegal and we must resist it. I believe that the killing of Ahmed will be the start of our victory in Nilin.

Almost 18 months after his death, the wall in Nilin is now complete. According to the Israeli military’s plans, it was supposed to be completed within six months, but we succeeded in delaying construction for another six. In the past we could get to the bulldozers that were digging on our land and stand in front of them. Sometimes we would get them to move back, sometimes the guys from the villages would break the bulldozers with stones and stop work for a long time.

At first the wall was built as a mesh and barbed wire fence, but they soon realized that it was useless. Here in Nilin, we have a practical way of resisting the wall, so we would reach the fence and cut it in many parts every Friday. So, after the killing of Akil Srour in June of this year, the fifth person to be killed during our nonviolent demonstrations, the army decided that they would stop invading the town as they had done in the past. Before, we would find the soldiers waiting for us in the trees 300 to 400 meters away from the wall, just to stop us from getting there. Instead, they decided to change the wall from a fence to concrete blocks. Nilin became the first village in the West Bank to have these concrete blocks — the concrete version of the wall was previously built in the main population centers, but never before in a village.

Despite this, we managed to damage the concrete wall twice. The army was in a state of shock. What is happening here is unnatural. The people of Nilin are not ordinary, and that is because of the high price we have paid for our resistance, and the suffering we have seen. It is the Israeli army’s aggression, and Israeli crimes, that makes the people more united and more determined to resist.

Now, they have tied all the concrete blocks together with a huge strip of iron and massive screws … again, this is the first place this has happened. They don’t want us to pull the wall down again, but I am sure the people are going to discover many miracles here. We will invent a way to damage the wall again.

Our hope is that the model of nonviolent resistance practiced here in Nilin can spread across Palestine. At the moment, we feel the massive presence of soldiers in Nilin, but if other villages and towns were having one demonstration per week, the number of soldiers would be distributed. The army would be in a state of confusion. We Palestinians have come to the conclusion that the Israeli government does not want peace, so it is time for us to put an end to this occupation.

Jody McIntyre is a journalist from the United Kingdom, currently living in the occupied West Bank village of Bilin. Jody has cerebral palsy, and travels in a wheelchair. He writes a blog for Ctrl.Alt.Shift, entitled “Life on Wheels,” which can be found at www.ctrlaltshift.co.uk. He can be reached at jody.mcintyre AT gmail DOT com.

Source

December 18, 2009 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

Even in cases the U.S. wins, Guantanamo evidence is suspect

By Carol Rosenberg | Miami Herald | December 16, 2009

A federal judge ruled Wednesday that the United States is unlawfully imprisoning at Guantanamo a Yemeni once accused of training at an al Qaeda camp, just days after a different U.S. judge upheld the detention of another Guantanamo detainee who trained at the same camp.

But even in that order, the judge found the U.S. evidence was the result of coercion and abuse and should not be used “in any fashion, in any court.” The judge ruled that while the detention may have been legal, the government’s own records “do not give any evidence for his continued detention.”

Judge Ricardo Urbina’s ruling on Wednesday, still sealed at the U.S. District Court in Washington D.C., brought the so-called habeas corpus scorecard to 32 losses and nine victories for the Pentagon in its defense against challenges from detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Because the order was sealed, lawyers declined to explain Urbina’s order to free Saeed Hatim, 33, who had been held at Guantanamo since June 2002.

“We are reviewing the decision and considering options,” said Justice Department spokesman Dean Boyd.

Long-time Guantanamo defense attorney David Remes, who argued for release in August based on the Pentagon record, and called no witnesses, said the ruling “once more demonstrates the thinness of the government’s evidence against these men.”

Of the Guantanamo detainees, Remes said, “That’s why they’ve won four out of five cases that have been decided so far.”

Defense Department documents alleged that Hatim left his native Yemen before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, was inspired to join Muslims waging a jihad in Chechnya and trained at the al Farouq paramilitary camp in Afghanistan.

The ruling followed by two days Judge Thomas F. Hogan’s finding that another Yemeni, Musa’ab al Madhwani, 29, was lawfully detained as “part of a member of al Qaeda or related terrorist groups.”

Hogan ruled in favor of the Pentagon, but sounded reluctant to do so. He said Madhwani was no longer a threat to the United States and that some of the evidence against him came from triple hearsay and coerced confessions.

He said the government built its case on documents it discovered only at the last minute.

“As the law’s written I have no choice” but to uphold Madhwani’s continued detention, Hogan said. But Hogan quickly pointed out that that doesn’t mean he thinks Madhwani should continue to be detained. In fact, he said, the government’s records “do not give any basis for his continued detention.”

“I see nothing in the record that the petitioner poses any greater threat than the dozens of detainees . . . who have been transferred or cleared for transfer. In fact, his record is a lot less threatening,” he said in a ruling from the bench, according to a transcript of the hearing.

Hogan said he heard four days of testimony this fall, including Madhwani himself, who testified by a closed-circuit television feed in a closed-door hearing.

The judge admitted 260 exhibits to the record to conclude that the captive traveled to train and have “some association to alleged al Qaeda operatives.”

He called Madhwani a young, under-educated religiously vulnerable “hapless individual” but said the grounds for continued detention amount to this: “[He] voluntarily trained with al Qaeda for 25 days, and then traveled, associated and lived with members of al Qaeda for an entire year.”

Hogan also recited, for the record, what has become a familiar narrative of physical and mental abuse, solitary confinement and sensory deprivation in U.S. detention, notably at the Dark Prison in Afghanistan, adding that Justice Department attorneys did not refute the claims.

Madhwani was captured Sept. 11, 2002 in Pakistan, the judge said, noting his interrogations in Pakistan and Afghanistan “were coerced and should not be admitted — in any fashion in any court.”

December 18, 2009 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Full Spectrum Dominance, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

IDF raids Naalin photographer’s home

Ali Waked | YNet News | 16 December 2009

Family members of a girl who shot a video showing an Israel Defense Forces soldier firing a rubber bullet at a bound Palestinian in the West Bank village of Naalin last year say the army has been harassing them ever since.

The relatives told Ynet that a massive IDF force raided their house on Wednesday night and left behind a lot of damage. The girl’s father and brother were then summoned for investigation.

An IDF official claimed, however, that the soldiers arrived to arrest a man suspected of rioting and that the incident had nothing to do with the videotape.

The girl’s family members said that soldiers arrived at their house at around 3:30 am. “They broke the windows of our car, which was parked outside, and did not leave one whole glass inside the house. They destroyed and ruined everything,” said the girl’s brother, Arafat Canaan.

“They used a loudspeaker and shouted, ‘We are the IDF, we are the IDF,’ without giving any warning, without telling us what they want.”

'They did not leave one whole glass (Photo: Activestills)

‘They did not leave one whole glass (Photo: Activestills)

According to the brother, his mother fainted during the raid, the soldiers attacked his father, forcibly removed two of his brothers from the house and cuffed them in the yard. He said a third brother, who was outside the house, was detained for six hours until the end of the raid.

Arafat added that dogs were brought into the house and caused destruction. He said he believes this was another attempt by the army to avenge the tape. “If they wanted to arrest, they would come and arrest. But to destroy an entire house only to leave behind a letter summoning me and my brother to meet with a Shin Bet officer? This proves they are driven by feelings of vengefulness over that affair.”

‘Soldiers were following orders’
The brother said that his sister documented the destruction caused by the soldiers and their entry into the house, and that the soldiers had threatened her not to film the incident. Arafat himself documents the anti-fence demonstrations in Naalin and says the soldiers’ arrival in the night was meant to also terrify him and make him stop filming the demonstrations and the army’s activity in the village.

IDF sources confirmed that a special force arrived at the house in Naalin in the night in order to arrest one of the family members on suspicion of causing repeated disturbances. A commotion broke out in the area during the detention.

The sources clarified, however, that the soldiers were following orders and were trying not to disrupt the other family members’ lives. The sources also clarified that the arrest had nothing to do with the video shot by one of the family members about a year and a half ago during an ant-fence rally.

It should be noted that the girl’s father was arrested several days after the video’s publication. He was accused of causing disturbances in the area, taking part in a demonstration, violating a closed military zone order and assaulting a soldier with a stick. He was released several days later, after a military judge accused the prosecution of acting unprofessionally.

Source

December 17, 2009 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Solidarity and Activism, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

Israeli Forces Shut Down Jerusalem Culture Event

Bethlehem – Ma’an – Israeli forces arrested several and scuffled with Palestinians while shutting down a cultural festival meant to proclaim attachment to Jerusalem on Thursday.

Organizers, including Prisoners’ Club President Nasser Kaws, were hustled out of the Damascus Gate area of the Old City of Jerusalem and detained by Israeli border police, prompting scuffles at the main entrance into the ancient streets. Also among those arrested was the secretary-general of Jerusalem’s Fatah movement Omar Ash-Shabi.

Crowds gathered at the site and groups sang traditional wedding songs, gathering in clusters around television cameras stationed on the stairs leading to the gate.

One participant in the event, meant to mark Al-Quds Capital of Arab Culture 2009 which comes to an end at the close of this month, told reporters, “Israel used to say they detain everyone who threatens it with weapons, but look, are these people threatening it? They are just celebrating.”

A performer at the Jerusalem event noted, “Israel is an occupation so it is its job to marginalize Palestinian culture, but we will resist with our willpower. No one can suppress the Palestinian people.”

Intended to be a yearlong event sponsored by the Arab League, Al-Quds Capital of Arab Culture was officially banned by Israel. The festival was marred by arrests and police raids.

Israel occupied East Jerusalem along with the West Bank in 1967 in a move not accepted by the international community.

Israeli forces also broke up a march planned by Palestinian scout troops and closed schools where cultural events were taking place.

Soldiers also surrounded the French Cultural Center and the British Council, where two simultaneous events were planned as the finale of Al-Quds Capital of Arab Culture. The two events were headed by Rafiq Al-Husseni the head of the Palestinian president’s office and the other by the Ahmad Ar-Ruwedi, the head of the Jerusalem unit in the president’s office.

Israeli officers handed out a written order from the Israeli minister of internal security stating that the cultural activities were prohibited. Ar-Ruwedi listed the schools that were shut down by Israel: St. George’s School, Freres, At-Tefl Al-Arabi, Az-Zuhour Kindergarten, Dar Al-Awlad, and the Refugees Girls School.

In Nablus, thousands also attended a celebration of Jerusalem as the Capital of Arab Culture, apparently organized by the local branch of Fatah. President Mahmoud Abbas gave opening remarks at the celebration in the northern West Bank city. Abbas told the demonstration that Jerusalem is the eternal capital of Palestine. “Jerusalem is ours and it will remain ours,” he added. Also attending the event in Nablus was Sheikh Abdallah Bin Zayid Al-Nahyan, the foreign minister of the United Arab Emirates, and a number of Palestinian Authority officials.

December 17, 2009 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

War-Crimes and their Victims

War Crimes Caught on Video

Abu Ghraib

Watch also:
Lifting the Hood – Iraq
on youtube (26 min)

The Road to Guantanamo (Trailer)

Ex-Guantanamo Muslim chaplain speaks out

Former Guantanamo detainee returns home – 15-Dec-07


Israeli War Crimes & Chemical Weapons
Former pilot of the Israel’s air force accuses Israel of war-crimes, using chemical weapons against the people of Gaza

December 16, 2009 Posted by | Aletho News, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture, Video, War Crimes, Wars for Israel | Leave a comment

Israel bans tourists from key West Bank bus line

December 16, 2009

Bethlehem – Ma’an – Just days before Bethlehem’s busiest tourist season begins, Israeli authorities implemented a ban on foreign-passport holders traveling to Jerusalem on Palestinian buses.

On 11 December, Bethlehem tourists began to report being pulled off line 21, a route used predominantly by holders of East Jerusalem residency cards, as they stopped for inspection at the Jerusalem tunnel entrance into Israel.

For years, foreign-passport holders using public transportation could choose between the tunnel bus, which departs near Beit Jala, or Israel’s military checkpoint 300, known colloquially as Gilo or Rachel’s Tomb.

A high-ranking Israeli security official confirmed the policy change on Monday. “This issue is being resolved presently. Everything will be completed in a day or so, possibly even today,” the official said, confirming that, for now, redirecting foreign-passport holders from the tunnel to checkpoint 300 is a matter of policy.

Palestinian Authority security sources said the phenomenon follows a unilateral decision by Israeli authorities made months ago to ban foreigners from the route.

It was not clear, however, who ordered the changes, or why. Israeli army sources insisted they had nothing to do with the plan, but officials in the country’s Border Police, the paramilitary branch of the Israeli Police, said such orders could only have come from the military.

“The [army] commander makes the policy; we just implement it,” said a border guard official who insisted on anonymity. “If the IDF [Israel Defense Forces] says we can’t allow foreign people – it’s a policy.”

A PA police spokesman said he was aware of the issue but refused further comment, referring inquiries to the District Coordination Office (DCO), the local arm of Israel’s non-military, civil administration in the occupied Palestinian territories.

“We’ve been aware of the plan for three, maybe four months; I don’t know why they’d implement it now,” said a Palestinian who works with the DCO. Israel never provided any official or written explanation, he added, nor were local officials given a say in the matter.

Despite numerous inquiries this week to the Israeli military, Border Police, Civil Administration, and national police, no official was ever willing to offer an on-the-record explanation for the ban.

‘Rude’ and ‘threatening’ treatment

Among the first reports Ma’an received about the issue was from an American music teacher accessing Jerusalem to teach students of a local conservatory. She, along with three others, were told they could not re-board the bus after it was checked by soldiers. “They saw the foreigners and herded us to the side,” said 24-year-old Katie Rowold, a US citizen held up on Friday. “Then everyone got back on the bus except for us. … We had to get a service taxi to the walk-through checkpoint [300].”

Sandra Baille, a 64-year-old Canadian citizen, was on a bus with some luggage waiting to have her passport checked by soldiers. As custom generally allows women with children or bags, the sick, or the elderly to remain on the bus during inspections, Baille was surprised when a guard ordered her off the vehicle. “A young Israeli soldier with a mask on his face up to his nose boarded the bus and indicated to me with his arm to get off,” she explained. “I held out my passport so he could see I was an international, but he threw his arm [pointing] to the side. He didn’t say a word, he just pointed.”

Outside the bus, Baille found herself with a group of foreign citizens also waiting at the side of the road. When they asked what was going on, “we were told ‘new rules, new rules,'” Baille said. She was ordered to take her luggage, for a planned trip to northern Israel, Nazareth and the Galilee, off the bus, and watched Palestinian passengers get back on board. She waited again while the driver argued with guards, and heard the bus ordered to leave without the five foreigners. “We were left to walk up the hill” back to Beit Jala, she said.

Others explained how they had to flag down a cab willing to enter a PA area and drive back inside Bethlehem to cross through the Gilo checkpoint there, before ultimately catching another Palestinian bus on the other side of the cement wall. One international who asked not to be named described being left helpless on the side of the busy highway, while Israeli-plated cars zoomed past. “Luckily there was a taxi sitting there. I don’t know what we would have done.”

Baille, the Canadian national, described the guards’ treatment as rude, saying she could not understand what reason Israel would have to target tourists. “Its ironic,” she added. “All over Canada there are signs saying ‘Welcome to Israel,’ but in the end they wouldn’t let us in.” Canada was the test country for the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ “Brand Israel” campaign.

Another group of six internationals – four Americans, a Canadian and German national – were warned by the driver of a 21 bus on Saturday that foreigners were no longer being permitted to travel via the tunnel. They said the driver eventually let them on, but that they were indeed refused passage through the checkpoint.

Bad news for Christmas

Reports of internationals being pulled off buses continued throughout the week, and several have noted longer lines at the Gilo checkpoint, making it increasingly difficult to access Jerusalem from Bethlehem.

However, the ban appears to apply only to Palestinian buses in the West Bank. Foreign nationals traveling on Israel’s Egged service, which connects the country’s settlements throughout the occupied territories, including in Bethlehem, into Israel, reported no problems at the tunnel checkpoint. Internationals in private cars were similarly unaffected.

It was not clear if the initiative to limit foreigners’ movement in the region was linked to prior passport restrictions. Mirroring the treatment received by Palestinians already living under the four-decade occupation, similar restrictions on foreigners first came to light in September when Israel began issuing visas that permit travel only in PA-controlled areas.

Israel, meanwhile, has sought to reassure Palestinian Christian leaders that it would facilitate the movement of congregants and tourists as Christmas approaches. Security authorities recently invited the leaders of local churches to a meeting on a military base, where army officials promised to help ease closures, for example, by granting permits for Christians from Gaza to visit Bethlehem for the holiday.

Tens of thousands of foreign-passport holders enter Bethlehem every Christmas to celebrate along with the local Palestinian population, attending mass at the Nativity Church and other annual festivities. Some 60,000 internationals made the pilgrimage in 2008.

December 16, 2009 Posted by | Full Spectrum Dominance, Illegal Occupation, Solidarity and Activism, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

In Alarming Step Obama Creates Gitmo North

ACLU Press Release
December 15, 2009

NEW YORK – The Obama administration announced today that it will purchase the Thomson Correctional Center in Illinois for the purpose of holding some of the detainees currently remaining at Guantánamo. Though the administration is leaving unsaid which detainees will be moved there and for what purposes, the information it has provided indicates that some detainees might be held for military commission proceedings in Illinois while others might be held at Thomson indefinitely without charge or trial.

The administration has stated that “any detainees at Guantánamo who continue to be held, and for whom no prosecution is planned, will be held only under authority granted by Congress in 2001 under the Authorization for Use of Military Force, as informed by the law of war.” However, the so-called war on terrorism is not a traditional war, having no temporal or geographical boundaries.

The following can be attributed to Anthony D. Romero, Executive Director of the ACLU:

“The creation of a ‘Gitmo North’ in Illinois is hardly a meaningful step forward. Shutting down Guantánamo will be nothing more than a symbolic gesture if we continue its lawless policies onshore.

“Alarmingly, all indications are that the administration plans to continue its predecessor’s policy of indefinite detention without charge or trial for some detainees, with only a change of location. Such a policy is completely at odds with our democratic commitment to due process and human rights whether it’s occurring in Cuba or in Illinois. In fact, while the Obama administration inherited the Guantánamo debacle, this current move is its own affirmative adoption of those policies. It is unimaginable that the Obama administration is using the same justification as the Bush administration used to undercut centuries of legal jurisprudence and the principle of innocent until proven guilty and the right to confront one’s accusers.

“It is also greatly disturbing that the administration will continue the use of military commissions, which are no more acceptable in Illinois or any other U.S. state than in Guantánamo. Despite some improvements, the commissions still fall far short of the legal standards necessary to comply with constitutional and international standards, allowing, for example, the use of coerced and hearsay evidence that would not be allowed in federal court. The proceedings will achieve neither reliable justice nor a restoration of America’s credibility around the world.

“The administration must also make very clear what category of detainee will be transferred to Thomson in the future and what kind of prison conditions will apply. Detainees not charged with a crime should not be subject to punitive conditions meant for sentenced prisoners who have been found guilty in a court of law, and all conditions must comply with the Geneva Conventions.

“The administration will no doubt be looking to Congress for legislative buy-in for this facility, and as both branches work together, we strongly urge lawmakers to legislate responsibly and not set any policies or precedents for indefinite detention on U.S. soil, or create any violation of the Geneva Conventions.

“The Obama administration’s announcement today contradicts everything the president has said about the need for America to return to leading with its values. American values do not contemplate disregarding our Constitution and skirting the criminal justice system. After detaining hundreds of individuals without the basic due process rights that define our justice system for almost eight years, it is time to charge suspects where evidence exists and repatriate and transfer the rest to countries where they won’t be tortured.”

CONTACT: (212) 549-2666; media@aclu.org

December 16, 2009 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Progressive Hypocrite, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

No freeze on Palestinian suffering

Seth Freedman | guardian.co.uk

14 December 2009

Within minutes of our arrival in Tuwani, in the south Hebron hills of the West Bank, an army Jeep rolled into the village and shattered the mid-morning tranquillity. “We’re turning this place into a closed military zone,” announced the stern-faced commander to anyone within earshot. Brandishing his rifle in one hand and a military document in the other, he proceeded to explain that “I decide who can be here and who can’t, and anyone who isn’t a resident has to leave immediately”.

That meant us – me, my friend and our three guides from the Villages Group – as well as the other activists who maintain a permanent presence in Tuwani assisting the locals in their struggle to survive. The timing of the closure was no accident: earlier in the morning NGO workers and locals had taken part in a solidarity march to highlight the hardships suffered by the village children who run the gauntlet of the neighbouring settlement every time they walk to and from their school.

Anything the activists could do the soldiers could do better, it seemed. “The IDF [Israel Defence Forces] don’t like us coming to support the residents of Tuwani,” said one volunteer, “so they make it their mission to make everyone’s lives uncomfortable as a result.”

The shutdown of the village and the surrounding farmland was only the latest in a long line of attempts by the Israeli authorities to break the will of the Palestinians living in the area. As we drove out of Tuwani, we were shown the stump of an electricity pylon sawn down by the army after attempts by villagers to connect themselves to the national grid. Elsewhere, dirt mounds and locked gates stopped locals driving to the nearby city of Ya’ta, thus preventing them taking their produce to sell at market, and severely impairing their economic prospects.

Thanks to the army’s exclusion orders, we were forced to walk a treacherous and convoluted route through the rocky scrubland to visit communities living in even deeper seclusion beyond Tuwani. In Tu’ba, the cave-dwelling residents of the village are under no illusion about what the future holds for them, despite all the hype surrounding the much-vaunted settlement freeze.

“The freeze will have no effect round here,” the father of the household told us bitterly. Our guide expanded on the theme, telling us that the “real freeze is on Palestinian construction: 95% of Palestinian applications for building permits in Area C are denied by the civil administration, and for communities in this area they are not allowed to build above ground whatsoever”.

Those people living in caves are, it seems, tolerated by the authorities while they remain underground, but as soon as they put their heads above the surface and attempt to build rudimentary shacks and outhouses, demolition orders are served and the army are quick to enforce the letter of the law with gusto.

Meanwhile, in the neighbouring settlements of Carmel and Ma’on, building work was going on in earnest, and defiant banners on bus stops and fence posts declared the settlers’ intention to “smash the freeze”, and denounced the incumbent government as traitors to the Zionist cause. While government inspectors have been attacked during their attempts to bring settlement construction to a halt, the full force of the settlers’ wrath has – as ever – been meted out against the Palestinians.

The sickening desecration of a mosque on Friday in the village of Yasuf, near Nablus, appears to be the opening salvo in the settlers’ latest battle to force the government to back down over the building freeze, and those we met in the south Hebron hills were wary of similar reprisal attacks being carried out against their communities. “Our children are still attacked on a regular basis,” one local told us, “as well as our shepherds and farmers. Even if we call the police, we know justice will never be done, and the situation is only getting worse now that the settlers are furious about Netanyahu’s decision.”

Ehud Krinis, one of the Villages Group activists, believes that the freeze is “just an act” on the part of the government; having worked in the area for almost eight years and seen the settlers’ above-the-law behaviour first hand, he maintains “there is no effective force that can stop the settlers building more. In fact, as we can see in Susiya and elsewhere, the settlers simply see the freeze as a challenge to construct [at an even faster rate], which is what will happen over the next 10 months.”

As we sat with the head of the Bedouin clan living in Um al-Kheir – a collection of tumble-down tents and shacks literally touching the perimeter fence of the Carmel settlement – the mood of resignation engulfing the encampment’s residents was suffocating. We were shown aerial photos of Um al-Kheir’s gradual demise over the past 30 years, a situation attributable to the encroachment of the settlers and the military on to their ancestral land. It was clear that for those forced to endure the humiliation and hardship on a daily basis, the politicians’ upbeat talk was at best cheap, and at worst a flagrant denial of the facts.

For those Palestinians living under military rule, coupled with indiscriminate and incessant settler attacks against them, their children and their flocks, there is no end in sight to the suffering. While the world might have been convinced that the worm is about to turn in the Israeli political arena, a quick glance at the fevered construction still taking place in the settlements, the oppressive military activity against the Palestinian villagers and the overarching penury in which the Palestinians are forced to subsist should give onlookers food for thought about the true situation on the ground.

Freeze or no freeze, the future looks no brighter for the Palestinian locals today than it has during any of the bitter years and decades gone by.

December 14, 2009 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

Bilin activist: “Words are not enough”

Iyad Burnat and Jody McIntyre writing from Bilin, occupied West Bank, Live from Palestine, 14 December 2009

Iyad Burnat being arrested by Israeli soldiers at a demonstration in Bilin. (Haitham al-Katib)

The following is Palestinian nonviolent resistance activist Iyad Burnat’s story as told to The Electronic Intifada contributor Jody McIntyre:

My name is Iyad Burnat. I am 37 years old, married with four children. I am the head of the Bilin Popular Committee.

I started my life in jail at 17, during the first intifada, a popular uprising amongst ordinary Palestinians. It was not the first time I participated in nonviolent resistance. I have always believed that this is the way to end the occupation. But as the intifada clearly showed, the Israeli military does not understand let alone sympathize with such methods.

One night, the Israeli army surrounded my home, and took my father from his bed to come and knock on my door. They told him that because I was a child, they just wanted to speak to me for five minutes. Some of the soldiers were dressed in civilian clothes, and they grabbed me as soon as I opened the door.

That five minutes became two years, in the worst place in the world — Naqab prison [in the Negev desert]. I spent the first 20 days in solitary confinement. I was kept in a room I could only stand up in, with terrible food and no showers, and during the night in a room I could lie down in but had a hole in the roof, at a time when it was raining and snowing. Every day the soldiers were beating me, and every night they would bang on the door so that I couldn’t sleep. The whole time, they were also asking me if I had thrown stones and what political party I belonged to, so in the end I admitted that I had, at some point, thrown stones. By the end of those 20 days, I smelled like an animal.

The jail was extremely bad. In the winter, water leaked from every corner, and in the summer it was unbearably hot. After six months inside, I got the first visit from my mother. My family left their home in Bilin at 3am, and didn’t return until late the next night, just to see me for 30 minutes. We couldn’t even shake hands because of the walls which separated us. She told me that my grandmother had died.

After two years in the Naqab prison, I was released, and given the new “green” ID, handed out after the creation of the Palestinian Authority (PA). At the time, people with green IDs were not allowed to travel and were essentially under house arrest. Even now, Palestinians with green IDs are forbidden from traveling to Jerusalem, our capital.

In 2005, we began our nonviolent demonstrations in Bilin against Israel’s wall in the occupied West Bank and the illegal settlements that have been built on our land. We practice nonviolent methods as a way of resisting, such as tying ourselves to our olive trees when they were due to be bulldozed and uprooted by the Israeli military. For the last five years, we have succeeded in sending our message to the whole world, to tell the people that Israel’s wall is not for security, but it is an apartheid wall built only to steal our land for the purpose of expanding illegal Israeli settlements.

On 4 September 2007, we had a major breakthrough. The Israeli high court made a decision ordering that the army remove the wall from the land of Bilin. Despite this, the Israeli military refused to heed the decision of the court, and instead resorted to violence in an attempt to crush our peaceful struggle. During our nonviolent demonstrations, they beat us with batons, fill the air with tear gas and sewage water, throw sound grenades, and shoot us with a range of projectiles, from lethal high-velocity tear gas canisters and rubber-coated steel bullets, to live ammunition. Over 1,000 people have been injured, more than 200 arrested, and one close friend of mine, Bassem Abu Rahme, has been killed.

The Israeli authorities want to stop us because they are afraid of our model of nonviolent resistance, and fear that the world is waking up to the reality of this situation.

During one demonstration, we had marched to the wall as usual, and Israeli forces immediately began shooting tear gas and rubber bullets. I was caught in the crossfire and started to suffer from severe tear gas inhalation. When I stopped running to allow the doctors to treat me, I saw two soldiers approaching. They told me that I was under arrest, and that they had photos of me throwing stones.

They put me on the other side of the wall, near the military base permanently stationed on our land, and the commanding officer came over with a photo in his hand. He asked me who the man in the photo was, but I didn’t recognize him. He said that if I told him where the man lived he would release me, but I couldn’t. So he told me that in the courts he would claim that it was me, and took me away.

After spending eight days in Ofer prison, I was finally taken into court. The moment the judge saw the photo he said it wasn’t me, and that the prosecution had another 24 hours to bring additional evidence. When they couldn’t, I was ordered to pay 4,000 shekels ($1,060) bail for my release. I told my lawyer that I would not pay one penny, and after one day I was back at home with my family.

During the last five years, the Israeli military has invaded my house many times. The worst thing is that I cannot look at the faces of my children because I am afraid that if I describe their fearful expressions I will start to cry. I want my children to see that I am strong in front of the army. The soldiers don’t seem to care whether Palestinians are adults or children — they start to kick the doors, throw the children outside, and ransack their bedrooms. If my children see their father being beaten by soldiers — I cannot describe how difficult this is.

But I have taught them that every time I am arrested you must continue this struggle, even if I am killed you must continue. I have told them not to be afraid, because we are on the side of justice, and we must return to our land.

None of the kids in the village can sleep anymore, because of the night raids during the last five years. The Israeli military invade the village in the early hours, shooting sound grenades in the streets and tear gas into people’s homes. Six months ago, the most recent wave of these night raids began and the soldiers invaded almost every night. They relaunched a campaign of harassment and intimidation against the people of Bilin, in an attempt to arrest all the people who participate in our nonviolent demonstrations and subject the rest of our residents to a constant state of terror. Since this most recent wave of night raids begun, we haven’t slept a single night.

I remember after one of our demonstrations, I came home and read in the news that US President Barack Obama had won the Nobel Peace Prize. I started to go crazy! The Americans are still in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Palestine is still under occupation. We haven’t seen any change, so I wondered why they didn’t give the prize to George W. Bush, when he was in power.

I am so sorry Mr. Bush — you worked so hard for eight years, killing children, starting wars around the world, and supporting the Israeli occupation of our land, and they gave the prize to another man! And you got a pair of shoes instead? That is a real injustice.

We are a simple people, and more than anything we want to see peace, but before there is peace there must be justice, and we must have our freedom. We are not against Jews or Israelis, but we are against the occupation.

One of the important elements of our struggle is the international volunteers who come to stay in the village. They are our messengers to the outside world, and it is so important for them to tell our story in their own countries, in order to counter the strength of Israeli propaganda in the mainstream media.

But words are not enough. We need people to be taking direct action, both here, and in their own countries against the embassies and governments who support this occupation.

Jody McIntyre is a journalist from the United Kingdom, currently living in the occupied West Bank village of Bilin. Jody has cerebral palsy, and travels in a wheelchair. He writes a blog for Ctrl.Alt.Shift, entitled “Life on Wheels,” which can be found at www.ctrlaltshift.co.uk. He can be reached at jody.mcintyre AT gmail DOT com.

source

December 14, 2009 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

Rules of human decency apply to Israelis too

A dose of Israel’s own (academic) medicine might help the message sink in

By Stuart Littlewood
The People’s Voice
12 December 2009

Stuart Littlewood argues that an academic boycott of Israel is now urgent in the light of an Israeli High Court ruling that the Israel occupation forces acted within their rights when they abducted, blindfolded, handcuffed and dumped in Gaza 21-year-old Palestinian student Berlanty Azzam just weeks before she was due to complete her degree at Bethlehem University in the occupied West Bank.

Poor Berlanty. What did she do to deserve this crushing blow to her hopes and life chances?

The Israeli High Court has denied Berlanty Azzam justice – again – and prevented her returning to Bethlehem University for the final few weeks to complete her degree.

On 28 October this Christian student at the Vatican-sponsored Bethlehem University was abducted by the “Israel Defence Forces”, “the world’s most moral army”, after attending a job interview in Ramallah, then blindfolded and handcuffed and dumped in Gaza. She had lived in the West Bank since 2005 after being granted a permit.

There was only one kind of permit available in 2005 – an entry permit to Israel. But the Israeli state claimed that this permit was insufficient and Berlanty should have obtained some other permit, even though the state admits that none existed at the time.

State representatives took her permit, a key piece of evidence, and never produced it to the court. After six weeks of double-talk the court accepted the state’s claim that Berlanty entered the West Bank illegally. We hear a lot about how independent Israel’s justice system is. Here’s proof, if any were needed, that it is simply a tool of the military.

To avoid accusations that her residence was not Bethlehem, Berlanty had for the last four years resisted the temptation to return to Gaza and visit her folks. She and her parents submitted numerous applications to change the Gaza address recorded on her identity card to her actual place of residence, Bethlehem, but to no avail. Israel controls the Palestinian population registry and refuses to register changes in address from the Gaza Strip to the West Bank – another example of how Gazans are effectively imprisoned.

This, of course, is in breach of her human rights. The West Bank and the Gaza Strip are internationally recognized as one integral territory and under international law everyone has the right to freely choose their place of residence within a single territory. In 1999 Israel and the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) signed an agreement establishing a 28-mile road corridor giving Palestinians safe passage between the two parts of Palestine – yet another empty gesture.

“We are disappointed that the Israeli military and High Court have interfered with the Church’s educational mission at Bethlehem University by denying Berlanty to be brought back to Bethlehem to complete her studies,” said Brother Peter Bray, the vice chancellor, on hearing the court ruling. “We realize that Berlanty is one of the many people in Gaza who suffer so unjustly.”

Indeed. Since 2000 Israel has implemented a sweeping ban, preventing youngsters from Gaza from studying at Palestinian universities in the West Bank. A 2007 High Court decision determined that students from Gaza wishing to study in the West Bank should be allowed to do so “in cases that would have positive humanitarian implications”.

However, to the best of her legal team’s knowledge, since that judgment was handed down Israel hasn’t issued a single entry permit. Only last summer 12 students from Gaza were refused permits to study at Bethlehem University. Back in the late 1990s, about 1,000 students from Gaza studied in the West Bank, most of them in disciplines that are not offered in the Gaza Strip.

Like Berlanty, an estimated 25,000 people currently living in the West Bank have been declared “illegal” by Israel solely because the address on their identity card is in the Gaza Strip. Some of them have lived in the West Bank for decades but Israel simply does not recognize their right to be there. They are extremely limited in their daily movements and live in fear of being detained and “deported”, just as Berlanty was. Consequently they have very limited opportunities for employment, business and studies. This policy not only breaches Israel’s obligations under international to treat the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as a “single territorial entity”, but it also chokes any prospect of healthy development in Palestinian society.

It is no use pretending that things will change – unless other countries give Israel a dose of its own medicine. How does the Berlanty case and the thousands like it sit with the great and the good who piously reject the idea of an academic boycott against Israel?

All political parties fight against such a boycott for muddle-headed reasons. The recent Channel 4 Dispatches programme uncovered the influence of the Israel lobby and its money on the Conservative Party. Another particularly obnoxious group that’s hopelessly out of touch with reality is the Liberal Democrat Friends of Israel (LDFI). At their party’s conference they tabled a motion squashing an academic boycott, saying that “Israeli universities are centres of free debate and discussion and that the universities contain Jews, Muslims, Christians, Israelis and Palestinians. Furthermore, a boycott does nothing to resolve a negotiated solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict and is indeed counter-productive as it discourages dialogue.” This motion against the boycott was passed with an overwhelming majority.

The aim of the Liberal Democrats Friends of Israel is to “maximize support for the State of Israel within the party and Parliament” and “encourage a broad understanding of Israel’s unique political position as the only democracy in the Middle East”.

Their stated purpose is:

  • To influence the party’s Middle East policy so it places a high priority on Israel’s right to peace and security.
  • To provide parliamentarians with briefing material for parliamentary debates, questions to ministers and public appearances.
  • To rebut attacks on Israel in the media, Parliament and the party.
  • To liaise with Israeli politicians and government.
  • To arrange and accompany LDFI delegations to Israel.
  • To keep in regular contact with the embassy of Israel.

In other words, they act as a prop within the British Parliament for this racist military regime.

Such blind allegiance and bizarre conduct contribute to the tragedy of Berlanty and countless other Palestinian youngsters. Without these beacons of misplaced support across the Western world lawless Israel would be sunk.

December 12, 2009 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Solidarity and Activism, Subjugation - Torture | Leave a comment

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