Journalist shot in abdomen by Israel sniper on Gaza border
MEMO | April 6, 2018
A Palestinian video journalist and photographer who had just been contracted to work with MEMO has been hospitalised after being shot by Israeli sniper fire today while covering The Great March of Return near Gaza’s eastern border.
Though wearing a vest marked ‘PRESS’, Yaser Murtaja, co-founder of Ain Media production company, was shot in the abdomen by Israeli snipers perched on a hilltop on Gaza’s border.
Israeli sniper shoots journalist on #Gaza border and now he is in the operation room in hospital. pic.twitter.com/m3Pw21SWRK
— Ahmad Samaan🇵🇸 (@ahmadsaman7) April 6, 2018
Ain Media, which is made up of a dozen Palestinian media professionals, has been covering the events taking place near Gaza’s border with Israel since Friday. In the past, the team have produced work for Al Jazeera Documentaries, BBC Arabic, VICE, Alaraby TV, UNICEF, UNRWA and Oxfam amongst others.
In an interview with MEMO earlier this month, Yaser said that his passion for filming and photography was born out of his desire to document the events taking place in the besieged Gaza Strip and to do what he could to help shed light on the reality of life in Gaza and the plight of fellow countrymen under occupation and blockade.
At least 23 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces in Gaza and more than 1,500 others wounded during the Great March of Return, a six-week demonstration and sit-in which started last Friday to mark Palestine Land Day and is calling for the implementation of the Right of Return.
Palestinians come together near Gaza’s eastern border for ‘The Great March of Return’
Demonstrators are demanding that Palestinian refugees be granted their right to return to their towns and villages in historical Palestine, from which they were driven in 1948 to make way for the state of Israel.
In the run-up to the mass demonstrations last week Israel deployed thousands of troops on the border, threatening to use live ammunition against anyone who threatened Israel’s “security infrastructure”.
Anti-Semitic claims against Corbyn, Labour exaggerated: Poll
Press TV – April 1, 2018
The majority of Labour Party members in Britain say Israel is “a force for bad” and believe accusations of anti-Semitism within UK’s main opposition party are being exaggerated to damage Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and stifle legitimate criticism of Israel, according to a new poll.
The YouGov survey, which was commissioned by The Times newspaper, showed that 65 percent of the party’s members held a negative view of Israel.
The poll’s findings sent a clear message as Israeli military forces continued to brutally stifle a six-week protest by Palestinians near the border with Gaza.
Called the Great March for Return, the march has seen around 30,000 Palestinians pitch tents along the coastal enclave’s borders to mark the Land Day, the 42nd anniversary of Israel’s murdering of several Palestinians who protested Israel’s land grab plans in 1976.
Israeli soldiers have so far killed 16 protesters and injured dozens more since Friday, the day the new protests began.
Palestinians have pledged to stand firm and continue the event until Nakba Day, or Day of Catastrophe, on March 15, one day after the Israeli regime was created in 1948.
The poll also saw Labour members express solidarity with Corbyn, who as a pro-Palestinian politician, has long been accused of anti-Semitism and come under pressure from the Israeli lobby in the UK to resign.
The pressure peaked last year, when Corbyn announced in his manifesto for the June 8 snap election that a Labour government will “immediately recognize” a state of Palestine.
The manifesto also called for an end to Israel’s blockade and occupation of Palestinian territories, as well as construction of illegal settlements on Palestinian lands.
In the latest case, Corbyn has been accused of partaking in a secret Facebook group that was used by some senior Labour members to allegedly post anti-Semitic content.
Around 77 percent of the participants in the poll said the allegations were “exaggerated” to damage Corbyn and stifle legitimate criticism of Israel. Some 61 percent said he was handling the situation well.
Corbyn’s popularity soaring
The poll also found that Corbyn was enjoying high approval ratings as an astounding 80 percent of Labour member supported him despite internal rebellions and anti-Semitism claims.
About 64 percent of Labour members also thought a Corbyn government was “likely,” compared to 62 percent who last year said it was “unlikely” for the opposition leader to be elected as PM.
7 Palestinians killed, dozens injured as Israel suppresses massive protest in Gaza
Ma’an – March 30, 2018
GAZA CITY – Six Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces and dozens more injured since early Friday morning, as thousands of Gazans took to the borders with Israel as part of “The Great March of Return” taking place across the besieged coastal enclave to mark the 42nd Land Day.
In 1976, Israeli police shot and killed six Palestinian citizens of Israel as they were protesting the Israeli government’s expropriation of thousands of dunums of Palestinian land. Since then, Palestinians have commemorated March 30 as Land Day with mass protests across the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, Gaza, and inside Israel.
A Palestinian farmer was killed around dawn and another was injured as Israeli forces targeted the southern Gazan district of Khan Younis with mortar shells.
Spokesperson of the Gaza Ministry of Health, Ashraf al-Qidra, identified the slain farmer as Omar Sammour, 31, adding that another Palestinian, whose identity remained unknown, was injured during the shelling.
Israeli media reported that Sammour and the other man with him were targeted for approaching the border fence with Israel in a “suspicious manner,” though local sources reported that Sammour was simply gathering crops from his land to sell later in the day.
On Friday afternoon, medical sources confirmed to Ma’an that two more Palestinians were killed during the protest along the border.
One of the slain Palestinians was identified as Amin Mahmoud Muhammar from Rafah in southern Gaza. His age remained unknown.
The other slain Palestinian was identified as Muhammad Kamal al-Najjar, 25, from eastern Jabaliya in northern Gaza.
Around 2:20 p.m. medical sources told Ma’an that a fourth Palestinian had been killed. He was identified as Muhammad Abu Omar, 19.
Fifteen minutes later, the Gaza Ministry of Health confirmed that a fifth Palestinian had been killed. He was identified as 16-year-old Ahmad Ibrahim Odeh from the northern Gaza Strip.
Around 3:15p.m. the ministry reported that Jihad Freineh, 33, from Gaza City was killed.
Minutes later, the ministry reported that the seventh Palestinian had been killed by Israeli forces. He was identified as Mahmoud Saadi Rahmi, from Gaza City.
Leading up to the march, the Israeli army released a statement saying it had declared the border area along Gaza a “closed military zone,” meaning that any Palestinian who got close to the border fence could risk getting shot.
The Israeli army released statements on Twitter describing the protests as “violent riots.”
“17,000 Palestinians are rioting in 5 locations along the Gaza Strip security fence. The rioters are rolling burning tires and hurling firebombs & rocks at the security fence & IDF troops, who are responding w riot dispersal means and firing towards main instigators,” the statement said.
Despite the Israeli army’s claims, Palestinian activists and leaders in the Gaza Strip have maintained that the “March of Return” was organized as a massive non-violent, weeks-long protest advocating for the return of Palestinian refugees to their original homelands in historic Palestine, now present day Israel.
Leading up to Friday, the first official day of the march — which will continue until the 70th anniversary of the Nakba, or catastrophe, in May — Palestinians set up tents along the border with Gaza, where protesters plan to stay until the Nakba anniversary.
Ismail Haniyeh, head of the Hamas politburo, gave a speech at the March of Return, saying it “demonstrates that there are no alternatives to Palestine and the right of return (for the Palestinian people),” praising the people who left their homes to attend the march.
When speaking about the goal of the march, Haniyeh said it constitutes “the beginning of a return (of the Palestinian people) to the entirety of the land of Palestine.”
“We will not give up and we will not bargain with the Zionist entity over even a small piece of the land of Palestine,” Haniyeh continued, stressing that the Palestinians will reject any deal proposed by the Trump administration.
“Our people went out today to make it clear that we will not give up Jerusalem and that there is no alternative to Palestine and the right of return. We will not accept the right of return staying only a slogan.”
Let’s Investigate John Brennan
Time to find out if CIA interfered in the 2016 election
By Philip Giraldi • Unz Review • March 27, 2018
Former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director John Brennan, a Barack Obama friend and protégé as well as a current paid contributor for NBC and MSNBC, has blasted President Donald Trump for congratulating President Vladimir Putin over his victory in recent Russian national elections. He said that the U.S. President is “afraid of the president of Russia” and that the Kremlin “may have something on him personally. The fact that he has had this fawning attitude toward Mr. Putin … continues to say to me that he does have something to fear and something very serious to fear.”
It is an indication of how low we have sunk as a nation that a possible war criminal like Brennan can feel free to use his former official status as a bully pulpit to claim that someone is a foreign spy without any real pushback or objection from the talking heads and billionaire manipulators that unfortunately run our country. If Trump is actually being blackmailed, as Brennan implies, what evidence is there for that? One might reasonably conclude that Brennan and his associates are actually angry because Trump has had the temerity to try to improve relations with Russia.
It is ironic that when President Trump does something right he gets assailed by the same crowd that piles on when he does something stupid, leading to the conclusion that unless The Donald is attacking another country, when he is lauded as becoming truly presidential, he cannot ever win with the inside the Beltway Establishment crowd. Brennan and a supporting cast of dissimulating former intelligence chiefs opposed Trump from the git-go and were perfectly willing to make things up to support Hillary and the status quo that she represented. It was, of course, a status quo that greatly and personally benefited that ex-government crowd which by now might well be described as the proverbial Deep State.
The claim that Trump is a Russian agent is not a new one since it is an easy mark to allege something that you don’t have to prove. During the campaign, one was frequently confronted on the television by the humorless stare of the malignant Michael Morell, former acting CIA Director, who wrote in a mind numbing August 2016 op-ed how he was proud to support Hillary Clinton because of her “commitment to our nation’s security: her belief that America is an exceptional nation that must lead in the world for the country to remain secure and prosperous; her understanding that diplomacy can be effective only if the country is perceived as willing and able to use force if necessary; and her capacity to make the most difficult decision of all: whether to put young American women and men in harm’s way.” Per Morell, she was a “proponent of a more aggressive approach [in Syria], one that might have prevented the Islamic State from gaining a foothold…”
But Morell saved his finest vitriol for Donald Trump, observing how Vladimir Putin, a wily ex-career intelligence officer “trained to identify vulnerabilities in an individual and to exploit them” obtained the services of one fairly obscure American businessman named Trump without even physically meeting him. Morell, given his broad experience as an analyst and desk jockey, notes, “In the intelligence business, we would say that Mr. Putin had recruited Mr. Trump as an unwitting agent of the Russian Federation.” An “unwitting agent” is a contradiction in terms, but one wouldn’t expect Morell to know that. Nor would John Brennan, who was also an analyst and desk jockey before he was elevated by an equally witless President Barack Obama.
So Morell is by his own words clearly an idiot, which explains a lot about what is wrong with CIA and is probably why he is now a consultant with CBS News instead of serving as Agency Director under the beneficent gaze of President Hillary Clinton.
Well, Trump’s fractured foreign policy aside, I have some real problems with folks like Michael Morell and John Brennan throwing stones. Both can be reasonably described as war criminals due to what they did during the war on terror and also as major subverters of the Constitution of the United States that has emerged as part of the saga of the 2016 election, the outcome of which, ironically, is being blamed on the Russians.
Back in 2013 John Brennan, then Obama’s counter-terrorism advisor, had a difficult time with the Senate Intelligence Committee explaining some things that he did when he was still working at CIA. He was predictably attacked by some senators concerned over the expanding drone program, which he supervised; over CIA torture; for the kill lists that he helped manage; and regarding the pervasive government secrecy, which he surely condoned to cover up the questionable nature of the assassination lists and the drones. Not at all surprisingly, he was forced to defend the policies of the administration that he was then serving in, claiming that the United States is “at war with al-Qaeda.” But he did cite his basic disagreement with the former CIA interrogation policies and expressed his surprise at learning that enhanced interrogation, which he refused to label torture because he is “no lawyer,” had not provided any unique or actionable information. He claimed that he had only “raised serious questions” in his own mind on the interrogation issue after reading the 525 page summary of the 6,000 page report prepared by the Senate Intelligence Committee which detailed the failure of the Agency program. Brennan’s reaction, however, suggested at a minimum that he had read only the rebuttal material produced by CIA that had deliberately inflated the value of the intelligence produced.
Surprisingly the subject of rendition, which Brennan must surely have been involved with while at CIA, hardly surfaced though two other interesting snippets emerged from the questioning. One was his confirmation that the government has its own secret list of innocent civilians killed by drones while at the same time contradicting himself by maintaining that the program does not actually exist and that if even if it did exist such fatalities do not occur. And more directly relevant to Brennan himself, Senator John D. Rockefeller provided an insight into the classified sections of the Senate report on CIA torture, mentioning that the enhanced interrogation program was both “managed incompetently” and “corrupted by personnel with pecuniary conflicts of interest.” One would certainly like to learn more about the presumed contractors who profited corruptly from waterboarding and one would like to know if they were in any way punished, an interesting sidebar as Brennan has a number of times spoken about the need for accountability.
Brennan was not questioned at all about the conflict of interest or ethical issues raised by the revolving door that he benefited from when he left CIA as Deputy Executive Director in 2005 and joined a British-owned company called The Analysis Corporation (TAC) where he was named CEO. He made almost certainly some millions of dollars when the Agency and other federal agencies awarded TAC contracts to develop biometrics and set up systems to manage the government’s various watch lists before rejoining the government with a full bank account to help him along his way. Brennan also reportedly knew how to return a favor, giving his former boss at CIA George Tenet a compensated advisory position in his company and also hosting in 2007 a book signing for Tenet’s At the Center of the Storm. The by-invitation-only event included six hundred current and former intelligence officers, some of whom waited for hours to have Tenet sign copies of the book, which were provided by TAC.
Brennan certainly knew how to feather his nest and reward his friends, but the area that is still murky relates to what exactly he was up to in 2016 when he was CIA Director and also quite possibly working hard to help Hillary get elected. He was still at it well after Trump got elected and assumed office. In May 2017, his testimony before Congress was headlined in a Washington Post front page featured article as Brennan’s explosive testimony just made it harder for the GOP to protect Trump. The article stated that Brennan during the 2016 campaign “reviewed intelligence that showed ‘contacts and interaction’ between Russian actors and people associated with the Trump campaign.” Politico was also in on the chase in an article entitled Brennan: Russia may have successfully recruited Trump campaign aides.
The precise money quote by Brennan that the two articles chiefly rely on is “I encountered and am aware of information and intelligence that revealed contacts and interactions between Russian officials and US persons involved in the Trump campaign that I was concerned about because of known Russian efforts to suborn such individuals. It raised questions in my mind whether or not Russia was able to gain the co-operation of those individuals.”
The testimony inevitably raises some questions about just what Brennan was actually up to. First of all, the CIA is not supposed to keep tabs on American citizens and tracking the activities of known associates of a presidential candidate should have sent warning bells off, yet Brennan clearly persisted in following the trail. What Brennan did not describe, because it was “classified,” was how he came upon the information in the first place. We know from Politico and other sources that it came from foreign intelligence services, including the British, Dutch and Estonians, and there has to be a strong suspicion that the forwarding of at least some of that information might have been sought or possibly inspired by Brennan unofficially in the first place. But whatever the provenance of the intelligence, it is clear that Brennan then used that information to request an FBI investigation into a possible Russian operation directed against potential key advisers if Trump were to somehow get nominated and elected, which admittedly was a long shot at the time. That is how Russiagate began.
So, Mr. Brennan, for all his bluster and scarcely concealed anger, has a lot of baggage, to include his possible role in coordinating with other elements in the national security agencies as well as with overseas parties to get their candidate Hillary Clinton elected. Brennan should be thoroughly investigated by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, to include subpoenaing all records at CIA relating to the Trump inquiries before requiring testimony under oath of Brennan himself with possible legal consequences if he is caught lying.
Trump Should Withdraw Haspel Nomination, Intel Vets Say
Consortium News | March 25, 2018
MEMORANDUM FOR: The President
FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
SUBJECT: Request to Withdraw Nomination of Gina Haspel
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
With respect, we veteran intelligence officers from CIA and other agencies urge you to withdraw the nomination of Gina Haspel for CIA director. From what is already known of her leading role in CIA torture 16 years ago, she has disqualified herself.
Gina Haspel
In 2002 Haspel supervised the first CIA “black site” for interrogation, where cruel and bizarre forms of torture were applied to suspected terrorists. And when the existence of 92 videotapes of those torture sessions was revealed, Haspel signed a cable ordering their destruction, against the advice of legal counsel at CIA and the White House.
Does Torture ‘Work?’
We are confident that if you set aside some time to read the unredacted portions of the Senate Intelligence Committee report of 2014 on the torture ordered and supervised by Haspel and other CIA managers, you will change your mind about her nomination. The five-year Senate investigation was based primarily on original CIA cables and other sensitive documents.
In addition to revealing clear violations of the UN Convention Against Torture, the Senate investigation shows that claims by senior CIA officials that torture is effective are far from true. The US Army — in which many of us have served — has been aware of the ineffectiveness of torture for decades.
General John Kimmons, head of Army Intelligence, drove home that point on September 6, 2006 — approximately an hour before President George W. Bush publicly extolled the virtues of torture methods that became known as “enhanced interrogation techniques.” Gen. Kimmons stated: “No good intelligence is going to come from abusive practices. I think history tells us that. I think the empirical evidence of the last five years — hard years — tell us that.”
We believe that Defense Secretary James Mattis’ lack of enthusiasm for torture reflects lessons drawn from the historical experience of the Marine Corps, as well. Not to mention the twin reality that torture brutalizes the brutalizer, and that US use of torture puts our own troops in serious jeopardy when captured. Moreover, there is no more effective recruitment tool than torture to attract more terrorists.
International and Domestic Law
Please also be aware that many signatories to the UN Convention Against Torture take seriously their obligations under the principle of “universal jurisdiction,” which applies when those who authorize or practice torture are not brought to justice by authorities in their home countries.
George W. Bush experienced a precarious brush with this reality in 2011, when he had to abruptly cancel a visit to Geneva, Switzerland, after discovering that plans were in place to arrest him as soon as he stepped onto Swiss soil. [See “America’s Stay-at-Home Ex-President”] The widely respected European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights already has made no secret of its intention to proceed quickly against Haspel, should she set foot in Europe.
We believe that CIA’s activities and general focus have become severely unbalanced, with the lion’s share of funding and energy going to the paramilitary-prone operational side — where the potential for human rights abuses is not given sufficient consideration.
That trend has gone on steroids in more recent decades, and it is a safe bet that Gina Haspel would accelerate it. We would also observe that if most of the talent and funding goes to CIA paramilitary operations, then the by-products will necessarily include a tendency to engage in politically motivated — and therefore shabby — analysis. That means that senior policymakers like you will be poorly informed, particularly with respect to complex world issues — including biased perspectives on Russia and its newly re-elected president, Vladimir Putin.
* * *
We Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) are extremely concerned at the possibility that Gina Haspel might become the next Director of the CIA. Haspel actually supervised a CIA “black site” codenamed “Cat’s Eye” in Thailand where a number of suspected terrorists were tortured. She subsequently collaborated in destroying all 92 videotapes of the torture sessions, effectively covering up what were likely serious war crimes.
There should be no question about the illegality of torture. It has been universally condemned and banned by both the Geneva Conventions and United Nations Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, which was signed by President Ronald Reagan in 1988 and ratified by the Senate in 1994.
The UN Convention defines torture “as any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him, or a third person, information or a confession…” and makes clear that “no exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture.”
The Convention’s Article 2 requires signatories to take effective measures to prevent torture in any territory under their jurisdiction. The complete prohibition of torture is absolute. Under international law, officials cannot receive immunity in cases involving torture and governments that have signed the Convention are obligated to bring torturers to justice. US domestic law was brought in line with the Convention once the US became a signatory and ratified it.
In the wake of the Abu Ghraib revelations, torture, to include its variations that have been euphemistically described as “enhanced interrogation techniques” (EIT), is now explicitly banned by the US military in its training manuals. A number of soldiers were tried and imprisoned in the wake of Abu Ghraib, although the “upper ranks” — in civilian as well as military spheres — who approved torture managed to escape serious consequences.
Some in the Pentagon clearly took seriously allegations of torture and were willing to file criminal charges against those involved, though Department of Defense leadership never saw fit to assume responsibility for having set up a policy environment that quite clearly condoned EIT.
There is also another significant historical and legal precedent that demonstrates that the United States government has by its own actions agreed that what is today being called “enhanced interrogation” is a war crime. In 1946-1948, Japanese officers who tortured Allied soldiers — including what is now referred to as waterboarding — were tried at the Tokyo post-war tribunals for that crime, found guilty, and executed.
Heinous
More recently, the meticulously documented unclassified 528 page Executive Summary of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) report on the CIA’s secret Rendition, Detention and Interrogation (RDI) program is remarkable for its candor. That five-year investigation was based on original CIA cables and other documents.
In blunt language, the Senate report describes the horrors of the black site secret prisons and the efforts that were made to get terrorist suspects to talk. It demonstrates that the interrogations were brutal — worse than anyone had been led to believe — and also that they did not produce any information that might not have been developed otherwise or, in many cases, any actionable intelligence whatsoever. The full classified text of the report — which names names of the actual torture perpetrators redacted in the summary — runs to almost 7,000 pages.
Moreover, coercive interrogation frequently produced misleading or fabricated intelligence that wasted resources by having to be meticulously checked before being used. This conclusion was also arrived at by former FBI interrogator Ali Soufan — who deplored CIA methods — as well as by a review conducted by CIA’s then-Inspector General (IG), John Helgerson, in 2004. The “Helgerson Report” condemned both CIA leadership and Langley’s on-the-ground management of questionable programs driven by “analytical assessments that were unsupported by credible intelligence” — programs which quickly became abusive.
It is our collective judgment that the loathsome physical abuses that included beatings, repeated waterboardings and anal violations referred to as “rectal feeding” — as well as physical threats to family members — cannot be whitewashed with the convenient euphemism of “enhanced interrogation.” All of those are acts of torture — plain and simple.
And while there are undoubtedly many good moral arguments against torture, there are practical considerations as well. Despite what the media would have Americans believe, torture does not work.
We recall the unambiguous remarks of then-commander of Army intelligence, Gen. John Kimmons, who held a Pentagon press conference on Sept. 6, 2006 — the same day President George W. Bush announced what he called “an alternative set of procedures” for interrogation (which later morphed into the term “enhanced interrogation techniques”). Anticipating that Bush would claim the EITS to be necessary and effective, Gen. Kimmons told the media: “No good intelligence is going to come from abusive practices. I think history tells us that. I think the empirical evidence of the last five years — hard years —tells us that.”
Colin Powell Mousetrapped by ‘Intelligence’ From Torture
Worse still, intelligence officials have used information, which they knew was gained from torture, to mislead the most senior US officials on issues of war and peace. One of the signatories below was eyewitness to how CIA Director George Tenet persuaded Secretary of State Colin Powell to tell the UN of a “sinister nexus” between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda.
Tenet did not tell Powell that this “intelligence” came from a source, Abu Yahya al-Libi, who had been “rendered” to, and waterboarded by, Egyptian intelligence. The Defense Intelligence Agency had deemed this intelligence unreliable, but Tenet chose to ignore DIA and never informed Powell. Al-Libi recanted less than a year later, admitting that he fabricated the story about Saddam and al-Qaeda in order to stop his torture.
Moreover, when you wink at torture, you motivate enemies of the United States to do the same to captured US soldiers, diplomats and travelers while also providing a propaganda bonanza for terrorist groups like al-Qaeda and ISIS.
Indeed, the only reason why CIA torturers have not been tried and sentenced to prison for the damage they have done to the nation is that an intimidated President Barack Obama — who once proclaimed that “nobody is above the law” — balked at allowing the judicial process to run its course, thereby whitewashing the Bush Administration’s many crimes related to the so-called “global war on terror.” Obama attempted to justify his inaction as looking forward rather than backward, but it is more likely that he feared opening up a Pandora’s Box of shameful government secrets that no doubt would have emerged.
Promoting Haspel in spite of her tainted record would send a message to both intelligence and military personnel that embracing practices like torture — indisputably a war crime — can be a path to promotion.
Haspel’s involvement with torture began when she accepted the assignment to go to Thailand — which she could have turned down — to run the “black site” where the interrogations were being conducted. She was, at the time, the deputy in CIA’s Counter Terrorism Center (CTC), working for Jose Rodriguez.
She was in charge of the secret Thailand base in late 2002 while Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri and possibly more suspects were being tortured in a process that included slamming victims’ heads against walls, subjecting them to painful stress positions, regularly depriving them of sleep, confining them to small, coffin-like boxes, and waterboarding.
The “confinement boxes” were of two types; one was coffin-sized, and the other was smaller and less than waist-high. Both had strong claustrophobic effects. A prisoner would be forced into the smaller box as an extreme form of stress positioning, creating excruciating pain. To maximize psychological distress and exploit phobias, insects were sometimes placed in the pitch-black “coffin” alongside the victim.
Destroying the Evidence
In 2005, after returning to CIA headquarters at Langley, she acted on instructions from Rodriguez and drafted the order to destroy the 92 videotapes that had been made of the interrogations. It has been reported that she was a “strong advocate” for the destruction. This was contrary to instructions provided by CIA Counsel John Rizzo and the White House. Thus, her act may have constituted destruction of evidence — a felony.
Jose Rodriguez was investigated for destruction of evidence by a Special Prosecutor who eventually ruled against charging him. An aide to CIA Executive Director Kyle “Dusty” Foggo later revealed Rodriguez’s rationale for shredding the tapes, writing in an email that “the heat from destroying [them] is nothing compared with what it would be if the tapes ever got into public domain – he [Rodriguez] said that they would make us look terrible; it would be devastating to us.” Gina Haspel ensured that these tapes — important, damning evidence of US government torture — would never see the light of day.
Haspel’s defenders claim that she was not the creator of the torture program and only served as a willing executor of a government initiative that she believed to be legal. That may be true as no one has access to the CTC documents that might prove otherwise. Nevertheless, it does not provide her a free pass under international law, where it is generally referred to as the “Nuremberg Defense” — a thoroughly discredited “defense” that harkens back to the era of Nazi atrocities and those who attempted to justify them by claiming perpetrators were “just following orders.”
‘Nuremberg Defense’ Didn’t Work at Nuremberg
Several former CIA leaders have supported her, saying that she was “implementing the legal orders of the president,” but many of them may be concerned about their own reputations or questionable decisions they may have made in the name of the “war on terror.” And the UN’s International Law Commission says something quite different in its codification of the legal options surrounding torture, writing that “the fact that a person acted pursuant to an order of his government or of a superior does not relieve him from responsibility under international law, provided a moral choice was in fact possible to him.”
It is also claimed that Gina Haspel was working for the CIA Chief of Station (COS) in Bangkok and acting under the COS’s orders, but those of us who have worked in and led CIA bases would dispute that that type of tight control was common, particularly since in this case, she was reporting directly to the Counterterrorism Center at Langley. Haspel would have been the boss and would have had independence in the field in executing directives from CIA Headquarters and the Counterterrorism Center — some of which she herself had a hand in drafting.
If Haspel is confirmed and wishes to travel abroad, she may have to restrict herself to countries not party to the UN Convention Against Torture because of her widely known involvement in the “black site” in Thailand. The 42 countries that have signed and ratified the Convention include the US and most of its allies. All take on a legal obligation to enforce the prohibition against torture, based on the principle of “universal jurisdiction,” when necessary. In other words, they are empowered to act when the accused’s home country refuses to do so.
Not Too Late to Do the Right Thing
If you do not withdraw the nomination of Gina Haspel and she is confirmed, this will cast a moral stain on the vast numbers of patriotic and ethically upright Americans who serve their country in the field of national security. It will also be a continuation of the steady erosion of human rights standards and rule of law post-9/11.
Apparent widespread support for torture among the US public — enabled largely by the false message of Hollywood, the media and the Cheney family that it “works” — is deplorable. It might have been headed off by the prosecutions of Haspel, Rodriguez and others by former President Obama, together with graphic exposure of the evidence. You have an opportunity to reverse this wrong.
Withdrawing Haspel’s nomination now would be a step in the right direction. Confirming her as Director of CIA would signal that Washington embraces what then-Vice President Dick Cheney referred to as the “dark side.” Regrettably, torture was once part of US policy. Indeed, one of this Memorandum’s signatories spent nearly two years in federal prison because he revealed that. But torture cannot be relied upon to yield accurate intelligence. It remains an internationally condemned malignancy that must be excised, never to return.
* * *
For the Steering Group, Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)
Jean Maria Arrigo, PhD, member of 2005 American Psychological Association task force evaluating the role of psychologists in U.S. intelligence and military interrogations of detainees (associate VIPS)
William Binney, former NSA Technical Director for World Geopolitical & Military Analysis; Co-founder of NSA’s Signals Intelligence Automation Research Center (ret.)
Richard H. Black, Senator of Virginia, 13th District; Colonel US Army (ret.); Former Chief, Criminal Law Division, Office of the Judge Advocate General, the Pentagon (associate VIPS)
Bogdan Dzakovic, former Team Leader of Federal Air Marshals and Red Team, FAA Security (ret.) (associate VIPS)
Philip Giraldi, CIA, Operations Officer (ret.)
George Hunsinger, Professor, Princeton Theological Seminary; Founder, National Religious Campaign Against Torture (associate VIPS)
Michael S. Kearns, Captain, USAF (ret.), Intelligence Officer & ex-Master SERE Instructor
John Kiriakou, Former CIA Counterterrorism Officer and former senior investigator, Senate Foreign Relations Committee
Karen Kwiatkowski, Lt. Col., USAF (ret.)
Linda Lewis, WMD preparedness policy analyst, USDA (ret.) (associate VIPS)
Edward Loomis, NSA Cryptologic Computer Scientist, ret.
Ray McGovern, former US Army infantry/intelligence officer & CIA analyst; CIA Presidential briefer (ret.)
Elizabeth Murray, former Deputy National Intelligence Officer for the Near East, National Intelligence Council & CIA political analyst (ret.)
Todd E. Pierce, MAJ, US Army Judge Advocate (ret.)
Diane Roark, Republican Professional Staff, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, 1985-2002 (ret.) (associate VIPS)
Coleen Rowley, FBI Special Agent and former Minneapolis Division Legal Counsel (ret.)
Greg Thielmann, former Director, Office of Strategic, Political, and Military Affairs, Bureau of Intelligence and Research, State Department; Former staff member, Senate Intelligence Committee
Peter Van Buren, US Department of State, Foreign Service Officer (ret.) (associate VIPS)
Kirk Wiebe, former Senior Analyst, SIGINT Automation Research Center, NSA
Lawrence Wilkerson, Colonel, US Army (ret.), former Chief of Staff for Secretary of State; Distinguished Visiting Professor, College of William and Mary (associate VIPS)
Valerie Wilson, former operations officer, CIA (associate VIPS)
Sarah G. Wilton, CDR, USNR, (ret.); Defense Intelligence Agency (ret.)
Robert Wing, former Foreign Service Officer (associate VIPS)
Ann Wright, Colonel, US Army (ret.); also Foreign Service Officer who resigned in opposition to the US war on Iraq
* * *
ANNEX
MEMORANDA from VIPS to President Barack Obama Regarding Torture
1 —
September 16, 2016
MEMORANDUM FOR: Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Vice Chairman, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence
FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)
SUBJECT: U.S. Media Mum On How Your Committee Faced Down Both CIA and Obama
2 —
September 19, 2015
MEMORANDUM FOR: The President
FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)
SUBJECT: Intelligence Veterans Challenge CIA’s “Rebuttal” on Torture
3 —
December 29, 2014
MEMORANDUM FOR: Senator Mark Udall
FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)
SUBJECT: Time to Speak Out on Floor of Congress to Stop Torture
4 —
https://consortiumnews.com/2009/092809a.html
September 27, 2009
MEMORANDUM FOR: The President
FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)
SUBJECT: There Must be Accountability for Torture
5 —
https://consortiumnews.com/2009/042909e.html
April 29, 2009
MEMORANDUM FOR: The President
FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)
SUBJECT: Torture: An Accumulated Evil (see Nuremberg): John Brennan Publicly Defended “Extraordinary Rendition” Knowing Its Purpose Was Torture
Shadi Ma’ali seized by disguised Israeli occupation forces in the heart of Bethlehem
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network – March 25, 2018
Former long-term hunger striker and Palestinian refugee, Shadi Ma’ali, was seized by undercover occupation forces at dawn on Saturday, 17 March in the heart of the city of Bethlehem on Manger Street.
Ma’ali, from Dheisheh refugee camp, was attacked by so-called “mustaribeen,” occupation forces that dress to appear as Palestinians.
Ma’ali, who was on hunger strike for over 40 days in 2015 with five of his comrades to demand an end to administrative detention, has been repeatedly arrested and has spent years in Israeli prisons. His fellow former hunger strikers have also been repeatedly targeted; Nidal Abu Aker is held without charge or trial under administrative detention while Ghassan Zawahreh has been transferred to the military courts after over a year and a half of imprisonment with no charge.
In a statement following Ma’ali’s abduction, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine said that “the abduction… once again raises new questions about the Palestinian Authority security forces and their inability to protect Palestinian citizens or detect and respond to the ‘mustaribeen’ attackers… This crime will not succeed in breaking his will and determination.”
Meanwhile, the military court hearing of wounded Palestinian prisoner Abdel-Aziz Arafa, also from Dheisheh camp, was postponed until 8 April. Arafa was seized on 7 August 2017, the same night that fellow Palestinian refugee Raed al-Salhi was shot by Israeli occupation forces. Salhi was isolated from his family and denied visits in the hospital for a month before he was killed by his injuries. As Salhi was fatally shot, occupation forces also shot Arafa in the leg; he has been held in the Ramle prison clinic and has undergone multiple operations during his detention.
Salhi was a beloved son of the camp who was deeply involved in political organizing, library volunteering and many other aspects of camp life. From an impoverished family, he dedicated his life to the freedom of his people and was shot down, unarmed, by the occupation forces who sought to imprison him for this very reason.
Ahed Abu Ghoulmeh has family visit with wife and daughter for first time since 2009
Wafa’ and Rita Abu Ghoulmeh
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network – March 25, 2018
The wife and daughter of imprisoned Palestinian leader Ahed Abu Ghoulmeh, 50, were permitted to visit him for the first time in many years at Hadarim prison on 20 March, reported Hadf News.
Wafa’ Abu Ghoulmeh, Ahed’s wife and a Palestinian organizer, and Rita Abu Ghoulmeh, their teen daughter, have been denied visits with Ahed repeatedly over the years. This was the first visit that Wafa’ and Rita were able to conduct together since 2009.
Ahed Abu Ghoulmeh, a leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, is serving a life sentence in Israeli prison; he was abducted with Ahmad Sa’adat and their comrades Hamdi Qur’an, Basil al-Asmar and Majdi Rimawi on 13 March 2006. They had been held in a Palestinian Authority prison in Jericho for the past four years under U.S. and British guard; in 2006, following promises of Palestinian Legislative Council members to release the PA political prisoners, the Israeli occupation violently attacked and destroyed the prison.
Abu Ghoulmeh and his comrades were seized first by the PA and then the occupation forces after the PFLP’s military wing assassinated notorious far-right, racist Israeli Tourism Minister Rehavam Ze’evi in 2001, in response to the assassination of PFLP General Secretary Abu Ali Mustafa by occupation forces using U.S.-made and -provided weaponry.
During his imprisonment, Abu Ghoulmeh has been repeatedly held in solitary confinement and denied family visits; he has been a leader in the prisoners’ movement and participated in prisoners’ leadership councils, hunger strikes and protests.
Ahed Abu Ghoulmeh’s daughter Rita in 2013 with a poster of her father
In speaking about the visit, Wafa’ Abu Ghoulmeh expressed the difficulties experienced at the hands of the Israeli occupation for Palestinian families who seek to visit their imprisoned family members, beginning their journey at 5 a.m. to pass all of the Israeli checkpoints. After arriving at the prison, she said, all of the families are searched extensively, accompanied by continuous shouting and screaming from occupation soldiers. She noted that the occupation deliberately delays and detains people during these searches. “On the day of our visit, a number of the prisoners’ family members were held back, including the father of Ahed Tamimi, and her brother was prevented from visiting,” said Abu Ghoulmeh.
Family members are forbidden to bring food, drink or personal items with them. Wafa’ said that she could only speak to her husband over a telephone, behind a glass wall. “One policeman stands behind the prisoner and another behind the visitor. Every word we say is heard by this guard… On the way back, we are subject again to the same procedures and harassment. The visit is a joy for prisoners’ families, but it is not without painful moments, especially when watching prisoners with their children.”
She noted that Hadarim prison, where Ahed Abu Ghoulmeh is held, is a type of mass isolation with 100 Palestinian prisoners; all of the men held there are serving life sentences. It is part of the same complex as HaSharon prison, where the women prisoners are held. She noted that family members are forbidden from bringing educational and political books to prisoners in Hadarim, and only religious books and novels are permitted to enter.
Despite the restrictions and repression imposed by the Israeli occupation, Abu Ghoulmeh is preparing to write a doctoral thesis on the Palestinian prisoners’ movement and the psychological situation of people with high sentences. He has compiled research and written significant portions; however, when he was in Ramon prison, the Israeli prison administration confiscated his writings as well as the archive of educational materials maintained by the prisoners. She noted that Abu Ghoulmeh was looking toward Arab and international universities to complete his education; while a number of European universities reportedly expressed interest in facilitating Abu Ghoulmeh’s continued education, he is unable to attend classes and the supervisor of his work is also imprisoned, Marwan Barghouthi.
She said that a Moroccan university has expressed initial approval of the project but seeks to partner with a Palestinian university. In addition, she said that Abu Ghoulmeh is committed to spending every moment in the prison in research, study or teaching other Palestinian prisoners.
UN rights body adopts 5 anti-Israel resolutions, urges arms embargo
Press TV – March 24, 2018
In a major diplomatic blow to Israel, the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHCR) has adopted five resolutions against Tel Aviv, urging an international ban on arms sales to the regime over its atrocities in the occupied Palestinian territories.
The resolutions were adopted Friday at the end of the UNHCR’s 37th session, which lasted for a month in Geneva, slamming the Israeli regime’s mistreatment of Palestinians and voicing support for the Palestinians’ cause against the regime’s occupation of their homeland.
One of the resolutions is called “Ensuring accountability and justice for all violations of international law in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem (al-Quds).”
The document, which was passed by 27 to 4 votes and 15 abstentions, urged the world community to stop selling arms to the regime in Israel.
The resolution called upon “all states to promote compliance under international law” with regard to Israeli actions “by ensuring that their public authorities and private entities do not become involved in internationally unlawful conduct, inter alia the provision of arms to end users known or likely to use the arms in the commission of serious violations of international humanitarian and/or human rights law.”
Another of the five resolutions calls for an Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights, which the regime seized from Syria during the 1967 Six-Day War. Tel Aviv continues to occupy two-thirds of the Syrian territory ever since, in a move that has never been recognized by the international community.
The UN rights body also approved a resolution that called on Israel to withdraw to the pre-1967 lines as well as one that urged the Tel Aviv regime to halt settlement activity.
The fifth document approved on Friday denounced Israel for human rights abuses against the Palestinians.
US gets angry, says losing ‘patience’
Furious over the resolutions, US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley has slammed the council as “foolish and unworthy of its name,” claiming it is biased against Israel.
She also warned that the US would continue to consider its options regarding membership of the UN panel, saying, “Our patience is not unlimited.”
“When that happens, as it did today, the Council fails to fulfill its duty to uphold human rights around the world. The United States continues to evaluate our membership in the Human Rights Council. Our patience is not unlimited,” Haley said.
The UK also spoke against what it called the council’s bias against Tel Aviv.
Britain opposed the resolutions on the Golan Heights and the one on accountability. It, however, voted in favor of the resolutions on human rights and Palestinian self-determination. The country also abstained on the resolution on settlements.
Under US President Donald Trump, the regime in Israel has stepped up its expansionist policies and crimes against Palestinians.
The regime has been further emboldened by a US decision to transfer its capital from Tel Aviv to the occupied city, in a major policy shift which drew global anger and protests late last year.
The city, which is designated as “occupied” under international law since the 1967 Arab War, is sought by Palestinians as the capital of their future state.
Nariman and Ahed Tamimi: Icons of Palestinian Resilience
By Bassem Tamimi | MEMO | March 20, 2018
The incarceration of the two most important women in my life, my wife Nariman and daughter Ahed, is not an extraordinary or exceptional case. On the contrary, Palestinians have continued to endure such atrocious behaviour from Israel as an occupying power since the Nakba of 1948. Perhaps my family represents a model of Palestinians in general, and women specifically, who suffer from inhumane practices on a daily basis.
While families in the Middle East and elsewhere celebrate Mother’s Day, my heart aches for my late mother who passed away about three years ago. She died after suffering from a severe illness, while also still grieving the murder of my sister Bassema. About 25 years ago, my sister was brutally beaten to death by a group of Israeli settlers at the entrance of an Israeli court while waiting to see her detained son. During this painful period, I also went through one of the most difficult and life-threatening periods of my life. While incarcerated in an Israeli prison, I sustained a brain hemorrhage that led to a coma, which left me incapacitated for a long period. The day I was released from Israeli prison, my sister was buried; a devastating time for me and my family. While the Palestinian people continue to suffer from this indefinite occupation, it feels as if these devastating days are a never-ending part of our everyday lives.
Such is the case as my wife and daughter continue to be imprisoned by the Israelis. In the early morning hours of 19 December, 2017, over 30 Israeli soldiers invaded my home and imprisoned my 16-year-old daughter, Ahed. The soldiers declared my village a closed military zone and sealed off all entrances and exits. With more than 12 military jeeps, they fired teargas and detonated sound bombs – they came to terrorize my child and family. Ahed was strong, resilient and calm. While sitting chained in an Israeli military jeep, she called, “Don’t worry, I am strong”. Yes, my child will continue to be strong and resilient and perhaps that is why many people idolize her, while others fear her strength.
Prior to the arrest, some Israeli groups launched a vicious campaign against her because she stood tall against Israeli intimidation and brutality. When my wife Nariman attempted to visit her at the Israeli interrogation centre, she was also arrested. Today, these two strong women await justice and freedom.
I should not be surprised by Ahed’s perseverance, strength, and rejection of the occupation. When she was a small child she asked me what ‘occupation’ means. “Fear,” I said. Despite Ahed’s gentle and warm personality, she grew up knowing how to face that fear and to be strong in the face of it. She stood strong against an armed solider and all that he represented in this illegal occupation. All she did was to unwaveringly say no, in her words and actions, to the occupation.
Despite Ahed’s youth, she stood strong and proud against intimidation and threats during her interrogation by the Israeli military. They tried to break her will, but my child won. In a letter sent through her lawyer, Ahed said, “What happened was expected, and when I remember why I am in Israeli prison, my will becomes stronger. This cause deserves a great deal. We have endured difficulties and we will overcome, as I was taught by my parents. The encouragement and enthusiasm I have received has made me immensely happy, however, I hope that the rest of the Palestinian prisoners receive the same support as I have.”
No doubt, I am a proud father, a father of a girl that has become an icon of popular and peaceful resistance. However, my heart is full of sadness and anger as my child is robbed of her childhood.
Despite my family’s long history of peaceful resistance and demonstrations, and both myself and Nariman’s numerous arrests by the Israelis, I cannot hide the fact that I am in distress and fear for Ahed’s future—perhaps because this is her first experience in Israeli prisons and her first time away from home.
Since 2010, Nariman has participated in hundreds of peaceful demonstration organized in our village against the Israeli occupation. Our home was raided hundred times and Nariman was arrested three times—but this did not deter her from continuing her struggle against the occupation. During the course of demonstrations, she rescued countless Palestinian youth who sustained injuries and attacks by the Israeli military. Yet, she was not able to rescue her own brother who was brutally killed by the Israeli military in 2012. Nariman captured the Israeli attacks on video that day, but did not know that she was in fact filming the death of her own brother. Planting the seeds of resilience in Ahed and my children, Nariman continues to be a role model to women everywhere.
The Palestinian people continue to endure hardship and dispossession, from the time of the Nakba in 1948 until today, both at the hands of the Israeli occupying authorities, as well as the terror of illegal Israeli settlers. Palestinians worldwide, whether living under occupation, in the refugee camps, or elsewhere in exile—continue to live a daily Nakba. We in An Nabi Saleh village represent every Palestinian family who continues to endure Israeli policies of disenfranchisement, a policy that deprives Palestinians of the basic human right to live free. Despite these inhuman and illegal policies and practices against our families, and especially against women in particular, Palestinian women have persisted in their fight. In An Nabi Saleh, women and girls are leaders, and their role in peaceful demonstrations is vital, and are considered role models for many women here in Palestine and abroad.
While the Israelis chose Mother’s Day to prosecute Nariman and Ahed, my family, village, and Palestinians worldwide await the day when they, and all political prisoners, are released from Israeli prison. I would like to extend my family’s sincere gratitude to all those who have supported my wife and daughter, especially human rights organizations.
I am a proud husband and father. I am proud of all the women and mothers of Palestine who, with their strength and determination, have taught us to be fearless. I am proud that today, my child’s beautiful face has become a universal symbol of steadfastness, resistance and anti-injustice – like the iconic image of Che Guevara.
Palestinian teen Ahed Tamimi to be sentenced to 8 months in Israeli prison
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network – March 21, 2018
Ahed Tamimi, 17-year-old activist from Nabi Saleh whose case has received widespread global attention, will be sentenced to eight months in Israeli prison following a plea bargain on 21 March at Ofer military court, Palestinian media have reported. The plea bargain will involve a modified indictment with four items instead of the 12 that were originally included in the indictment, under which she was threatened with imprisonment for up to 10 years.
In the revised indictment, Ahed is accused of obstructing and assaulting an occupation soldier as part of the famous incident in which she slapped an occupation soldier on her family’s land, demanding he leave. Other charges of “incitement” and allegations related to political speech were excluded from the new indictment, as were five other incidents in which she was accused of assaulting occupation forces when they invaded her village, Nabi Saleh.
Ahed’s mother, Nariman, is also imprisoned and facing similar charges relating to the action on 15 December, in which Ahed confronted an Israeli occupation soldier invading her village alongside her cousin, Nour. Nariman Tamimi livestreamed the confrontation on Facebook in a video that soon went viral, expressing Palestinians’ commitment to resist occupation. Ahed and her family are leaders in the grassroots indigenous land defense movement in Nabi Saleh, confronting the illegal settlement of Halamish and occupation soldiers who have confiscated the village’s spring and lands.
The vast majority of all military court cases in occupied Palestine end in plea bargains. Palestinian prisoners are forced into plea bargains with threats of lengthy sentences that pose an all-too-real danger, especially with the inflated charges and lengthy indictments proffered against Palestinians. Over 99 percent of all military court cases end with a conviction, and lengthy sentences have become a norm, even for many children. Plea bargains are forced on Palestinians by a colonial “court” system that is only designed to suppress their resistance and isolate organizers and leaders from the Palestinian people.
The sentence comes only days after the Israeli military appeals court ruled on 19 March that Ahed’s trial must be held behind closed doors and away from public view. Ahed and her lawyer, Gabi Lasky, are rejecting the closed trial, especially as the case has helped to shine an international light on Israeli practices against Palestinian prisoners, especially Palestinian children targeted for arrest and persecution. Ahed’s case has helped to highlight the ongoing, systematic practice of the military imprisonment and trial of hundreds of Palestinian children each year.
While the Israeli court justified its order for a closed trial with language about the protection of minors, the Israeli army videotaped and widely distributed footage of Ahed’s arrest and leading Israeli politicians have publicly demanded she spend the rest of her life in prison. The village of Nabi Saleh has been subjected to repeated raids and attacks and the imprisonment of yet more children of the extended Tamimi family.
Over 1.5 million people have signed a global petition to demand Ahed’s freedom and thousands of people around the world have participated in hundreds of events and actions to demand her release and that of the over 6,100 Palestinian political prisoners held in Israeli jails, including over 350 Palestinian children. The struggle to free Palestinian prisoners and build solidarity for their struggle must be continued and intensified; the global action was critical in maintaining a high profile for Ahed’s case, and every Palestinian prisoner also deserves this attention, solidarity and struggle.
Free Ahed Tamimi! Free all Palestinian prisoners!
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From the Archives
Wartime internment camps in Australia
National Archives of Australia
World War I
During World War I, for security reasons the Australian Government pursued a comprehensive internment policy against enemy aliens living in Australia.
Initially only those born in countries at war with Australia were classed as enemy aliens, but later this was expanded to include people of enemy nations who were naturalised British subjects, Australian-born descendants of migrants born in enemy nations and others who were thought to pose a threat to Australia’s security.
Australia interned almost 7,000 people during World War I, of whom about 4,500 were enemy aliens and British nationals of German ancestry already resident in Australia.
Records of World War I internment camps
World War II
During World War II, Australian authorities established internment camps for three reasons – to prevent residents from assisting Australia’s enemies, to appease public opinion and to house overseas internees sent to Australia for the duration of the war.
Unlike World War I, the initial aim of internment during the later conflict was to identify and intern those who posed a particular threat to the safety or defence of the country. As the war progressed, however, this policy changed and Japanese residents were interned en masse. In the later years of the war, Germans and Italians were also interned on the basis of nationality, particularly those living in the north of Australia. In all, just over 20 per cent of all Italians resident in Australia were interned. … continue
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