Israel pushes Dutch to freeze funds for group exposing ‘IDF crimes in Gaza’

Barak Ravid | Ha’aretz

26 July 2009

Following protests by Israel, the Netherlands will reevaluate its funding of an organization that alleged that Israeli troops used Palestinians as human shields in Gaza.

Acting on instructions from the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem, the Israeli ambassador to the Netherlands, Harry Knei-Tal, met last week with the director-general of the Dutch Foreign Ministry and complained about the Dutch embassy’s funding of Breaking the Silence.

The Israeli ambassador suggested that the Netherland’s funding of the organization should be terminated. “The Dutch taxpayer’s money could be better used to promote peace and human rights,” a source quoted Knei-Tal as saying.

According to sources familiar with the situation, Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen – considered one of Israel’s staunchest supporters in the European Union – did not know that the embassy in Tel Aviv was funding Breaking the Silence. He learned about it after the organization’s funding sources were published in an article in The Jerusalem Post.

Sources say Verhagen reproached senior figures in the Dutch Foreign Ministry upon learning this and gave instructions to launch an internal investigation on the matter. It showed that the embassy in Israel gave Breaking the Silence 19,995 euros to help put together its 2009 report, which discusses Operation Cast Lead and was released earlier this month. Had this figure been five euros higher, it would have required approval from The Hague.

The director-general of the Dutch Foreign Ministry told the Israeli ambassador that in light of the probe, funding for Breaking the Silence would be reevaluated because of the political sensitivities of the issues covered by the organization.

Breaking the Silence, which was founded by Israeli army veterans, has collected what it says are damning testimonies from soldiers who took part in the January offensive against Hamas in Gaza. The report contains almost 30 anonymous testimonies.

An Israeli diplomat said that in the meeting last week, Knei-Tal said Israel was a democratic country and that such funds should go to places without democracy. Breaking the Silence was a legal and legitimate organization, he said, according to sources, but its funding by the Dutch was unreasonable “in light of the political sensitivities.”

According to a senior Israeli official: “A friendly government cannot fund opposition bodies. We are not a third world country.”

The director-general of the Dutch Foreign Ministry said Spain had also funded Breaking the Silence. A diplomat in Jerusalem said Breaking the Silence had also been funded by the British government. Israel has not yet approached Spain or Britain on the matter.

ISM Gaza accompanies Palestinian farmers

Israel’s Open-Fire Policy: shooting the donkey (as an old woman hides behind it)

Resisting the Zionist Gun – Part 1: Letaemat 07/05/2009

Resisting the Zionist Gun – Part 2: Letaemat 09/05/2009

Harvest in the Automated Kill Zone, Part 1 – Khoza’a 21/05/2009

Harvest in the Automated Kill Zone, Part 2 – Khoza’a 24/05/2009

U.S. warns Israel: Don’t build up West Bank corridor

Aluf Benn | Ha’aretz

24 July 2009

The U.S. administration has issued a stiff warning to Israel not to build in the area known as E-1, which lies between Jerusalem and the West Bank settlement of Ma’aleh Adumim. Any change in the status quo in E-1 would be “extremely damaging,” even “corrosive,” the message said.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed in the past to finally build the controversial E-1 housing project – as have several premiers before him, though none has done so due to American pressure. He opened his recent election campaign with a visit to Ma’aleh Adumim in which he declared: “I will link Jerusalem to Ma’aleh Adumim via the Mevasseret Adumim neighborhood, E-1. I want to see one continuous string of built-up Jewish neighborhoods.”

He has also warned in the past that failure to build in E-1 would allow the Palestinians to create territorial contiguity around Jerusalem.

Just before his government was installed this spring, the media reported that Netanyahu had reached an agreement with his largest coalition partner, Yisrael Beiteinu, to unfreeze construction in E-1. However, that clause was ultimately not included in the coalition agreement.

The plans for E-1 call for building 3,500 housing units, along with commercial areas and tourism sites, to create a single urban expanse stretching from Jerusalem to Ma’aleh Adumim and strengthen Israel’s hold on East Jerusalem, which would then be completely surrounded by Jewish neighborhoods.

The United States has always vehemently opposed this plan, fearing it would deprive a future Palestinian state of territorial contiguity, cut the West Bank in two and sever East Jerusalem from the rest of the West Bank – all of which would thwart any hope of signing a final-status agreement and establishing a Palestinian state.

President Barack Obama’s predecessor, George W. Bush, vigorously opposed building in E-1 during the terms of prime ministers Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert. Sharon did approve construction of a police station in E-1, and under Olmert, infrastructure work in the area continued. But neither ever approved construction of either the residential units or the commercial buildings, for fear of a confrontation with the United States.

Four years ago, after resigning from Sharon’s government, Netanyahu attacked him for giving in to American pressure on E-1. “A sovereign government must build in its eternal capital,” he said. “Sharon set a precedent that will lead to the division of Jerusalem.”

The Obama’s administration – which opposes all construction in East Jerusalem, even of a few houses – would be even more outraged by a large-scale project such as E-1.

It is demanding a moratorium on Jewish building in East Jerusalem until an agreement is reached on the city’s legal status, arguing that the cumulative effect of even small-scale projects would destroy any chance of a peace agreement and arouse fierce opposition in the Arab world, especially among East Jerusalem Arabs. Small projects include the construction of 20 apartments in the Shepherd Hotel in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood or plans to build new Jewish housing in Silwan.

At Sunday’s cabinet meeting, however, Netanyahu rejected this American stance. “United Jerusalem is the capital of the Jewish people and the State of Israel. Our sovereignty in it is not subject to appeal, and among other things, this means that Jerusalem residents can buy apartments anywhere in the city,” he said. “We cannot accept the idea that Jews should not have the right to live and buy anywhere in Jerusalem.”

Next week, three senior American officials will visit Israel: special envoy George Mitchell, National Security Advisor James Jones and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. Mitchell will continue his efforts to reach agreement on a settlement freeze, including in East Jerusalem, while the other two will focus on the Iranian threat.

Bil’in demonstrates against the Apartheid Wall

Bil’in Popular Committee

24 July 2009

Immediately after Friday prayers today, Bil’in citizens, International supporters, and Israeli activists went out in a demonstration, raising Palestinian flags and banners condemning the occupation policies of building the wall, land confiscation, building settlements, roads closures, the siege of cities, killing civilians, house raids, and the arresting of children.

Palestinian Minister of Affairs Related to the Apartheid Wall, Mr. Maher Ghuneim, also participated in the demonstration, and listened to a comprehensive explanation from the Popular Committee for Resistance Against the Wall about the experiences of the Bil’in community and its most recent developments. The Minister affirmed the government’s support for the popular resistance, pointing to the fact that there are no current negotiations on the question of the presence of settlements and the wall.
demo 24-07

The gathering began at the center of the village, with participants chanting slogans against the Occupation, calls for national unity, and releasing the thousands of prisoners in the Israeli prisons –many being held without being charged. The demonstrators turned towards the wall after trying to cross into the land incorporated by the wall. Upon arrival one of the demonstrators threw a football (soccer ball) at the soldiers. Right away the Israeli soldiers responded by opening a tear gas assault. This football activity was in response to the recent airing of a recent Israel TV commercial (Cellcome Mobile Phones), in which Israeli soldiers are playing football with a Palestinian football that accidentally comes flying over the wall. The TV commercial makes light of the Palestinian situation, shows the Israeli soldiers having fun at the Palestinian expense, and ignores and mocks the real suffering, racial discrimination, and poverty the Palestinians on the other side of the wall face daily.

Demonstrators were able to approach the wall, but while they were chanting slogans against side of the wall face daily. the occupation and the Israeli soldiers, a dispute took place among Israeli soldiers and the demonstrators. The Israeli soldiers fired sound bombs and tear gas at the demonstrators, which led to the injury of tens of the demonstrators, after breathing the toxic gas.

In a new protest activity, last Wednesday night the Popular Committee organized a demonstration, with approximately 80 local and international participants, parading alongside the wall, waving Palestinian flags, lighting torches, and chanting slogans against the occupation and night arrests.

In other news, the occupation forces yesterday released Muhamad Abdul Fattah Bernat, after forcing him to pay a fine of 1500 shekels. Mohammed was arrested a week ago in his Bil’in home. Also, occupation forces detained Haitham Khatib, the photographer of the Popular Committee, for several hours before releasing him.

Well-watered and soldier-free: the good old days on Palestinian farmland

Eva Bartlett | In Gaza

23 July 2009

The young farm worker wasn’t oblivious to the danger: working in the Israeli-imposed “buffer zone” is no task for the faint-hearted. But, like so many, he either needed the paid labour, or his family depends on the land.

The farmers had returned two days after their land was again ravaged by Israeli military bulldozers and tanks: 2 and 4 of each respectively. The war machines ate up the land, finished off a house they’d not quite destroyed the last time, and tore up a water source, the farmers’ well.

The day after the incursion, Yousef, one of the farmers, had dared to peek at the well, doing so furtively although it is on their land. The Israeli army incursion into Abassan Jeddida, just east of southern Gaza’s Khan Younis, had ended the same afternoon it started –July 21st –but the farmers knew all too well that Israeli military jeeps, hummers, tanks and military bulldozers lay just 400 metres away over the Green Line border, and that the Israeli soldiers running the machines are generous with their gunshots.

Yousef’s land lies near that of land where Anwar al-Buraim (27) [**note: al-Buraim is also found transliterated as al-Ibrim] was martyred on January 27th, shot dead by Israeli soldiers as he worked the land. It’s the same land where his cousin Mohammed al-Buraim (20) was shot in the ankle weeks later, also targeted by Israeli soldiers as he worked. The cousins were farm labourers, working to support large, impoverished families living in the region.

From his assessment of the well, Yousef gathered that the reason he couldn’t water his crops was that the motor had been destroyed. The following day, accompanied by ISM human rights workers, two of the farmers set to repairing the razed electrical lines and motor.

As the morning quickly heated up, farmers in nearby fields worked hurriedly to harvest parsley, wanting to finish before the intense heat as well as before any intense Israeli army shooting.

Plump hot chilli peppers and fresh parsley evidence how recent the incursion was: just two days without water, the plants are surviving. Much more and they will begin to wither, like life in the “buffer zone”.

27 dunums (1 dunum=1000 square metres) of chillis and 10 dunums of parsely depend on the destroyed water source.For Palestinians in Gaza, these are two of the most vital ingredients.

The farmers returned unsuccessful, but undefeated: if they can find and afford the parts to repair the motor to the well’s pump, they can re-gain their source of water. But in encaged Gaza, under a full siege which allows less than 40 items into the Strip, finding replacement parts could prove difficult, expensive, and could mean waiting for items to come through the tunnels.

He knows his farming life is hard, dangerous, filled with impossible obstacles…but does the young farm worker know how easy it could be, without the collective punishment of the Israeli army’s indiscriminate shooting at civilians in and beyond the Israeli-imposed‘300m buffer zone’, the burning of cropland, and the destruction of such infrastructure as wells, irrigation piping, greenhouses, farming equipment and tractors? Yes, he knows, he remembers, he longs for those days again. The good days when a chilli ripened under the sun, and was watered and harvested without haste.