Tag: 1948 Palestine - Page 11 - International Solidarity Movement

16 Palestinian children made homeless today

2 more home demolitions in the Negev
by Yeela Raanan, Regional Council for Unrecognized Negev Arab Villages

Today, Wednesday, June 13, 2007 at 8:00am hundreds of police people, accompanied by a chopper and two bulldozers, came the village of Tarabin al-Sanaa, located by the affluent Jewish town of Omer in the Israeli Negev. They demolished two homes. 16 children are homeless today, one two months old, another nine months. When I asked their father where they will stay tonight, he said – “I will build a tent, what can I do?”

When they entered the home, the 17-year-old son was still asleep. Thirty policemen pounced on him. He responded with fright and fought back. So they arrested him. Three other youngsters were arrested today.

Tarabin al-Sana is not new to these police invasions. Omer, their neighbor, has wanted them relocated so that they would not have to deal with poor neighbors, and because the real estate value of the land, if cleaned of Bedouins and added to Omer would be very high. Badash, the mayor of the town has been trying to make this happen for many years now. He has managed to enlarge the municipality’s area to include the village, of course with no intention of giving them the municipal services of trash removal, school, and the use of Omer’s medical facility. Then he convinced the authorities to allocate a new area for the village. The government did this, but still continued with their warped way of dealing with the Bedouin community. They choose a leader of sorts, “bought” him, and he had to convince the rest of the community to relocate. It worked only so far. Half he managed to convince to sign and relocate. The other half requested to see the contract he signed with the government. Until today the government is refusing to allow the people of the village to see this contract. The government is also refusing to negotiate with the elected leader of the village (in open democratic elections the village people initiated, and requested human rights lawyers to oversee).

Now the government is doing what the government seems to do all to often when they find themselves in a bind: demolish Bedouin homes.

For more information, contact:

The Regional Council for the Unrecognized Villages in the Negev
08-6283043

YNet: Tel Aviv fountains painted red to protest killing of Palestinians

by Moran Rada

Anarchists add red paint to water in two central fountains, say paint represents blood of Palestinians killed and injured by IDF in territories

Fountain in Dizzengof Square

Anarchist activists sprayed red paint on walls across Tel Aviv Sunday night and added red paint to the water in several fountains, as an act of protest against Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories.

IDF offices in Tel Aviv were “bombarded” during the night with red paint bombs, and the water in the fountains in Masaryk Square and Dizzengof Square were painted red.

IDF offices

According to the anarchists, the paint represents “the blood of the thousands who were killed and the tens of thousands who were injured throughout the long years of occupation, and was meant to illustrate the scope of the killing that is being carried out by the occupation army only several dozen miles away from Tel Aviv.”

In a pamphlet distributed by the activists, they wrote, “We believe that after 40 years of murderous occupation, the Tel Aviv public no longer has the right to enjoy decorative displays while ignoring the crimes that are being committed in its name in the occupied territories on a daily basis.”

They invited the residents of Tel Aviv to dip their hands in the reddened water and “realize that these hands, which appear clean, are also stained with the blood of the occupied and the oppressed.”

Masaryk Square fountain

The Tel Aviv municipality said in response, “We don’t know who is behind these acts, but the responsibility and authority to handle vandals lies in the hands of the police.

“Regarding the fountains that were painted red, the filters should filter out the paint within 24 hours.’

Marking 40th Anniversary of Occupation

Demos in London, Madrid, Tel Aviv in Solidarity with the Palestinian People
from the International Press Center

GAZA, Palestine, June 10, 2007 (IPC+ Agencies) – -Thousands of people gathered in central Tel Aviv Saturday evening to attend a rally protesting Israel’s continued occupation of the Palestinian territories on 40th anniversary of 1967 six- day war. More than 20 Spanish humanitarian, NGO’s and parties in association with the Palestinian community in Madrid set off a similar demo.

London also witnessed the biggest demo of 50,000 demonstrators in solidarity with the Palestinian people and his just cause among were Dr. Mustaf Al Burghouti, PLO representative at Britain and other Palestinian figures.

Plethora of British parliamentarians among were Veteran campaigners Bruce Kent of CND, Labour MP Jeremy Corbyn and Green MEP Caroline Lucas , George Galway, the Anglican Bishop of Jerusalem, Riah Abu El Assal, and Mairead Corrigan Maguire, who won the Nobel Peace Prize for founding the “Peace People” in Northern Ireland in 1976. . The protestors gathered in London’s Trafalgar Square.

The Prime Minister Ismael Haneyeh addressed the gathering by video in which he stressed on the need to support the national unity government to enable it to assume its responsibilities as well as support the Palestinian people right of liberation, independency and to attain an equitable peace.

He also underscored the independency of the Palestinian decision-making and backing the struggle of the Palestinian people, right of refugees to return back to their homelands and uplift the unfair embargo on the Palestinians. Also Dr. Al Burghouti addressed the demonstrators and thanked their participation and showing solidarity with the Palestinian people.

“There has been something wrong when the Israeli occupation continues to become the most prolonged occupation the modern history and converted in an apartheid system, as the world keep idle, ” Al Burghouti addressed the gathering.

He added that there has been something wrong when the Palestinian people punished by political and aid embargo instead of divesting Israel for persistent sanction and abuse against the Palestinian people.

“There has been something wrong when the Palestinian democratic which is the best in the Middle East and ministers and MPs were arrested.” He added “there has been soothing wrong when the Palestinian need four entry permissions to move in the West Bank and Gaza Strip that have turned into ghettoes and cantos and cur into pieces by 500 permanent checkpoint and 600 flying roadblocks.”

In central Tel Aviv Saturday evening Thousands of people gathered to attend a rally protesting Israel’s continued occupation of the Palestinian territories. The event was organized by left-wing groups including Meretz, Peace Now and Anarchists against the Wall. The protesters marched from Rabin Square to the Tel Aviv Museum, where they held a big rally.

Participants shouted slogans against the occupation and raised signs saying, “The occupation corrupts,” “The settlements – Israel’s catastrophe,” and “The occupation – a disgrace.”

In connection, more than 20 Spanish NGOs; humanitarian and political parties in association with the Palestinian community in Madrid organized a rally marking the 40th anniversary of the Israeli occupation of West Bank, Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem. In a joint press, the organizations called all institutions, individuals and humanitarian bodies to monitor the dismissal living condition of the Palestinian people under the Israeli occupation that has been practicing all forms of tyranny and refuse to recognize his right of self-determination.

The statement called for feasible measures to compel Israel to withdraw from the occupied Palestinian territories in 1967 including East Jerusalem, dismantle of Jewish settlements, cessation of building the apartheid wall and freeze partnership agreement between the European Union and Israel.

It also urged the Spanish government put off the agreement of military trade with Israel and recognition of the legitimate Palestinian democracy with no prerequisite and surmount all obstacles in the way of convening an international peace conference in the Middle East among its goals establishment of a sovereign viable Palestinian state within 1967 borders.

RCUV: Israeli police destroy family homes in Negev

from The Regional Council for the Unrecognized Negev Arab Villages

Yesterday, Wednesday June 6th 2007, at 8:45am the bulldozers came accompanies by hundreds of police officers to the village of Hashem Zaneh in the Israeli Negev and demolished four structures belonging to the Abu-Ghanimeh family. The first belonged to a family of eight: parents and their six children. The next two belonged to two young men who had intended to marry this summer and bring their brides to their new homes. These modest dwellings had been built slowly over the last year and a half, slowly collecting the funds needed, building the home as they could. When they received the demolition warnings three months ago, they went to the authorities and asked if there was any place they could build a house for their new family to be and the authorities response was “we have no answers for you.” The forth was a shiq, the traditional space of hospitality for any guests arriving in the neighborhood.

A month ago we gathered in the same village of Hashem Zaneh as we celebrated the opening of a new playground that the village had built with the help of the organizations AJEEC and the Regional Council for the Unrecognized Villages. But celebrations in the unrecognized villages are rare and short.

For more information: Yeela Raanan, RCUV. yallylivnat@gmail.com

Democracy for Bedouins postponed

By Yeela Raanan, Regional Council for the Unrecognized Villages in the Negev , 5 June 2007

Yesterday, June 4th 2007, the Internal Affairs Committee agreed: The first municipal elections in the Regional Council of Abu-Basma for the Bedouin villages is postponed a year – because of insufficient effort by the government officials.

The Regional Council of Abu-Basma was established by the Government of Israel four years ago as the municipality for the newly-recognized Bedouin Villages. Over the four years twelve villages have received recognition and are supposed to receive their services from their newly established regional council – “Abu Basma”.

However, the policies towards the villages and their residents have been only of oppression and deprivation: the government is still insisting on non-recognition of Bedouin traditional ownership of land and is confiscating from one only to turn around and sell to another. Of course the Bedouins refuse to buy their neighbor’s land from the government. The government is insisting that the planning of the villages be done without community involvement. The result is that the villages are planned in manners that are inappropriate to the culture and the needs of the population, with only one aim in mind – minimizing the use of land – so that the government can free up as much land to hand over to the Jewish citizens.

The Government of Israel has already confiscated since 1948 98% of the Bedouin’s land. Now, through the Abu-Basma regional council and the enforced planning the government is attempting to confiscate the rest.

Hssein al-Rafia, head of the Regional Council for the Unrecognized Villages (RCUV – an NGO), together with residents of the Abu-Basma villages, and human rights activists gave testimony at the Internal Affairs Committee in the Israeli Knesset to the state of affairs within the Abu-Basma regional council and the communities it is supposed to serve. The Internal Affairs Committee chastened the high level administrators for the lack of community involvement in all levels of decision-making and administration, and for not accelerating development in the villages under its jurisdiction.

If the policies towards the Abu-Basma villages remain as they are, the result is fully predictable: the planning and the development will come to a standstill, and the Bedouins will be blamed for their lack of cooperation…

For more info, contact:
RCUV, 08-6283043