Salon.com: “Up Against the Wall”

Israel continues building a mammoth barrier in the name of border security. Opponents charge that it’s carving more land for Jewish settlements — and assaulting Palestinians’ human rights.

by Rachel Shabi, Salon.com

Sept. 18, 2006, WEST BANK: “We haven’t seen our land since January last year,” says Abdul Ra’uf Khalid, sitting in his home in the Palestinian village of Jayyus. The Khalid family’s 5.5 acres lie on the Israeli side of the separation barrier, which in Jayyus consists of a tall electric fence winding its way across the hilly, rural terrain. The Khalids have greenhouses, and olive, citrus and fruit trees, on the land but aren’t allowed to cross the divide to tend them. “The apricots and peaches are falling from the trees and rotting,” says Abdul’s wife, Itaf. Stuck here, restless and unable to work, the Khalids appear to be deteriorating in similar fashion.

Along much of the West Bank’s border with Israel a similar story is unfolding. It is a story of land, livelihood and a way of life lost to Israel’s rising barrier, known as the “security” or “separation fence” by its supporters and the “apartheid wall” by its opponents. In June 2002, the Israeli government approved the building of the first stage of a physical barrier separating the Jewish state from the West Bank. In July 2004, the International Courts of Justice deemed the wall illegal and called for its removal. Now, the wall — built from various combinations of concrete, razor wire and electric fencing — is 51 percent complete, and construction of the rest continues apace.

Read the rest of the article at Salon.com

IMEMC: Another settler attack in Susiya

by IMEMC and Agencies, Tuesday 19th September

Khalil Nawaja, in his 70s, was attacked with sticks and pipes Monday evening by a group of seven Israeli settlers with their faces covered. An Israeli soldier was escorting the settlers and did nothing to stop the attack, said local eyewitnesses. Villagers called the Israeli police, but could not get a response.

They then called Ezra Nawi of Ta’ayush (Israeli peace group), who was able to get through to the police on their behalf and ask for an investigation. According to a press release from the Christian Peacemaker Team (CPT) working in the area, the Israeli police only arrived on the scene two hours after the attack, despite the fact that the police station is only 300 meters away from where the attack took place.

The village of Susiya lies between the Israeli settlement of Susya (a Hebrew-ization of the Arabic village name, a common practice among Israeli settlements built atop Palestinian villages), an Israeli settlement outpost (on the site of an ancient synagogue) and an Israeli military base. The Palestinian village has some remaining fifty residents scattered over several hills living in tents, and have been attacked frequently by the Israeli settlers.

According to the Christian Peacemaker Team, the Israeli soldiers and police who eventually arrived to take testimony were angered by the fact that one of the Christian Peacemakers was videotaping, and tried to stop him. The soldiers and police also refused to open an Israeli-controlled gate to allow an ambulance through to the injured man.

When Nawaja was finally able to receive medical treatment, medics noted injuries all over his body – he had been hit on his leg, arm, hand, and upper body. The elderly farmer was taken by the Palestinian Red Crescent Society to Yatta hospital for examination and treatment.

Tulkarem Farmers in Boycott of Israeli goods

Palestinian traders and farmers will gather in the Tulkarem Refugee Camp on September 20th for a Palestinian goods market, boycotting Israeli products as a statement of resistance against Israel’s ongoing occupation, The Grassroots Palestinian Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign said.

The Campaign said that The Tulkarem trade fair will gather over a hundred businesses and farmers, many of them from Tulkarem Camp itself, as part of a growing movement to boycott Israeli goods and promote Palestinian produce.

“Seizure and destruction of land and property has made life almost impossible for many Palestinian farmers, and restrictions on movement have devastated trade,” it said.

The Trade Fair will run from September 20-23, from 9.00 – 4.00 every day in The Hall of the Martyr Kamal Saleem, Main Street, Tulkarem Refugee Camp.

The Trade Fair is organised by the Tulkarem Refugee Camp organising committee with the support of the Grassroots Palestinian Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign.

During the first intifada Palestinians created ‘victory gardens’, mostly famously in Beit Sahour, in an effort to feed themselves without relying on Israeli goods.

Meanwhile, in the latest international boycott action, shops and supermarkets across Ireland were picketed last Saturday by the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign (IPSC) to mark the anniversary of the Sabra and Shatila massacres. Shops were targetted by pickets which handed out leaflets as well as by trolley actions, which involved activists filling up trolleys with Israeli products and taking them to the checkout to vociferously demand that these products no longer be sold. Actions took place in Dublin, Belfast, Cork, Limerick, Galway and Sligo. Especially targetted was the Irish-owned supermarket chain Dunnes Stores as this was where workers first refused to handle goods from Apartheid South Africa in 1984.

These actions coincided with a call in a letter to the Irish times signed by 61 Irish academics for a moratorium on EU support for Israeli academic institutions until Israel abides by UN resolutions and ends the occupation of Palestinian territories.

Haaretz: High Court – “Unbearable Situation” For Palestinians During Olive Harvest

by Akiva Eldar, Tuesday 19th September

Labor Party minister Yuli Tamir recommended putting forth the demand that the prime minister renew negotiations with Syria and Lebanon in the Sareinu forum of ministers . Minister Ophir Pines-Paz told Labor activists in Tel Aviv over the weekend that Ehud Olmert’s references to the road map (among others) were nonsense. He suggested immediately opening the blocked Israeli-Palestinian channel. But, in the occupied territories, the domain of the party chairman, Defense Minister Amir Peretz, it’s business as usual. A non-law abiding group in the settlements continues to cut down olive trees and confront Palestinian farmers. A report prepared by the organization Yesh Din relating to a period in which Peretz was responsible for the welfare of residents of the territories, lists three serious incidents of felled olive trees in Salam (45 trees) and Sinjil (140 trees.) As in all previous instances, no arrests were made. Another report by the organization’s volunteers tells of an illegal outpost whose residents mock the law and those in charge of enforcing it.

At the end of June, the High Court of Justice panel, led by then vice president, Justice Dorit Beinisch, ruled there could be no acceptance of “the unbearable situation,” in which Palestinian farmers were afraid to harvest their olives. The High Court ordered the security authorities to act more diligently against offenders to uproot the phenomenon at its source. Subsequently, Attorney General Menachem Mazuz approached Peretz and Internal Security Minister Avi Dichter. He told them to “immediately order the implementation of a general plan” to fulfill the court’s directives,” and to address “specifically” how to beef up enforcement units in the territories as recommended. He told the two officials to keep him updated.

A document Haaretz received from a legal source, entitled “Recommended Directions of Activity,” reveals that the problem is not “staff work” nor even a manpower shortage, but the authorities’ level of effort in meeting the obligation to protect helpless farmers. The term “effort” (in other words “motivation”) appears five times in the document, which was prepared last January by the office of the coordinator of activity in the territories, Major General Yosef Mishlav.

Below are its main points: “Very serious incidents, involving damage to some 2,300 trees require urgent measures, and that the guilty parties be brought to justice, to serve justice, serve as a deterrent and prevent acts of revenge.”

The document notes it is necessary to act on three planes simultaneously:

  • Investigative efforts, under the auspices of the Israel Police and the Shin Bet security service – intensive work by the designated investigation team with the aim of linking suspects to events or their surroundings in order to produce evidence for an indictment
  • Operational-command level effort – the OC Central Command allocated a specific force for this objective, the “patience” objective, until all the guilty parties are caught red-handed. This will require a coordinated effort by the intelligence-investigative team and the operational team.
  • Legal efforts: convening a committee chaired by the Defense Ministry’s legal adviser to consider within the strict letter of the law the granting of compensation to tree owners, as was done at Inbus [hooligans destroyed an entire orchard in Samaria, and compensation was granted after MK Efraim Sneh intervened – A.E.] A legal opinion is needed for issuing removal orders and restraining orders against suspects from the Scali Farm and the Arussi Farm immediately after the evacuation of the Hebron wholesale market and the caravans at the Amona outpost. The legal advisers must help the OC Central Command.”

This document was sent to then-defense minister Shaul Mofaz for the lessons from the shortcomings in the preceding olive harvest. Peretz says that in the coming season, which starts at the end of the month, things will be better to the extent they depend on him. Defense Ministry officials say that it does not depend solely on the IDF. Check how much “effort” the police and Shin Bet’s Jewish division are investing, they suggest, in protecting residents of the territories.

Among the possible steps recommended by the coordinator of activities in the territories are “evacuation actions” at the two “farms” – the term that illegal outposts hide behind. Such items are popping up under the nose of the defense minister, who once protested against previous defense ministers over the establishment of new settlements. Apparently the changeover in justice ministers and heads of the ministerial committee for the implementation of the report on outposts, are providing the government with a new excuse for stalling. The new justice minister, Meir Sheetrit, assures the few interested in the fate of the promise Ariel Sharon made to the U.S. in 2004 to dismantle the illegal outposts built during his term that he is “studying the matter.”

Mazuz still has not formulated his position on the document prepared by his deputy, Mike Blass, which among other things proposes “whitewashing” the illegal outposts and even providing them with public funding. Mazuz wants to review the responses of all relevant parties to the new proposal, says the Justice Ministry spokesman. That’s what Shaul Mofaz said when he was appointed defense minister a few months after leaving the post of chief of staff. Someone should open a school of outposts. Attorney Talia Sasson, who wrote the report on illegal outposts at the request of then prime minister Ariel Sharon, could be the principal. She explains that with every day that goes by without any action being taken by the authorities in the face of the massive invasion of private lands is another day of collaboration with criminal elements, at least by default.

The case of the El-Matan outpost in Samaria demonstrates brazen violation of the law by settlers. Ten days ago, Ibrahim Alem of Tulat found that an electric cable had been laid on private lands owned by village residents. The cable led from the community of Ma’ale Shomron to the El-Matan outpost. Yesh Din volunteers found a group of residents from the outpost with a tractor out in the field working on laying a pipe and summoned representatives of the Civil Administration. A young settler named Eitam Luz said into the volunteers’ microphone that he was aware he was standing on Palestinian land, but the state was refusing to supply the outpost with electricity, and bypassing the land to run cable would be more expensive.

The Judea and Samaria Police district said in response that this was indeed private land and an investigation has been opened of possible trespassing. The work in the field was halted but the Civil Administration released a statement saying that it did not have the authority to issue a stop-work order, because this was not infrastructure building or a case of unapproved work.

TOMORROW: Brian Avery Shooting Investigation Appeal

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

On Wednesday, September 20, Israeli attorney Michael Sfard will again apply to the Israeli Supreme Court in Jerusalem demanding that the Israeli military open an investigation into the circumstances of the shooting of Brian Avery in Jenin on 5th April 2003. The application will be heard by judges Beinish, Arbel and Heshin at 9am.

The preliminary investigation conducted by the Israeli military concluded that no Israeli military personnel were responsible for the shooting, stating that its forces were not in the area at the time. Following a petition in June 2004, the Supreme Court ordered the military to open an investigation into the shooting in February 2005. The court ordered the Israeli military to interview witnesses, who had provided affidavits to a lawyer before they left Israel in 2003 which identified Israeli military personnel as responsible, and present their findings to the court within 90 days. In November 2005 the Israeli military still felt the case didn’t merit any further investigation whereupon attorney Sfard entered another appeal. The hearing, initialy set for 9th August 2006, was postponed until September 20th. This appeal is the last opportunity for Brian Avery to seek justice in the Israeli criminal law system.

Brian Avery, an ISM volounteer from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, was shot in Jenin on 5th April 2003. This was done at short range, by a MAG machine gun mounted on an Israeli tank, while his hands were raised and he was wearing the fluorescent jacket of the medical rescue team in which he was a volunteer. The killing of Rachel Corrie (on 16th March 2003), Tom Hurndall (on 11th April 2003) and the photographer James Miller (on 2nd May 2003) – all three by the Israeli military – in the Gaza strip, took place within 6 weeks of Brian’s injury. Verdicts of intentional killing and murder were handed out over the deaths of Tom Hurndall and James Miller.

Brian, whose face was shattered, was taken in an Israeli military helicopter to Rambam Hospital, where he underwent several life-saving operations. He was hospitalized for several months, and his medical bill for that period was paid by the Israeli military. He was supported by several activists in Haifa, as well as by his colleagues from the ISM, both while hospitalized and during his visit last year, when he submitted his appeal.

Since his return to the US Brian underwent extensive reconstruction and rehabilitation surgery that is very costly and has not yet been completed. The Israeli military does not recognize its responsibility for the shooting and refuses to bear the costs of the ongoing medical treatment.

The presence of supporters in the court is urgently required as this could be Brian’s last bid for justice.

For more details:

Adv. Michael Sfard: 03 560 7345
Bilha Golan: 050 763 8568
ISM media office: 02 2971824