Category: Press Releases

More people rally to Bil’in’s defense against occupation army

The world is paying attention to the injustices and illegality of the Israeli occupation, annexation barrier and settlement expansion thanks in large part to the steadfast resourcefulness of people in the small West Bank village of Bil’in.

After the violent military siege last Friday aimed at stopping a demonstration before it began, organizations and individuals have been flocking to Bil’in’s side. What follows are some events that have taken place this last week in relation to and what is planned for tomorrow’s demonstration.

Demonstration for Friday: At 1 p.m. on Friday, people in Bil’in plan to plant olive trees along the route of Israel’s illegal annexation barrier in protest of the confiscation of their agricultural land. It’s expected to have a record turnout.

Late night invasions: Since last Friday’s invasion, the military has stepped up nighttime raids on the village, entering homes, taking photos and interrogating people. Four jeeps full of soldiers invaded Bil’in early this morning. At around 2:30 a.m. soldiers began taking photos and interrogating villagers. One coordinator of demonstrations, Abdullah Abu Rahme was questioned in an exchange that ended with soldiers saying, “we know who you are.” Soldiers entered and searched the home of Eyad Burnat, the head of the Bil’in Popular Committee Against the Wall at around 4 a.m. He wasn’t there, and soldiers were unable to find him. Soldiers also took photos of a house used by volunteers with the International Solidarity Movement. Internationals and Palestinians in the village are expecting incursions tonight as the military continues to use violence to intimidate Palestinians to cease their use of nonviolent direct action against occupation policies.

Letter to Bil’in from Nobel laureate: In an open letter of support of the forthcoming Demonstration in Bil’in, Mairead Corrigan Maguire stated, “I write to join with you in the spirit of solidarity and friendship, and to offer my full support for your Demonstration on Friday September 9th in Bil’in. It is our duty and right, as human beings wherever we live, to speak out for human dignity, human rights and against State injustice and oppression.”

Knesset, Palestinian leaders invited: Bil’in demonstration coordinator Mohammed Al Khateb has invited members of the Knesset and parliamentary leaders of the Palestinian Authority and district council to be in Bil’in on Friday. He said some Knesset members agreed to show up. As for Palestinian leaders, Kadura Fares and Mustafa Barghouti announced they would attend, Al Khateb said.

Background: Bil’in began resisting the confiscation of their land by Mod’ain Elit settlement and the subsequent construction of the annexation barrier in February of this year. The weekly Friday demonstrations and creative nonviolent direct actions have drawn dozens of Israeli activists and international support, capturing media headlines for months.

The ritual of confrontation at the path of the construction of the Wall was shattered last Friday when the army entered the village before the Friday prayer, marching through the streets and positioning itself on three main roads. Villagers and ISM internationals followed the Israeli soldiers, yelling “Get Out, Go Away!” The soldiers immediately responded by firing sound grenades and rubber bullets at close range. Residents and internationals were confined to one block near the ISM apartment for nearly one hour, under a show of bullets and gas. About 12 people were injured, three journalists among them. Villagers were threatened by military commanders who ordered a stop of all demonstrations and that no Israeli or international human rights activists remain in the village.

Denunciation: The Israeli paper Haaretz published an editorial denouncing the military’s action, describing the protests as “legitimate and sometimes effective means of protest against the annexation of land,” the editorial states that the Israeli military is showing its “general contempt for the right to legitimate protest.” The Popular Committees against the Wall and Settlement Expansion, Gush Shalom, Taayush, the Coalition of Women for Peace, The Committee against House Demolitions and Anarchists against the Wall released a joint statement in support of Bil’in demonstrations that also criticized the overwhelming amount of violence used by the military.

Nobel Peace Laureate writes in support of West Bank village’s protests against annexation wall

Mairead Corrigan Maguire, founder of the Northern Ireland Peace Movement and recipient of the Nobel peace prize, wrote a letter this week to the poeople of the West Bank village of Bil’in in support of their continued struggle against Israel’s illegal annexation wall.

Dear Friends,

To : Palestinian and Israeli Peace Activists – Support For Nonviolent Resistance in Bil’in. Village. I write to join with you in the spirit of solidarity and friendship, and to offer my full support for your Demonstration on Friday September 9th in Bil’in. It is our duty and right, as human beings wherever we live, to speak out for human dignity, human rights and against State injustice and oppression.

Building the wall, occupying Palestinian villages, demolishing Palestinian homes and building more Jewish settlements, is not the way forward and will not bring forward the day of peace for the Palestinian and Israeli people. Only dialogue and justice for the Palestinian people can hasten the much desired peace which all your people of goodwill long for.

The Israeli Government, using military repression and brute force against nonviolent unarmed civilians, whose only crime is to follow their conscience and refuse to be silenced in the face of such gross injustice against the Palestinian people, is committing a crime against humanity; and this is not the way to peace. There is another way: it is time the Israeli Government listened to your peace activists’ sane voices, and took up their human and political responsibility by getting serious about peace negotiations with the Palestinian authorities. They owe it not only to the Palestinian/Israeli people but to the world, who need signs of hope, in these days of suffering and pain for so many people around the world.

The politics of fear and repression only births more fear and more repression and continues the vicious circle of cruelty and violence from all sides. There will, just as in Northern Ireland, not be a military or paramilitary solution to your problems; only through dialogue and negotiations can you solve this tragedy and suffering of all the people.

We are inspired by our Palestinian and Israeli peace friends and activists and thank you for your courage which gives us all hope.

Shalom, Salaam, Peace,

Mairead Corrigan Maguire
Nobel Peace Laureate
Northern Ireland
6th September, 2005
www.peacepeople.com

Petition challenges Sharon’s address to the U.N. General Assembly

From Al-Awdi

Palestinians remember the anniversary of the Sabra and Shatila massacres of September 16-19, 1982. On Sept 15, a day before the twenty-third anniversary of the killing of thousands of Palestinian refugees, Ariel Sharon will speak as an honored guest at the United Nations in New York City.

Sharon began his murderous career in 1952 as a commander of the army during the massacre in Qibya where 69 villagers were slaughtered. He was the architect of the massacre in Sabra and Shatila that cost the lives of 2,000 people. He is one of the masterminds of the Occupation’s settlement policies in the West Bank and Gaza and now implements the project of the Apartheid Wall prepared by his predecessors against the rights of the Palestinian people and in defiance of international law.

In remembrance of those killed, the Palestinian organizaton Al-Awdi is calling on all who value human rights to challenge the UN’s decision to have Sharon appear as a guest of honor.

Sharon represents a regime that is not only fighting the Palestinian right of existence on their land but also violates international law and
conventions on a daily basis. Hundreds of UN resolutions have been disregarded by the Occupation while the decision of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to dismantle the Wall has been brushed aside by the Occupation bulldozers that continue their to destruction of Palestinians lands and lives.

The UN prepares to applaud Israel’s latest move towards the Bantustanization of Palestine – the Gaza “disengagement” – refusing to acknowledge that Gaza is and remains the world’s largest open air prison. It pressures the Palestinian people to “negotiate” on the status of their ghettos and to surrender to the facts on the ground imposed by the Occupation.

Popular mobilization in the West Bank and Gaza will remind UN that:

  • The Palestinian people do not require Walls or Ghettos but Freedom and the Liberation of their land.
  • The Palestinian refugees in Sabra and Shatila, in Gaza and all over the world will never give up their right of return.
  • If the United Nations want to keep up a facade of coherence with their own rules, it should not allow the presence of the wretched war criminal and Prime Minister of Apartheid Israel in front of the General Assembly but work towards ending Israel’s impunity and the international support for the Occupation, colonization and ethnic cleansing of Palestine.

The 60th Session of the UN General Assembly is asked to:

  • Start the implementation of the UN resolutions including resolution 194.
  • Enforce the decision of the International Court of Justice to tear down the Apartheid Wall and to prohibit any international aid or assistance for this crime.
  • Insist on the true meaning of the “Gaza disengagement”, as a ploy to further split and weaken the Palestinian resistance and to enable the annexation of 47 percent of the West Bank and the expulsion of Palestinians from their capital in Jerusalem.

You can:

Related websites:
International Campaign for Justice for the Victims of Sabra & Shatila
The Sharon Files – The Guardian
UN Security Council Resolution condemning the massacres

New Settlement Puts Pressure on Jerusalem Palestinians

by Jon Elmer
The New Standard

Situated on a hill overlooking the Old City of Jerusalem, the new Israeli housing development looks like it could be an upscale planned community in suburban North America: a billboard solicits buyers for “phase one” housing units; another shows the blueprint of the future community, complete with a daycare, a shopping center, a school, parks, a country club and, eventually, a hotel.

Read the rest right here.

Israeli troops say they were given shoot-to-kill order

by Conal Urquhart
The Guardian

Israeli military prosecutors have opened criminal investigations following allegations by soldiers that they carried out illegal shoot-to-kill orders against unarmed Palestinians.

The 17 separate investigations were prompted by the testimony of dozens of troops collected by Breaking the Silence, a pressure group of former Israeli soldiers committed to exposing human rights abuses by the military in suppressing the Palestinian intifada. The investigations cover a range of allegations, including misuse of weapons and other misuses of power.

Some of the soldiers, who also spoke to the Guardian, say they acted on standing orders in some parts of the Palestinian territories to open fire on people regardless of whether they were armed or not, or posed any physical threat.

The soldiers say that in some situations they were ordered to shoot anyone who appeared on a roof or a balcony, anyone who appeared to be kneeling to the ground or anyone who appeared on the street at a designated time. Among those killed by soldiers acting on the orders were young children.

While the background to the soldiers’ experience is the armed conflict that has been going on in the West Bank and Gaza Strip since October 2000, many of the shootings occurred in periods of calm when there was no immediate risk to the soldiers involved.

Yehuda Shaul, the co-founder of Breaking the Silence, said it aimed to show that individual soldiers were not to blame for killings of innocent Palestinians. “It is the situation which is to blame and that is created by military and political leaders, not the soldiers on the ground,” he said.

The testimonies shed light on how around 1,700 Palestinian civilians have been killed during the second intifada.