Analysis: EU aid to Palestinians — help or hindrance?
IRIN – 19/02/2014
JERUSALEM — The European Union has long been one of the most reliable foreign sources of humanitarian, economic and political aid in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT), providing 426 million euros ($575 million) in 2013 alone.
In 2011, overall overseas development aid to the OPT was worth $2.5 billion, according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.
Much of this aid to the Palestinian people is focused on a single long-term objective, according to EU officials — the building up of the institutions of a future democratic, independent and viable Palestinian state, living side-by-side in peace and security with Israel.
But with limited progress so far in the current US-brokered peace talks and the wider aim of the realization of a Palestinian state, some in the more austerity-minded EU are starting to wonder if the aid is being well spent, when humanitarian crises in Syria and Mali are in need of greater funds.
“By now there is no Palestinian state. The point is: what are we funding here? Are we helping Israel to maintain the occupation, or are we actually helping Palestinians to build independence?” Caroline du Plessix, a French political scientist specialized on EU policy towards the two-state-solution, told IRIN.
“EU member states are today much more aware than before that their aid has not made possible the creation of an independent Palestinian state,” she said, adding: “The EU is trying to figure out what the best strategy may be. Member states need to show that their policy is reaching its ends and is effective. But if the main solution still is the two-state-solution and we are not really going in that direction, this policy is not sustainable and cannot go on for ever.”
Carrot and stick
A substantial reduction in EU aid seems unlikely at the moment. Such a move would have dramatic consequences for the Palestinian economy and the livelihoods of tens of thousands of families.
“There will be a price to pay if these negotiations falter,” the EU’s ambassador to Israel, Lars Faaborg-Andersen, said in late January. In December 2013, an EU official was cited in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz as saying that the EU may cut off financial aid to the Palestinian Authority if peace talks fail, while “some people suggested giving the money to other countries, like Syria, Mali and other places around the world.”
On the other hand, EU foreign ministers are making unprecedented offers, setting out a very substantial set of incentives designed to encourage both parties to finalize a peace agreement.
“These incentives aim at boosting prosperity for both Israelis and Palestinians by increasing access to European markets, facilitating trade and investment and deepening business and cultural ties,” EU-representative John Gatt-Rutter told IRIN, adding: “Therefore, at this stage our approach is one of encouraging both parties to seize this unique opportunity provided by the peace negotiations.”
“In spite of donor fatigue in Europe we will not see more than a limited gradual reduction — say 10 percent a year — in European aid if negotiations fail because European leaders do not want to trigger major instability or a humanitarian crisis,” Ofer Zalzberg, senior analyst at the International Crisis Group, told IRIN.
Building the state to come
Of the 426 million euros provided by the EU to Palestinians in 2013, 168 million was Direct Financial Support to the PA under the so-called PEGASE-mechanism.
PEGASE helps the PA to meet its recurrent expenses through paying salaries, pensions and social allowances to people in extreme poverty, and through supporting essential public services and revitalizing the private sector through policy reforms, institution-building and strengthening the relations between Palestinian enterprises and European counterparts.
The funds are transferred directly to individual beneficiaries like 55-year-old Nabila from the Qaddura refugee camp. “I get 750 shekels ($210) every three months, have a disabled son, and my husband died 10 years ago. How can I move on?” she told IRIN at the Ramallah district office of the PA’s Ministry of Social Affairs.
“There is poverty and we get tired of this situation,” she said, adding though that restrictions on movement (caused, for example, by the Barrier and numerous Israeli checkpoints allegedly set up for security reasons) highlighted a greater problem that aid would never solve.
“How do you want to solve this problem? Why do we have to be in this miserable situation?”
In addition to the direct financial support, humanitarian aid is provided through the European Commission Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection Department (ECHO), which spent 35 million euros in 2013 on areas such as humanitarian coordination, legal assistance and emergency response to demolitions and evictions.
Propping up the status quo
EU aid faces the same challenges as non-governmental aid groups have faced — that by providing support they may inadvertently be playing a political role by helping prop up the status quo, giving life-support services that should normally be provided by Israel, as the occupying power.
“EU funding is strategic. Its main aim is to prevent instability. It is thus scared of the PA’s breakdown,” said Caroline Du Plessix.
For Sami Abu Roza, former economic policy adviser to the Palestinian president, this system of dependency has a bitter political aftertaste.
“If you take away the good intention behind the money, aid is a substitute for not having real remedies,” he told IRIN at the PA’s Ministry of Education, where he currently works.
The EU’s approach to solving the conflict, he says, is part of a larger trend he calls “peaceconomics”, the feeding of an illusionary idea that institution-building and economic aid can contribute to real progress, while the actual political causes behind the difficult situation are side-lined and remain unresolved.
Ashraf Azzam sits in the ruins of his house in eastern Gaza City in Jan. 2013 after it was destroyed in an Israeli attack in Nov. 2012. (Ahmed Dalloul/IRIN)
‘Patronizing’ attitude
“The EU’s attitude towards Palestinians is patronizing, as if money was the only thing Palestinians needed,” he said, adding: “They are sacrificing real solutions for economic aid, building a smoke screen around the real problems.”
“Palestinians know that any money coming to Palestinians is political. But they also know that the world won’t stop paying for Palestinians under occupation. That’s the strange kind of peace Palestinians live in.”
In an attempt to decrease the political dependence from aid, the Ministry of Education has implemented a new mechanism, the Joint Financing Agreement, which has been running for about three years.
With aid money flowing from the German KfW Development Bank, Finland, Ireland, Norway and Belgium, directly into a pool at the treasury of the PA’s Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Education has full ownership of the money and decides how and where it is spent.
“It’s a small path to independence, towards political independence,” Abu Roza said.
But for one senior official in the Ministry, who asked to remain anonymous, the notion of independence remains unreal.
“We don’t have control of our own borders, no taxation, and all of Area C is under Israel’s control. What economic independence are we speaking of?” he said, adding that the PA was not created to become a social entity providing salaries and services to Palestinians. “Its aim was political, and so are our problems.”
‘Aid has not helped to fulfill Palestinians dreams’
Some anomalies in the EU’s funding to the PA emerged recently in a report of the European Court of Auditors (ECA), which criticized the EU’s paying of salaries to Palestinian civil servants in the Gaza Strip “who no longer work.” The report suggested financial assistance “be discontinued and redirected to the West Bank.” Hamas, which took control [won elections] of the Gaza Strip in 2007, is classified by the EU as a terrorist group.
So the EU continues to support the former PA structure in Gaza with salary payments even though the PA no longer has any control: The political cost of stopping funding is seen as too great.
From 2008 to 2012, the average number of civil servants and pensioners whose salaries were at least partly paid by the EU rose from 75,502 to 84,320, about half of the PA’s 170,000 civil servants and pensioners.
During the same period, the average monthly PA wage bill for EU-beneficiaries rose from 45.1 million euros to 62.9 million euros, an increase of 39 percent.
But at the same time, contributions to PEGASE for Civil Servants and Pensioners fell from 21.3 million euros (47 percent of total pay to eligible beneficiaries) in 2008 to 10.4 million euros (16 percent) in 2012, mainly due to reductions in contributions from donors, such as Spain.
These pressures point to a new funding environment in which the PA is finding it increasingly difficult to pay salaries and pensions on time.
The UN Works and Relief Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) faces similar challenges. This year it has a deficit of $65 million in its core budget and struggles with declining international funding. The EU is UNRWA’s largest donor.
“Aid has not helped to fulfill Palestinians dreams, nor did it lead to sustainable development. Independence is today further away than 20 years ago,” Alaa Tartir, program director of the Palestinian Policy Network, told IRIN.
Despite the contradictions in EU aid policy, it is clear that without EU aid the humanitarian situation in OPT would worsen significantly.
“If we reach a condition where there is no more aid for PA employees, who will fill this gap? This will have a severe humanitarian impact,” said Tommaso Fabri, head of the Jerusalem office of Doctors Without Borders.
One beneficiary of the EU’s direct assistance to the PA is 49-year-old Said Samara, a teacher at the Secondary Boarding School in Ramallah.
“As a teacher, I hope that this aid will continue. But as a teacher, and for my students, I also need some hope for an independent Palestinian country,” he said.
Israeli forces use tear gas against schoolchildren in Hebron
International Solidarity Movement | February 17, 2014
Hebron, Occupied Palestine – On Sunday, the 16th of February, Israeli soldiers and border police in Hebron fired tear gas and sound grenades at children on their way to school. The border police also chased the children, attempting to arrest them.
At Checkpoint 29, around 7:30 a.m., a few children on their way to school (there are three schools near the checkpoint) were throwing stones at the soldiers stationed there. In response to this two border police and a soldier appeared from an alley and threw a sound grenade at the kids close to the United Nations school on Tareq Ben Ziyad Street.
This frightened not only the children who had thrown stones but all the children on their way to school, causing them to flee. When they did not catch any children the two border police and the soldier stood in front of the school blocking the entrance and started firing teargas at those who had fled.
As the border police and the soldier returned to the checkpoint, three new soldiers came out of an apartment across the street, preventing the children from entering their school. The soldiers continued firing teargas towards the crowd of upset and frightened children.
Tear gas is a nondiscriminatory nerve gas which affects all persons nearby. The gas often takes a long time to disperse, forcing children to go through the half-dispersed gas clouds on their way to school, leaving them crying and coughing. The use of tear gas against schoolchildren is common in Hebron.
In total, seven soldiers and two border police were involved in the incident, firing six tear gas grenades and two sound grenades at the children.
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Israeli troops shoot, injure Palestinian girl at flying checkpoint
Ma’an – 15/02/2014
NABLUS – Israeli forces on Saturday opened fire at a vehicle traveling on a main road near an Israeli settlement south of Nablus, injuring a 17-year-old Palestinian girl, security sources said.
Palestinian security sources told Ma’an that Israeli troops operating a flying checkpoint near the illegal settlement of Yitzhar fired at a Palestinian car that allegedly refused to stop at the soldiers’ request.
A bullet hit Nahad Kamal Aqil in the thigh, and she was taken to a nearby hospital, the sources said, adding that the teen is a resident of Kafr Qaddum in the northern West Bank.
Israeli troops detained the driver of the car, the sources said.
An army spokeswoman said that the Israeli border police was responsible for the area where the incident occurred.
A border police spokesman did not return calls seeking comment.
Israeli forces maintain severe restrictions on Palestinians’ freedom of movement in the West Bank through a combination of fixed checkpoints, flying checkpoints, roads forbidden to Palestinians but open to Jewish settlers, and various other physical obstructions.
At any given time there are about 100 permanent Israeli checkpoints in the West Bank, while surprise flying checkpoints often number into the hundreds.
The internationally recognized Palestinian territories of which the West Bank and East Jerusalem form a part have been occupied by the Israeli military since 1967.
Palestinian footballers shot by Israeli forces never to play again
Ma’an – February 14, 2014
BETHLEHEM – Two young Palestinian football players shot by Israeli forces last month have learned that they will never be able to play sports again due to their injuries, according to doctors.
Doctors at Ramallah governmental hospital said the pair will need six months of treatment before they can evaluate if the two will even be able to ever walk again, at best.
Jawhar Nasser Jawhar, 19, and Adam Abd al-Raouf Halabiya, 17, were shot by Israeli soldiers as they were walking home from a training session in the Faisal Hussein Stadium in al-Ram in the central West Bank on Jan. 31.
Israeli forces opened fire in their direction without warning as they were walking near a checkpoint.
Police dogs were subsequently unleashed on them before Israeli soldiers dragged them across the ground and beat them.
The pair was subsequently were taken to an Israeli hospital in Jerusalem, where they underwent a number of operations to remove the bullets.
Medical reports said that Jawhar was shot with 11 bullets, seven in his left foot, three in his right, and one in his left hand. Halabiya was shot once in each foot.
The two were taken to Ramallah governmental hospital before being transferred to King Hussein Medical Center in Amman.
Chairman of the Palestinian Football Association Jibril al-Rajoub condemned the shooting and said that “Israeli brutality against them emphasizes the occupation’s insistence on destroying Palestinian sport.”
Rajoub called for imposing penalties on the Israeli football association, and demanded its removal from the FIFA as it should not accept racist organizations that do not adhere to international law.
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Ahava blockaders Supreme Court appeal fails, but campaign remains victorious
By Tom Anderson and Therezia Cooper | Corporate Watch | February 7, 2014
An appeal to the Supreme Court by two campaigners against the Ahava store in London has been unsuccessful.
The campaign
Ahava manufactures its products at the Israeli settlement of Mitzpe Shalem in the occupied West Bank. The settlements of Mitzpe Shalem and Kibbutz Kalia are shareholders in the company (see here).
Ahava, a multinational Israeli Dead Sea products company, was forced to close its flagship store Monmouth Street, central London in 2011 after two years of concerted campaigning by grassroots groups.
The case
The two campaigners, Matt Richardson and Gwen Wilkinson, had locked themselves to a concrete barrel inside the Ahava store on Monmouth street with the aim of stopping the shop from doing business. The store closed for the day. Police arrived and cut them free. They were arrested for aggravated trespass under Section 68 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act.
In their defence they argued that the store’s business was unlawful on the basis that the shop was:
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aiding and abetting a war crime by aiding the transfer of Israeli civilians into the Occupied Palestinian Territories
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The products in the shop were criminal property as they were the proceeds of a war crime
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The products had fraudulently claimed the benefits of the Eu-Israel Association Agreement
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The products had been labelled Israeli when they were in fact from a settlement
In the Magistrate’s Court the defendants were not successful. They were given a conditional discharge and a fine. In an appeal to the High Court the judge upheld their conviction.
The campaigners were appealing against their conviction to the Supreme Court and on the following point of law: “Should the words ‘lawful activity’ in section 68 Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 be limited to acts or events that are ‘integral’ to the activities at the premises in question?”
The court ruled that the answer to that question is “yes” and that the convictions should be upheld. Importantly the judgement says that for activists to use the defence that businesses are unlawful in aggravated trespass cases then the unlawful business must be integral to the business obstructed. Ie it might follow that if activists lock themselves to the gate of a pharmaceutical company that is involved in illegal animal testing then it is only a defence in court to argue that the company’s business isn’t lawful if the business you disrupt is ‘integrally’ involved in the unlawful activity.
The judgement can be viewed here, and here
The option of appealing to the European Court is still open to the defendants
Implications
The ruling is an example of the English court system attempting to close avenues for lawful resistance to corporate crime. In reality, corporations are multinational enterprises that commit crimes across continents. The defence that was the subject of the appeal has often been a chance for ordinary people to express their anger against these crimes.
Its important not to overestimate the importance of this ruling – it only actually adjudicated on the application of the defence in aggravated trespass case. It does not rule out the use of similar defences in criminal damage cases like those used by the Raytheon 9 and the EDO decommissioners, who were found not guilty after breaking into arms factories linked to the supply of arms to Israel and destroyed machinery and computers in order to stop war crimes.
Direct Action
Its also important to remember that the Ahava campaigners were successful in their campaign. The store closed down, not as a result of a court victory but as a result of a concerted grassroots campaign. The victory came after two years of regular demonstrations, blockades of the store, legal challenges as well as acts of direct action which included activists daubing slogans on the windows, super-gluing the locks during the night and throwing paint bombs at the shop front. This combination of public demonstrations, legal challenges and clandestine direct action proved a successful formula.
Jewish settlers beat Israeli activist protecting Palestinians
Ma’an – 09/02/2014
BETHLEHEM – Footage released by a rights group on Saturday appears to show Jewish settlers beating an Israeli activist as he tries to defend Palestinian farmers while Israeli soldiers look on.
The videos released by joint Israeli-Palestinian human rights group Ta’ayush show an Israeli activist who has accompanied Palestinians to their farm lands in the village of Khirbet Shuweika in the South Hebron Hills being assaulted by Jewish settlers.
The videos, which could not be independently verified, also show that after the settlers have beaten the activist, an Israeli soldier approaches the settlers but pats one of them on the back and does not attempt to detain or reprimand them in anyway.
According to Israeli alternative news website +972, the assault occurred around 11 a.m. on Saturday.
An Israeli activist affiliated with Ta’ayush had accompanied local Palestinians after they had been prevented from reaching their lands numerous times in recent weeks by local settlers, even though Israeli authorities recognize the area as private Palestinian land.
The Jewish settlers were from the nearby Eshtemoa outpost, and according to an activist affiliated with the group, none of them were detained by Israeli forces.
Following the attack, the activist went to the Kiryat Arba police station and Israeli authorities said an investigation would be launched into the incident.
Israeli news site Haaretz quoted an IDF spokesperson as saying that the video was “tendentiously edited,” and that Israeli soldiers on the scene had acted to “distance” the settlers and call on police to investigate the incident, as per protocol, according to +972.
In 2013, there were 399 incidents of settler violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
In the last week alone, hundreds of olive trees across the West Bank have been chopped in a number of incidents targeting Palestinian farmers’ livelihoods.
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Israel demolished 27 Jordan Valley homes in January
Ma’an – 07/02/2014
BETHLEHEM – Israeli forces destroyed 27 homes in the occupied Jordan Valley in January, according to Israeli rights group B’Tselem, leaving 147 people homeless.
Nearly half of those displaced were children and 65 people lived in communities that had been demolished more than once by Israel, B’Tselem said.
On Wednesday, the International Committee of the Red Cross said it would stop providing tents to Palestinians whose homes had been demolished in the Jordan Valley because Israel would often confiscate them.
Last week, the UN humanitarian coordinator for the Palestinian territories criticized Israel’s demolition of Palestinian homes in the Jordan Valley.
“I am deeply concerned about the ongoing displacement and dispossession of Palestinians … along the Jordan Valley where the number of structures demolished more than doubled in the last year,” James Rawley said in a statement.
“This activity not only deprives Palestinians of access to shelter and basic services, it also runs counter to international law.”
The number of structures demolished by the Israeli authorities in the Jordan Valley in 2013 more than doubled, from 192 in 2012 to 393 in 2013.
Israel has said in recent negotiations that it is not willing to compromise security in the Jordan Valley, which forms a third of the occupied West Bank.
Over 90 percent of the Jordan Valley is designated as Area C, with illegal settlements controlling up to 50 percent of the land area.
Canadian multiculturalism minister Jason Kenney buys SodaStream unit in jab at Oxfam
Al-Akhbar | February 4, 2014
The employment minister of Canada, a strong supporter of Israel, has waded into the spat over Oxfam breaking with US actress Scarlett Johansson for endorsing an Israeli soft drink firm that operates in the occupied West Bank.
Minister Jason Kenney, who is also minister of multiculturalism in Canada, extended an ironic thank you to Oxfam for bringing the Israeli firm SodaStream to his attention.
Last week Johansson made headlines when she quit her role as Oxfam ambassador after the NGO said her promotion of SodaStream was “incompatible” with her role at the international aid agency.
SodaStream, which manufactures machines for making carbonated drinks at home, has 25 factories around the world, including one that operates in a settlement east of Jerusalem.
“Bought a nice SodaStream unit at the HudsonsBayCo. Thanks to Oxfam for the tip,” the minister said in a tweet.
The minister’s message also featured a photo of a SodaStream beverage machine with its brand name clearly visible.
It also bore the letters “BDSfail” in reference to the campaign calling for “boycott, divestment, sanctions” of Israeli products and goods.
Oxfam calls for a boycott of any Israeli firm operating in settlements in the occupied West Bank, which are illegal under international law.
Canada is a strong backer of Israel, and Prime Minister Stephen Harper visited Israel late last month.
(AFP, Al-Akhbar)
A riot near Yizhar demonstrates the essence of Israeli occupation
The comedy, in whole
By Yossi Gurvitz | Yesh Din | January 31, 2014
Settlers hurl stones near the settlement of Yitzhar.
On April 25th, 2013, Raed Mahmoud Ahmad Sabah was in his house in the village of Urif, when he noticed three Israeli civilians, all wearing hoods, approaching his house from the settlement of Yizhar. Shortly afterwards, a settlement security vehicle arrived and joined the raiders, and out stepped a man who Sabah identified as a settlement security officer. Several minutes late, two IDF vehicles joined the group, out of which emerged a handful of soldiers. The squad of hooded Israelis were reinforced by more hooded Israelis, who also came from the direction of Yizhar. Together they began to hurl stones at Sabah’s home and at the neighboring houses. The group also started to uproot saplings. The Israeli soldiers, as well as the settlement security officer, stood about aimlessly, without bothering to stop the attack. The young men of Urif gathered to defend themselves and their property, and only then did the army spring into action. Large forces of the IDF and Border Police began firing tear gas canisters – at the Palestinians, naturally. Sabah would later count seven tear gas canisters in his courtyard. The Israeli rioters used the opportunity to sneak back home under cover of the gas screen. Needless to say, none of them were detained.
Yizhar is one of the most notorious settlements. Its municipal council recently resigned (Hebrew) after its residents? decided to stop cooperating with the IDF and appointed a suspected criminal, Boaz Albert (Hebrew) as their representative to the army. Last August, the Yizhar settlers denied Druze workers entry to the settlements. At the time, the army decided once more to retreat (Hebrew) and sent Jewish workers in their stead. Yizhar is home to the Od Yosef Khai Yeshiva (religious school), whose rabbis published the gentile-slaying manual, “Torat HaMelekh”. The yeshiva students operate the “HaKol HaYehudi” website, which several years ago published an article (Hebrew) by Yossi Elizur (one of the writers of Torah/torat? Hamelekh), which detailed the principles of “arvut hadadit,” the name given by the settlers at the time to the terror acts known as “price tag” attacks. The security system alleges that several Yizhar residents are involved in a series of “price tag” incidents, as well as daily terror attacks on Palestinians.
So, here was another story of the usual riot and collaboration by the army with the attackers. We’ve become inured to that. Our client, Sabah, possesses a sense of humor, so he complained to the Military Police Criminal Investigations Department (MPCID) about the behavior of the soldiers, and to the police against the settlers and settlement security officers. This, we should note, is his second complaint: three months earlier, Sabah lodged another complaint about a settler attack.
So, what did the police do with Sabah’s complaint? It did nothing. Just like Sabah’s earlier complaint, this case was also closed by the police on grounds of “perpetrator unknown.” The police did so even though Sabah presented it with a video showing the settlement security officer exiting the vehicle near the hooded settlers. Indeed, the only investigative action taken by the JSDP (Judea and Samaria Police District Police) was taking Sabah’s statement and watching his video.
As noted by our attorneys, Anu Lusky and Noa Amrami, there were quite a few actions the police could have taken. It could have interrogated Sabah’s neighbors; he said in his testimony that they, too, were attacked. The police didn’t do so. The JSDP could have interrogated the settlement’s security officer, but instead it was satisfied with a short question presented to him about the issue, which was dropped when he replied that he “did not remember” such an incident.
The police could have located the soldiers, who Palestinians testified were seen talking to the Israeli rioters during the incident, and interrogated them – but the investigators did not bother to find out who they were. In a handwritten memo, a police officer noted that he asked the security coordinator of Yizhar whether he could identify the rioters – but the officer didn’t even bother to write down the answer.
This is how it looks. First, you build a settlement. Then you let it turn into a base of attacks against the local villages and towns, while the army not only refrains from stopping the attacks but provides cover for them; and then comes the police and puts the investigation out to pasture. In the West Bank, this desolate state of affairs is masquerading as “the rule of law.”
We’ll repeat this again: the residents of the West Bank are protected persons according to the Geneva Conventions and the rulings of the Israeli High Court of Justice. When the army and the police refrain from providing them with this protection, they betray their basic duty. The words of Attorneys Lusky and Amrami in the appeal against the decision to close the case are worth quoting:
“We shall further remind you that according to Israeli law, as well as international law, the military commander and the police in the region are under an active duty to ensure the realization of the rights of the Palestinian residents and their protection. Hence, it is clear that our client is entitled to full protection by the JSDP, as has been ordered by the military commander in the region, particularly as this is not a single offense. […] This duty was blatantly violated in this case by the failure of the IDF troops and settlement security officials, who stood idly by and did not stop the violence started by [the settlement’s] residents, even though they were present at the scene in real time. This duty was violated once more, when a decision was made to close the case without fully investigating it.”
Israel should decide to which world it wants to belong: that which performs tikkun olam based on the rule of law and international law, or that of the rogue nations. Even though the question has never been presented to the citizens of Israel, the State’s actions in the West Bank provide a fitting answer.
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Israeli forces shoot, injure Palestinian youths at checkpoint
Ma’an – 31/01/2014
BETHLEHEM – Two Palestinian youths were shot and injured by Israeli forces early Friday at a checkpoint east of Jerusalem in the West Bank, witnesses said.
Witnesses told Ma’an that 19-year-old Jawhar Nasser Jawhar was injured by Israeli fire at al-Zaayyem checkpoint near Abu Dis.
Additionally, Adam Abd al-Raouf Halabiya, 17, was injured in the incident.
Jawhar remains in Israeli custody, and was not immediately given access to first aid, witnesses said.
His mother Svetlana, a Ukrainian citizen, said that her son was admitted to an Israeli hospital.
She spoke to Ma’an via telephone from the hospital, where she said she was being prevented from seeing her son. She said Israeli soldiers instructed doctors not to answer her questions about his health.
Israeli forces also threatened to deport her to Ukraine, she said.
An Israeli Border Police spokesman was unable to be reached for comment.
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An ugly ending to Oxfam-Johansson saga
By Jonathon Cook | January 30, 2014
Here is Oxfam’s official and very brief statement on the ending of its eight-year relationship with Scarlett Johansson, who served as a “global ambassador”. It seems clear that Oxfam – very belatedly – gave her an ultimatum following her recent decision to accept another ambassadorship, this time promoting SodaStream, whose factory is in an illegal settlement in the West Bank.
Oxfam states Johansson’s “role promoting the company SodaStream is incompatible with her role as an Oxfam Global Ambassador”. It was either us or them. Johansson stepped down, making clear she prefers to work for a company that breaks international law over an organisation concerned with humanitarian issues.
Oxfam’s dithering and its final efforts to allow Johansson to present this as a resignation rather than a dismissal reinforces the point I made yesterday about how money talks, even for Oxfam. The charity needs pretty ambassadors to raise funds and to gain media attention. Treating Johansson harshly, even now when the relationship is over, might put off other Hollywood starlets who hope to burnish their humanitarian credentials – at least as long as the work doesn’t interfere with their opportunities to make money, even when it comes at the expense of other people’s freedom.
No one comes out of this affair looking good.
www.oxfam.org/en/pressroom/reactions/oxfam-accepts-resignation-scarlett-johansson
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Trans ‘milk’ as good as the real thing – NHS
RT | February 18, 2024
The drug-induced nipple secretions of trans women are as good as mothers’ breast milk for babies, the University of Sussex Hospitals NHS Trust claimed in a letter to campaigners made public in a report by British think tank the Policy Exchange on Sunday.
The healthcare trust’s medical director, Rachel James, argued that the off-label prescription drug cocktail men transitioning to female take in order to produce milk was “similar to the natural hormones which encourage lactation to develop when the baby is newly born.”
“The evidence which is available demonstrates that the milk is comparable to that produced following the birth of a baby,” James wrote in the letter, sent to Children of Transitioners last August.
Biological men who wish to lactate must first take hormones to grow milk glands and then take high doses of either domperidone or metoclopramide to stimulate milk production. Neither drug is approved for this use, though they are occasionally prescribed off-label to biological women who have trouble lactating.
However, domperidone’s own manufacturer, Janssen, warns patients the drug “may cause unwanted side effects affecting the heart in a breastfed baby” and “should be used during breastfeeding only if your physician considers this clearly necessary.” … continue
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- Fear Of Debate: Alarmist German Climate Scientist Calls On Mainstream Media To Discredit Skeptic Voices
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