25 October 2010 | International Solidarity Movement
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Recently an article titled “We are looking for the next Rachel Corrie” appeared on several IndyMedia websites purporting to be an official ISM call for volunteers in Gaza. This article was not written or released by the International Solidarity Movement. Some versions of the article may have Huwaida Arraf, an ISM co-founder, falsely cited as the article’s author.
Because of the difficulty entering and leaving Gaza imposed by the continuing Israeli blockade and the potential for large scale assaults such as the Cast Lead operation, the International Solidarity Movement is currently only accepting human rights activists with significant previous experience in conflict zones to join our team in Gaza. For more information please contact the ISM media office.
Haifa, Israel – The bulldozer driver who struck and killed Rachel Corrie in March 2003, in Rafah, Gaza, testified for the first time Thursday in the civil lawsuit filed by the Corrie family against the state of Israel, but did so under extraordinary protective measures that continue to underscore the lack of transparency in the investigation as well as the trial process.
The driver, Y.P., whose name was not released, is a 38-year-old Russian immigrant who came to Israel in 1995. He was the sole witness for the day and gave his testimony over four hours behind a makeshift partition, a measure the state claimed was necessary to protect his security. Attorneys for the Corries requested that the family be allowed to see the driver even if the public could not, but their appeals were denied.
“We were disappointed not to see the whole human being,” said Cindy Corrie, Rachel’s mother. “It is a personal affront that the state’s attorneys and Israeli government, on the basis of security, chose to keep our family from seeing the witness.”
Scores of journalists, human rights observers and members of the public were shut out of the proceedings Thursday. The courtroom has only two long rows of seats, nearly half of which were held for the first time by observers apparently from the State Attorney’s office and Ministry of Defense.
In over four hours of often confused testimony, Y.P. seemed to struggle to read and understand his own affidavit signed in April. He could not remember basic facts, such as the date of Rachel’s killing or time of day it happened. He repeatedly contradicted his own statements on the stand and testimony given to military police investigators in 2003.
Highlights of testimony include the following:
Y.P stated that after he drove over Rachel and backed up, she was located between his bulldozer and the mound of earth that he had pushed, corroborating photographic evidence and testimony from international eyewitnesses given to the court in March. His testimony calls into question that of the commander inside this same bulldozer, whose written affidavit states that Rachel’s body was located in a different location, on the far side of the mound of earth created by the bulldozer. In court, Y.P. was asked if based on this contradiction he wanted to change his testimony. He firmly stated no.
In testimony to military police investigators only three days after the incident, Y.P. said the blind spot in front of the bulldozer was 3 meters. In contradicting court testimony, he claimed the blind spot was 30 meters–ten times the distance first stated.
Y.P. knew about regulations that the bulldozer was not to work within 10 meters of people. He was aware civilians were present, but said he was given orders to continue working. He said I’ m just a soldier. It was not my decision.
He claimed he did not see Rachel before the event. Nor did he recall seeing her specifically at all that day, despite the fact that she had protested the bulldozer’s activity for several hours and was the only female activist wearing a bright orange fluorescent jacket.
Following the driver’s testimony, Cindy Corrie stated, “It was very difficult not to hear or detect anything in this witness’s words or voice that suggested remorse. Sadly, what I heard from the other side of the screen was indifference.”
The proceedings on Thursday were attended by representatives of the US Embassy, Advocates sans Frontiers, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), National Lawyers Guild, Adalah, and the Arab Association for Human Rights, many of whom have closely followed the hearings throughout the trial.
The next scheduled hearings are November 4 and 15 between the hours of 9:00-16:00 before Judge Oded Gershon at the Haifa, District Court, 12 Palyam St., Haifa, Israel. Additional court dates are expected to be announced soon.
At-Tuwani – On Thursday, 21st October, at around 9.20 am, two Operation Dove volunteers, coming back to the village of At-Tuwani after having visited some Palestinian families in the village of Tuba, were attacked by Israeli settlers from the illegal outpost of Havat Ma’on (Hill 833).
While walking, the internationals received a phone call by a Palestinian shepherd who was with his flock on a upper hill and warned them about some settlers who were quickly approaching. A few minutes after the phone call, two settlers, faces covered by t-shirts, appeared where the internationals were walking. They shot stones with slingshots at the internationals who quickly ran away.
Later on, a few minutes after 1 pm in the same area, there was a similar attack on a Palestinian boy walking back home through the path on Meshaha hill. Two Operation Dove volunteers were on the top of the close Kharrouba hill to monitor the afternoon military escort of the school children from Tuba and Maghayir al Abeed when they saw an Israeli settler quickly coming out from the outpost, covering his face and calling reinforcements. Few minutes later, three more masked settlers appeared on the top of Meshaha hill and, together with the first settler, started to throw stones against the Palestinian. The boy, after running down in the valley, joined the internationals on Kharrouba hill and stayed with them until the settlers disappeared inside the outpost.
Israeli soldiers, who arrived after being called by the settlers, asked the internationals what had happened and if, according to them, the problems were in some way connected with the Palestinian olive picking activity. The commander then declared he was not proud of the settlers behavior and suggested the internationals call the police every time anything similar happens.
After the settlers attacked At-Tuwani village on June 12th 2010, internationals living in the area documented no other aggression during the summer. These latest events, preceded by the aggression of October 12th when two Israeli masked settlers chased two Palestinian young men and threw stones at them, appear to be a significant renewal of settler violence.
These kinds of incidents are frequent in the South Hebron Hills area, where national-religious settlers from settlements and outposts used to attack shepherds and farmers to intimidate and drive them to abandon their land. These illegal actions usually remain unpunished and, in many cases, happen with the complicity of Israeli army and police. The Palestinian community of this area choose to resist the continuous abuses of Israeli settlers and military with nonviolence.
21 October 2010 | Popular Struggle Coordination Committee
Adeeb Abu Rahmah sentenced to 18 months
Adeeb Abu Rahmah, a protest leader from Bil’in, was sentenced to 18 months imprisonment by the Military Court of Appeals, for his involvement in organizing demonstrations. The decision dramatically aggravates the one-year sentence originally imposed in the first instance.
Judge Lieutenant Colonel Benisho of the Military Court of Appeals accepted the Military prosecution’s appeal in Adeeb Abu Rahmah’s case today, which demanded to harshen the already heavy-handed one-year sentence imposed on him by the prior instance back in July. The court sentenced Abu Rahmah 18 months of imprisonment with bail of 6,000 NIS and suspended sentence of 1 year. An appeal filed by the defense both on the severity of the punishment and on the conviction itself was denied.
Adeeb Abu Rahmah’s sentence is the first to be handed by the Military Court of Appeals in a series of recent trials against high-profile Palestinian anti-Wall grassroots organizers. The harsh and imbalanced decision is likely to affect other cases, most notably that of Abdallah Abu Rahmah – the Bil’in organizer declared human rights defender by the EU – who was too recently sentenced to a year in jail by the first instance of the military court.
Adeeb Abu Rahmah’s case relied heavily on the forced confessions of four minors arrested in nighttime raids by Israeli soldiers. The four attested in court to having been coerced into incriminating Abu Rahmah and other organizers during the course of their police investigations. They were also questioned unlawfully, denied consol and without their parents being presents and, in some cases, late at night.
The ruling in the appeal concludes 15 months of unfair legal procedures, held amidst a massive Israeli arrest campaign, which ended with an upheld conviction of incitement, activity against the public order and entering a closed military zone.
This precedent-setting decision is the first time in recorded history of the Israeli Military Court of Appeals in which a Palestinian is convicted with a charge of incitement. Even the original one year sentence dramatically exceeds precedents set by the Israeli Supreme Court. The Court of Appeals’ even harsher sentence highlights the lack of equality before the law between Israelis and Palestinians, who are tried before two different legal systems. For instance, in a case of a Jewish settler convicted of incitement to murder, the court only imposed an eight months suspended sentence.
Attorney Gaby Lasky (Defense): “Today the court of appeals has shown that it is serving as one more instance of political repression not as an actual court where justice is served. The court admitted what we all knew – that the entire system is trying to make an example of Adeeb in order to silence the entire Popular Struggle movement against Israel’s occupation.”
Background
Having served his original one-year prison term in full, Adeeb Abu Rahmah should have been released immediately after hearing the sentence. The military prosecution, which hoped for an even harsher sentence as part of its ongoing efforts to use legal persecution to suppress the Palestinian popular struggle, petitioned the Military Court of Appeals, asking that Abu Rahmah remains incarcerated despite having served his sentence.
In a clearly politically motivated decision, Judge Lieutenant Colonel Benisho of the Military Court of Appeals decided to remand Abu Rahmah until a decision in the appeal, saying that “This is an appeal filed to set the proper punishment in a unique case regarding which a general punishment level has not yet been set.” The judge chose to completely ignore the punishment level set forth by the supreme court in similar and even harsher cases. Benisho also ignored a supreme court precedent instructing the courts to only extend the remand of convicts past the time they were sentenced to in very extreme situations.
Occupied Territories Department of Physicians for Human Rights Reports on Another Death in Gaza of a Sick Person who Did Not Receive a Permit to Exit the Gaza Strip for Medical Care
Nasama Abu Lashin, a two-year old toddler from Gaza died on Saturday October 15, 2010 in the Netzer Hospital in Gaza. Nasama did not receive a permit in time to receive medical care that could save her life in Haemek Hospital in Afula.
Nasama Abu Lashin, two years old, suffered from leukemia for which, on October 6, she was most urgently directed for life-saving treatment to Haemek Hospital in Afula. Testimony from the family reveals that the request for the toddler and her accompanying father to receive a permit to exit the Gaza Strip was sent to the Gaza Coordinating Authority (Matak Gaza) the same day to arrange her exit on 10.10.10. The response from Matak Gaza was not received immediately and the family was told on 10.10.10 that the request was “under consideration.”
On October 13 as the delay continued in receiving a reply to the request of the ill person, her family turned via Betselem to Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) for assistance. The same day PHR turned to Matak Gaza requesting immediate transfer of the toddler to the hospital in Israel, but the approval was given only in mid-day of October 14.
Tragically, due to a rapid deterioration, the toddler’s condition was so bad on the day the permit was received that the Gaza doctor treating her said it was no longer possible to transfer her to the Israeli hospital. Nasama died of her illness early on the morning of October 16, 2010.
In light of this incident the PHR submitted a sharp complaint to the head of Matak Gaza demanding that an investigation be initiated and that those responsible for the delay be brought to justice.
This case follows the testimony of PHR as to the consequences of the Israeli policy of closing the borders of Gaza on the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip before the Turkel Committee from October 13, 2010. In its testimony the PHR noted before the committee members cases of the deaths of patients residing in the Gaza Strip whose exit for life-saving medical treatment was prevented by the Israeli authorities – a phenomenon that has increased since Israel tightened the closure on the Strip in June 2007. In its testimony PHR emphasized that for the patient, the difference between receiving the permit for exit in time and not receiving it or receiving it after a delay was liable to be the difference between quality of life and unnecessary suffering that might possibly be prevented or even a matter of life and death, as was the situation in the present case.
Physicians for Human Rights calls upon the Israeli authorities at the Erez checkpoint to demand justice from those responsible for the delay in responding to the request of Nasama Abu Lashin. PHR also repeats its demands of Israel to fulfil its obligations towards residents of the Gaza Strip to ensure the unrestricted access of the patients to medical care without delay.
