International Solidarity Movement - Page 281 - Nonviolence. Justice. Freedom.

International activists remain in Gaza hospital threatened by Israeli missiles

11th July 2014 | International Solidarity Movement| Gaza, Occupied Palestine

Israel’s army fired four ‘warning’ missiles at the roof of El-Wafa rehabilitation hospital in Gaza City, Gaza. International volunteers now staying in the hospital in solidarity, have said they, “can hear missiles falling close by”.

“The civilian population of Gaza is being bombed. We will stay with them in solidarity until the international community and our governments take action to stop Israel’s crimes against humanity.” States Swedish International Solidarity Movement (ISM) activist, Fred Ekblad.

The volunteers are citizens of USA, Spain, Sweden, Venezuela, France, UK, Australia, and New Zealand. The first barrage of missiles hit the fourth floor of the hospital at 2:00AM.

At approximately 17:00 a fifth missile hit the fourth floor of the hospital.

“Windows and doors were blown out, broken glass everywhere, damage to the stairs, there’s a big hole at the impact area and the wall is burnt,“ reports Joe Catron, ISM activist, from the U.S.

At around 20:00 Basman Alashi, executive director of the hospital, received an unidentified call from a person with a, “heavy Israeli accent”, asking if there were any injuries, whether there was any one in the top floor, and whether they were planning to evacuate the hospital.

Alashi says the hospital will not be evacuated because there is nowhere to evacuate the patients too. “El-Wafa hospital serves the patients that need medical attention 24 hours a day. Including patients that can’t move, or people who need to be fed by tube. This hospital is the only one in Gaza specializing in the rehabilitation of people who need physical and occupational therapy. Some of our patients are over 60 years old, men and women. We don’t understand why the Israeli forces have fired five rockets at the hospital in the last 24 hours so far. We serve humanity.”

Gaza report: Death and destruction

11th July 2014 | International Solidarity Movement, Charlie Andreasson | Gaza, Occupied Palestine

We managed to get a lift in an armoured Land Rover belonging to French journalists, and at crazy speed we went through intersections with only the cat horn as protection. The goal was Jabalya refugee camp and the latest targeting killing using a drone.

Ambulances left the site shortly after we arrived, and the fire brigade were just about to pull away from the car. Or what had once been a car.

What was in front of me was a complete wreck with twisted metal parts. Although the real shock and disgust came when I saw the license plate. It ended with 22. It had been a taxi.

We caught a ride with another journalist to Kamal Hospital, where the bodies of the three men, Mahmoud Walaid, Hazim Balouska, Alaa Abdelnabi, were taken. On a stretcher was one of the men, crumbling, burnt, with no identity left, he would now be placed into cold storage.

But there were problems. The storage was full. Too many people have been killed in the past three days since “Operation Defensive Edge” began.

As I’m writing the number of people murdered is 80 [the number has now risen], the cold storage is full, awaiting their funerals.

Two bodies were lying on the same stretcher.

Now we no longer had a car from the press to hitch a ride with. By taxi, we headed to the border crossing at Erez, which we heard had been attacked earlier.

It was the first time I’d seen the gate stand wide open on the Palestinian side, and the building appeared deserted. We didn’t step out of the taxi.

To walk into the area towards the Israeli part of the border crossing, although it’s a kilometer apart, is not a good idea.

Instead we went on to another one of Israel’s bombing target from the day before. Opposite a petrol station was an enormous crater among overturned and broken citrus trees, and from the apartment building next to it, a lemon tree hung upside down with the roots wedged on the roof.

We looked at each other, and all felt that it was enough death and destruction for one day, and when the driver asked if we wanted to go to the next bombed place, we said no in a unified voice.

Israeli forces engaged in punitive destruction of homes in the Gaza Strip

10th July 2014 | Palestinian Center for Human Rights | Occupied Palestine

The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) is strongly concerned by Israel’s conduct of its offensive on the Gaza Strip, and in particular by the widespread punitive targeting of homes belonging to members of Hamas and Islamic Jihad.

In recent days, the Israeli air force has conducted two phase targeting of fighters’ homes whereby a ‘warning’ is issued to the house in question so that it may be evacuated. This warning takes the form of either a dud missile (termed ‘roof knocking’) or a phone call. The house is then subsequently targeted and destroyed, typically 15 minutes later.

Photo by Palestinian Center for Human Rights

PCHR highlights that during active hostilities, only fighters and military objectives may be targeted. Civilians and civilian objects are protected from direct attack.

Article 52(2) of Additional Protocol II to the Geneva Conventions defines a military objective as: ‘those objects which by their nature, location, purpose or use make an effective contribution to military action and whose total or partial destruction, capture or neutralization, in the circumstances ruling at the time, offers a definite military advantage.’

Unless a home is being used to ‘make an effective contribution to military action’ – i.e. unless it is being used to store weapons or as a base from which attacks are launched – it cannot be considered a military objective. A home cannot be classified as a military objective merely because it owned by a fighter. Instead, it must be recognised as a civilian object and protected from direct attack. Issuing a warning does not remove this protection from direct attack.

Significantly, Article 52(3) of Additional Protocol II to the Geneva Conventions clearly states: ‘In case of doubt whether an object which is normally dedicated to civilian purposes, such as a place of worship, a house or other dwelling or a school, is being used to make an effective contribution to military action, it shall be presumed not to be so used.’

From the facts of the cases documented by PCHR, in the majority of instances there does not appear to be any military necessity justifying the destruction of Hamas or Islamic Jihad members’ homes. To-date, no secondary explosions have been documented indicating that the houses were used for weapons storage. PCHR highlight that the Gaza Strip is one of the most densely populated areas in the world, and that the targeting of homes inevitably results in significant collateral damage to individuals and property nearby.

PCHR is forced to conclude that the houses are being destroyed as a ‘punitive’ measure, targeting members of Hamas and their families. PCHR notes that Israel has recently resumed its policy of punitive house demolitions in the West Bank. This appears to be a continuation of the Dahiya doctrine, whereby civilian suffering is deliberately caused in order to act as a deterrent. This doctrine was developed during the 2006 Lebanon War, and continued during Operation Cast Lead.

The destruction of homes has resulted in a number of civilian deaths to-date. For example, in an attack on the Kaware family home in Khan Younis, 7 civilians were killed, and 28 injured, while an attack on the Hamad family home in Beit Hanoun resulted in the death of 6 civilians.

The direct targeting of civilians and civilian objects is a war crime. All suspected war crimes must be investigated and, if appropriate, those responsible must be prosecuted.

Journal from Gaza: Ghost town

10th July 2014 | International Solidarity Movement, Charlie Andreasson | Gaza, Occupied Palestine

The entrance to the harbour was yesterday blocked for cars and other vehicles, but it was no problem to enter by foot. No one tried to stop me; there was no one there to stop me.

The sentry box, where the police are always calling me by name and trying to invite me in for a coffee and a chat, was closed. I looked around. The harbour, a place that is usually bustling with life and is a popular place for picnics, was noticeably deserted. I got the feeling that I was there without permission. The night before, I stood on the roof of the building where I live and saw two missiles hit just beyond the harbour. The target was, as I later could read, a building belonging to the port police.

Memories came back from the interviews I had with released fishermen and what they had to say about the interrogations, that the interrogators questioned them specifically about these buildings, how many people they were manned by, if the Port Police carried weapons.

To my surprise, I discovered that I was not alone in the harbour. On board some of the boats were people, but they were few. Perhaps they felt they were there without permission, as I did, none of them waved at me to come closer, but I didn’t try to contact them either.

I left the harbour, went to a nearby beach cafe, sat down for a moment and looked around at all the empty chairs. No one, including staff, was there. I stayed for a while, seemingly invisible under the parasol for the drones circulating above.

Heavy shelling from the sea could be heard. I received a text message from a friend in a refugee camp a few kilometers from where I sat. The situation was insane there, no one dared leave their homes, and drones seemed to fire off missiles at everything that moved. Detonations could be heard from where I was sitting.

The usually busy streets up towards a central square were deserted. Only occasional cars passed by, mostly press cars driving at high speed hunting for the latest attacked target, and a moment later, running in the opposite direction, an ambulance.

The shops were barred. This area, one that always reminded me of the hysterical Christmas shopping I witness yearly in Europe, was as deserted as the beach. And out of nowhere came the memory of an old song again, Ghost Town by The Specials. But totally deserted it was not. Three men in blue flak jackets with ‘Press’ written across were heading towards me. One of them recognised me, he came up and greeted me, asked if I wanted to come with to Shifa hospital.

I declined, but didn’t say why. There is life I want to see, it is life that I need, not death and suffering.

Politics in Gaza

9th July 2014 | International Solidarity Movement, Charlie Andreasson | Gaza, Occupied Palestine

I wake up after a night shattered by rocket launches, airstrikes, and flyovers, to sparrows friendly twittering, seemingly unconcerned by the drones swarming overhead.

No explosions have been heard since five o’clock in the morning, almost four hours ago. The sun shines as usual, I will not have any internet access for many hours yet, and thus no access to any news; had it not been for all the drones that circulate above, and I admit that I do sometimes wish that they will fly into each other so I don ́t have the unwanted noise in my ears for a while, it could have been a day of peace.

But it is not.

People I have talked to have stated that this war cannot be compared with that of 2012. This is nowhere near as intense as the last, not yet.

According to an American analyst in Gaza, Joe Catron, the war is an extension of the Israeli government’s attempt to break the political reconciliation between Gaza and the West Bank, and to obstruct such a merger being completed in the foreseeable future. That Israel this time allows the various resistance movements in setting the agenda may be an attempt to conceal their intentions, to dissolve the political merger, and instead show the world that it only responds to rocket attacks.

Politics. This war is clearly political by military means.

People who sweep up shattered glass in their homes, brush away grout from their furniture, live in fear of what might happen to their loved ones, is nothing else but politics.

The children who recently died when they tried to prevent their home from being bombed are nothing but political victims.

The fishermen that recently had their waters halved are political losers.

The farmers are currently outside the political fray; it’s the middle of summer and therefore not growing season. There is reason to believe that the death toll would be higher if farmers had been out on their fields.

And the battle, the political one of course, is just about having Palestine united, a necessity for a future Palestinian state, or not.

My watch says it is now past 10am, sparrows are still twittering, the drones have not yet flown into each other, and at a distance I can hear some explosions.

Political ones, of course.