Tag: Gaza

Spain signals end to war crimes, genocide hunting

Ben Harding | Reuters

20 May 2009

Spanish judges who tried to extradite ex-Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet and investigate Bush administration officials over Guantanamo will likely be barred from doing so again after a parliamentary vote on Tuesday.

Under pressure from foreign governments, members of Spain’s congress almost unanimously passed a resolution which, if translated into law, would end the right of Spanish judges to investigate serious crimes like genocide anywhere in the world in cases where courts in the affected country do not act.

The resolution would restrict Spain, which had been praised by international campaigners, to only investigating cases in which the accused is in Spain or Spaniards are victims.

Spain’s Socialist government said earlier this year it would change the law after protests from Israel over the High Court’s decision in January to launch a war crimes probe into seven Israelis including former defence minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer for a 2002 attack in the Gaza Strip that killed 14 civilians and a Hamas leader.

U.S. President Barack Obama has also expressed his opposition to moves by Spanish courts to begin a probe into former Bush officials, including then-Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, over torture allegations at Guantanamo Bay.

“There will be fewer places a victim can turn when he does not find justice in his own country,” said Reed Brody, spokesman for non-governmental organisation Human Rights Watch. “There’s no doubt that the diplomatic heavyweights were throwing their weight around”.

The opposition-backed resolution covering a number of reforms to the judicial system was backed by 338 deputies to eight against.

The vote is the first step in formally changing a law which was used by Judge Baltazar Garzon to request Pinochet’s arrest and extradition from Britain in 1998.

Although the British government ultimately allowed him to return to Chile, his arrest spurred efforts in Chile to prosecute the atrocities committed while he was in power.

European diplomats have privately expressed concern that the law could oblige them to arrest members of friendly governments under EU-wide legal agreements.

It is unclear whether any change in the law would be retroactive and wipe the slate clean of cases currently under investigation.

Those include a request by a Madrid judge to interrogate eight senior Chinese officials including its defence minister as part of an investigation into the deaths of at least 203 Tibetans during disturbances in 2008.

Spain to limit judges’ jurisdiction; includes probe against Israelis

The Jerusalem Post

20 May 2009

Spain’s congress on Tuesday reportedly passed a resolution to limit the jurisdiction of investigative judges.

The move follows pressure from foreign governments such as the US, China and Israel, which has strongly criticized Judge Fernando Andreu’s ongoing investigation into the 2002 assassination of Hamas terrorist Salah Shehadeh in Gaza, in which 14 others were also killed.

The resolution confines judges to cases with a clear Spanish connection and excludes them from probing investigations already under way in the country that allegedly committed the crime, The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday.

The move effectively reins in Spain’s investigative judges from dealing with crimes against humanity allegedly committed around the world. The investigating judges of Spain’s National Court have been employing the so-called principle of universal jurisdiction – which holds that for grave crimes such as genocide, terrorism or torture, suspects can be prosecuted in the country even if the alleged offenses were committed elsewhere – to 13 cases involving events that took place in other countries, from Rwanda to Iraq.

Under the new resolution, however, cases taken up by the judges would now have to involve a Spanish citizen or the accused would have to be on Spanish soil, the WSJ reported. The Spanish government will now introduce legislation, which the major parties in Congress have agreed to back, according to the report. It wasn’t clear whether the changes would apply to existing cases or only to future ones.

At the beginning of the month, Judge Andreu of Spain’s National Court decided to continue the investigation of Industry, Trade and Labor Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya’alon and five other former top security officials for their part in the Shehadeh assassination, despite Spanish prosecutors’ attempts to dissuade him from doing so on the grounds that Israel was still investigating the attack. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has said the Shehadeh case “makes a mockery out of international law.”

Herb Keinon contributed to this report.

Harvest challenges

Eva Bartlett | In Gaza

1 June 2009

Just after 7 am on May 30th, Palestinian farmers in Khoza’a, east of Khan Younis, returned to the land they’d been menaced off of 5 days earlier. “The same day the Israelis dropped papers saying they would shoot at us for being on our land they did shoot at us,” Ahmed, a 22 year old farmer explained. It was around 10:30, he said. “They were shooting so much that the dirt rose in clouds of dust.”

When we arrive on May 30th, the bales of wheat are ready, all neatly and compactly hand-bundled, covering 30 dunums (1 dunum=1000 square metres) of land belonging to Radi Abu Rayder. He has another 140 dunums which he can no longer access because it lies too close to the border, within the Israel-imposed “buffer zone”.

The farmers will take 2 days to clear the bundles from the field.

The farmers today are two 18 year olds, two 22 year olds, and two men in their late 30s/early 40s.

They work steadily, carrying bales of wheat to the waiting tractor trailer. It is piled as high and full as manageable, then trundles off to a storage field hundreds of metres away, further from the Green Line and the potential danger from Israeli soldiers.

While most of the 30 dunums has been harvested, a small section remains. As some of the farmers off-load the trailer, the others resume hand-picking the wheat, ripping in bunches and laying for bundling.

As they work, they tell us of how the land used to be. “This area used to be so filled with trees you couldn’t see the fence,” Ahmed recalled, gesturing at the naked fields around us. He spoke of how they adapted to the razing of trees and grew, instead, many types of vegetables. “We grew tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, and beans, among other things. We used to fill 17-20 trucks (4 tons each) of produce each day,” he said.

Amazingly, as he recounts their losses, he speaks without audibe bitterness or anger. This is something I’ve come across countless times, whether speaking of razed farmland or a bombed house. The tone, when emotion is evident, is fatigue and confusion: why do they attack us? how are we supposed to live? how can I feed my children?

But Ahmed recounts with a soft smile, just telling how it used to be.

Some time later, we notice thick smoke rising from the direction of the tractor. Moving to see what’s happened, we arrive to find blackened, burnt wheat spread along the dirt track, laid there as the panicked farmers put out the fire. Upon inspection, they see that the tractor crossed under a low-hanging electrical wire which immediately set the dry wheat alight. It’s not hard to imagine how the wheat and barley in Johr ad Dik blazed just weeks ago, after Israeli soldiers shot incendiary bombs into farmers’ fields.

After two days, the group has successfully brought all of the bales to safety. We are pleased their harvest hasn’t been lost, but not disillusioned to think that this is a victory. Their situation remains the same: each time they go onto their land near the Green Line border fence they face the danger of being targeted by Israeli soldiers from jeeps or from their watchtowers.

A heavy price to pay for working on your land.

Six days earlier, on May 24th, we joined 7 farmers, including women and 1 youth, in a different area of Khoza’a, on land of Nasser abu Rjla a few hundred metres from the border fence. They, too, were harvesting the wheat they had already bundled, though they were forced to bring it in without the luxury of a tractor.

At around 7:45 am the shooting began, coming from one of the mechanical watchtowers this time. These towers are a recent addition to the military landscape: remotely-operated by soldiers, the towers guns can shoot as dangerously close as the guns of Israeli soldiers at the jeeps.

An independent fact-finding committee calls for the prosecution of Israeli political leaders and members of the military

30 May 2009

An independent fact-finding committee (IFFC) established by the League of Arab States (LAS) to investigate and report on violations of human rights and international humanitarian law arising out of Israel’s offensive in Gaza from 27 December 2008 to 18 January 2009, code named Operation Cast Lead, has submitted a report to the LAS in which it finds that there is sufficient evidence to substantiate prosecutions of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) for war crimes and crimes against humanity. The report also finds that the Israeli political leadership is responsible for such crimes.

The IFFC, comprising of Professor John Dugard (South Africa, Chairman), Professor Paul de Waart (the Netherlands) , Judge Finn Lynghjem (Norway), Advocate Gonzalo Boye (Chile / Germany), Professor Francisco Corte Real (Portugal) and Ms Raelene Sharp (Australia: Rapporteur), bases its findings on a visit to Gaza, during which it interviewed victims and witnesses of the conflict and visited sites of destruction, and on official publications of the Israeli government and NGO’s operating in the Territory. This evidence showed convincingly that the IDF had failed to distinguish between military and civilian targets in killing over 1,400 Palestinians (of which at least 850 were civilians, including 300 children and 110 women) and wounding over 5,000, and in destroying over 3,000 homes, damaging a further 11,000 and destroying or damaging hospitals, mosques, schools, factories, businesses, UN properties and government buildings.

On the basis of these facts and information collected in Gaza the IFFC found that the IDF had committed four separate war crimes:

  • Indiscriminate and disproportionate attacks on civilians;
  • Killing, wounding and terrorizing civilians;
  • Wanton destruction of property not justifiable on grounds of military necessity; and
  • Attacks on hospitals and ambulances and obstruction of the evacuation of the wounded.

The IFFC also found that the IDF had committed crimes against humanity in that it had committed acts of murder, persecution and inhumane acts as part of a widespread and systematic attack on a civilian population.

The IFFC examined the firing of rockets by Palestinian militants from Gaza during the conflict, which had caused the death of four Israeli civilians and wounded 182, and traumatized the population of Southern Israel . It found that the evidence showed that these militants were responsible for the commission of the war crimes of indiscriminate attacks on civilians; and the killing, wounding and terrorization of civilians.

The weaponry used by the IDF in Operation Cast Lead was examined by the IFFC, which found that Israel had used white phosphorus in violation of international law by using it as an incendiary weapon in densely populated neighbourhoods.

The IFCC considered the internal investigation conducted by the IDF which found that that the IDF had acted in accordance with the requirements of international law in the course of Operation Cast Lead . It rejected the conclusions of this investigation on the grounds that it was not an independent investigation, that it failed to consider most of the allegations made against the IDF and that it had not had regard to Palestinian sources. While the IFFC was prepared to accept that some buildings destroyed had been used to store munitions and that the Palestinians had on occasion used civilians as human shields, this could not explain or justify the heavy loss of life and injury and the massive destruction of property.

The IFCC considered the question whether the IDF had committed acts of genocide in the course of its offensive. Here it found that while IDF actions met some of the requirements for the crime of genocide, Israel lacked the necessary special intention to destroy in whole or in part a national or ethnical group as required by the Genocide Convention because its operation had been motivated by an intention to collectively punish the people of Gaza in order to compel the population to reject Hamas or subdue the population into a state of submission. The IFCC rejected Israel ’s claim that it had acted in self-defence as Israel ’s actions failed to satisfy either the legal or the factual requirements for this defence.

The IFCC made a number of recommendations to the LAS. It recommended that the LAS should:

  1. endorse the request of the Palestinian Authority that the commission of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza be investigated and prosecuted by the International Criminal Court;
  2. request the Security Council of the United Nations to refer the situation in Gaza to the International Criminal Court as it had done in the case of Darfur with a view to prosecution of those responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity;
  3. request the General Assembly of the United Nations to ask for an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice on the legal consequences of Operation Cast Lead; and
  4. recommend to states which recognize the principle of universal jurisdiction for international crimes that they prosecute Israeli political and military leaders for the commission of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Goldstone’s UN inquiry team arrives in Gaza

BBC

1 June 2009

A UN team investigating possible war crimes in Gaza, led by Richard Goldstone, has arrived in the Strip on a week-long fact finding mission.

The four-member team entered from Egypt after Israel failed to grant visas, despite repeated requests by the UN.

The UN wants to investigate whether Israel and Hamas committed war crimes during Israel’s three-week operation in Gaza in December and January.

Israel accuses the UN branch carrying out the mission of bias against it.

The UN Human Rights Council has been accused of singling out Israel unfairly, and is viewed by some as having less credibility than other parts of the United Nations.

But correspondents say the selection of Mr Goldstone, a respected South African war crimes prosecutor who is also Jewish, as head of the inquiry has given it greater clout.

“They have been instructed to prove that Israel is guilty and we will not collaborate with such a masquerade,” foreign ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor told AP news agency.

Public hearings

The team plans to meet “all concerned parties”, including non-governmental organisations, UN agencies and victims and witnesses of alleged violations of international humanitarian law, its office said in a statement.

Mr Goldstone has previously said his team had hoped to visit southern Israeli towns which have suffered Palestinian rocket fire , before entering Gaza from Israel, but Israel has shown no sign of allowing access.

Israel was initially angered that the team was tasked only with investigating alleged Israeli violations, but after Mr Goldstone was appointed, its mandate was widened to cover the activities of Palestinian militants too.

Inquiry conclusions

Several investigations into alleged violations of international law during Israel’s 22-day operation in Gaza, which ended on 18 January, have now reported back.

Israeli bombardment of Gaza, 14 January 2009
Israel has been accused of war crimes for air raids in heavily populated areas

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has requested more than $11m (£7m) compensation from Israel for damage to UN property in Gaza, after a limited UN inquiry accused Israel of targeting known civilian shelters and providing untrue statements to justify actions in which civilians were killed.

The report found Israel to blame in six out of nine incidents when death or injury were caused to people sheltering at UN property and UN buildings were damaged.

The Israeli military has concluded in an internal investigation that its troops fought lawfully, although errors did take place, such as the deaths of 21 people in a wrongly targeted house.

Meanwhile, a fact-finding team commissioned by the Arab League said there was sufficient evidence for the Israeli military to be prosecuted for war crimes and crimes against humanity, and that “the Israeli political leadership was also responsible for such crimes”.

It also said Palestinian militants were guilty of war crimes in their use of indiscriminate attacks on civilians.

Palestinian rights groups say more than 1,400 Palestinians were killed during the January conflict. Israel puts the figure at 1,166.

Israeli and Palestinian estimates also differ on the numbers of civilian casualties.

Ten Israeli soldiers were killed, including four by friendly fire, and three Israel civilians died in rocket attacks by Palestinian militants.