Tag: Gaza

The party line: ‘Palestinians attack, Israelis respond’

By Asa

In an attempt to disguise the current Israeli military operations in Nablus as a response to the suicide bombing in Tel Aviv, the Israeli media are either directly lying that the military entered Nablus “in response to the terror attack” (Jerusalem Post) or strongly implying the same by saying the army is there “in [the] wake of [the] Tel Aviv blast” (Ha’aretz).

In actual fact, house occupations and shootings of Palestinian children by Israeli soldiers in Nablus were underway well before the bombing. Furthermore, the military have been in and out of Nablus almost constantly over the last week. The Ha’aretz news timeline today directly contradicts the claim by the Jerusalem Post and even the strong implication that it was a “response” in the headline of their own story. At 12:34, the timeline refers to an AP wire report covering the military operations in Nablus: “Palestinian youth shot by Israeli troops during W. Bank protest” (note that there is no mention of the Tel-Aviv bombing in this story). The bombing does not appear in the Ha’aretz site’s timeline until over an hour after the Nablus story was filed: 13:43.

Click on this link for an image of the timeline.

It is possible that the military operation intensified in Nablus after the Tel Aviv bombing. But the Israeli media were ignoring the story about Israeli jeeps rolling into Nablus before it became possible for them to re-cast the incursion as a ‘response to terrorism’. A response to what is often characterised as ‘irrational, unprovoked, fanatical terrorism’. All this despite the fact that the Israeli army has been shelling civilian areas in Gaza for the past 12 days killing at least eighteen people, including at least two children with many more injured. We in the general public might be niave enough to think that terrorism is the deliberate targeting of civilians, regardless of their natonality, but it would seem that the major media defines Israeli bombing of Palestinians as “counter-terrorism” almost by definition.

Before the bombing in Tel Aviv, the story about Nablus was all but ignored by the Israeli media. This currently remains the the policy of the western media, despite the fact that the army continues to occupy as many as five houses in Nablus using them as sniper posts, and have injured at least four Palestinian young people with live rounds and rubber-coated bullets.

We have been covering this story here in the ISM Media office since 10am this morning, and have watched the hypocrisy and subservience to establishment interests of the Israeli media explicitly illustrated before our own eyes. Apparently, Palestinian lives are only of use to the propaganda system. It could be argued, however, that this position is morally superior to the position of western media agencies such as the BBC on whose radar the attacks in Nablus do not even register.

Israel’s uber-wardens and the story of my friend B.

By Laila El-Haddad

A friend and neighbour of mine, B, recently got accepted to get her masters in engineering in Bir Zeit University in Ramallah. She is around 30 years old. After numerous attempts, B had to withdraw her standing (after paying one semester’s tuition) because Israel kept denying her permit based on … you guessed it…”security reasons”.

B has also not seen her sister who lives in Ramallah for 5 years now because of the travel ban. The most they can do is exchange photos through her personal family blog and talk on the phone-even thouh they are only one hour apart, the moon may as well be closer! This is the case for almost all Gazans.

B. She came with her family during the “Oslo Days” with many other Palestinains who lived outside, in her case, from Syria. After years and years of exile, they were able to obtain permits and eventually ID cards (issued by Israel) in a deal that allowed many Palestinians to return to Gaza. Now, says B, she went from being in one prison on the outside, unable to live in her homeland, to another internal prison, unable to move, study, or visit her family.

B also had to drop all her dreams in one fell swoop of her continuing education there because of Israel’s…”uber-wardens”.

“The soldier at the checkpoint or behind the Civil Administration counter…the Israeli uber-wardens… is the last, least important, link in the thicket of restrictions and limitations…implanting the jailor mentality in thousands of Israeli young people, soldiers, clerks and policemen – an intoxicating mentality of those who treat those weaker than they with impunity,” explains Amira Hass, in another gripping article where she describes every so eloquently the matrix of Israeli control over Palestinians.

“a thicket of physical, corporeal barriers of all types and sizes (checkpoints, roadblocks, blockades, fences, walls, steel gates, roads prohibited to traffic, dirt embankments, concrete cubes) and by way of a frequently updated assortment of bans and limitations.”

Periodic bans supplement permanent wants, and in the end, none of it is “news”, Hass says, because the asphyxiation of Palestinians, the rupture of everyday Palestinian life has become so routine.

Gazans, such as myself and millions of others, cannot enter the West Bank. Palestinians, including residents of Jericho, are not permitted to be in the Jordan Valley. Palestinians residing in East Jerusalem cannot enter West Bank cities (except for Ramallah). Citizens of Arab states, like my husband, (not jus refugees, and any state really, since Israel controls family-reunification permits) married to Palestinians are prohibited from entering the West Bank and Gaza.

In Gaza’s case, the West Bank is a mere 70 kilometres away. But hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who have family in the West BAnk have been unable to visit them in YEARS, and many many others who have been accepted to study in universities there cannot, because, to quote a recent (January) Israeli high-court ruling, made in response to the appeal of 10 Gaza students to study Occupational Therapy (there is only once licensed Occupational Therapist in all of Gaza, and 25, 000 injured people) in Bethlehem, “West Bank Universities are breeding grounds for terrorism”…and “Gaza is a foreign entity for which the state of Israel is no longer responsible”

…control without responsiblity, the true formula of disengagement, the recipe for ultimate disaster.

Occupation? What occupation?

Stop the bombing of Gaza! Prevent a humanitarian crisis!

UPDATE: Since this Action Alert was posted, the shelling of Gaza has continued almost non-stop.

Eight days [now 17 days] and thousands of shells later, the assault on Gaza continues. Israel has vowed that it will continue to intensify the attack. Eighteen people are dead, including at two children, and many more are injured.

Amnesty International is “calling on the Israeli army to end immediately its air bombardments and shelling of civilian residential areas in the Gaza Strip.” Amnesty says, “Israeli forces…must put an immediate end to the frequent, disproportionate and excessive use of force against Palestinians. Such attacks continue to cause death and injury to Palestinian children and other bystanders, and constitute violations of international law.”

John Ging, Director of UNRWA Operations in Gaza, stated that “from a humanitarian perspective the outlook here in Gaza is bleak at the moment. We are once again facing imminent food shortages, insecurity is making delivery of humanitarian services difficult and we are very concerned about the public health risks from the outbreak of avian influenza. All of this is likely to add up to more refugees falling below the poverty line and becoming dependent on humanitarian assistance.”

Please help stop these atrocities:

  1. Contact your local representatives and demand they raise the issue of the bombardment of Gaza and the closure of the Karni checkpoint (see information below).
  2. Contact your Ministry of Foreign Affairs and demand they put pressure on Israel to stop the bombardment of Gaza and open the Karni checkpoint (see information below).
  3. Hold a protest, vigil, or rally in front of your Israeli embassy or consulate and demand that Israel stops bombarding Gaza and opens the Karni checkpoint. To find the address of the Embassy or one of the Consulates, go to (http://www.embassiesabroad.com/embassies-of/Israel.cfm#171)

UK
Contact MPs
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/aristotle/

Fax your MP direct from this site
http://www.faxyourmp.com/

USA
Contact local representative
http://www.house.gov/writerep/

Contact your Senators
http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

US (Department of State)
http://www.state.gov/

Websites for Ministries of Foreign Affairs
For all countries see http://www.usip.org/library/formin.html

Australia
http://www.dfat.gov.au/contacts.html

Denmark
http://www.um.dk/en/servicemenu/Contact/?wbc_purpose=basi

France
http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr

Greece
http://www2.mfa.gr/www.mfa.gr/en-US

Germany
http://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/www/en/index_html

Japan
http://www.mofa.go.jp/feedback/index.html

Spain
http://www.mae.es/en/Home/

UNRWA Director: “Counting down to a crisis in Gaza.”

From UNRWA

PDF Version of Press Release

Gaza – Another week of closure at Karni commercial crossing between Israel and the Gaza Strip adds to the mounting woes facing Palestine refugees living in Gaza. This follows a weekend that saw the killing of 14 Palestinians, protests by refugee farmers who have yet to receive any compensation for bird flu and widespread public demonstrations protesting the cutting of donor funding.

John Ging, Director of UNRWA Operations in Gaza, warned that “if Karni remains closed, we are, once again, counting down to a food crisis.” 765,000 refugees depend on UNRWA’s food distribution of flour, oil, sugar and other basic items. Ging stated that “the clock is now ticking and distribution will have to be shut down entirely for the second time in less than a month if the crossing does not open immediately.”

Returning from a visit this morning to an UNRWA primary school in Beit Lahia, where parents and teachers protested that the children are in very real danger from the daily Israeli shelling in close proximity to the school, Ging stated that “from a humanitarian perspective the outlook here in Gaza is bleak at the moment. We are once again facing imminent food shortages, insecurity is making delivery of humanitarian services difficult and we are very concerned about the public health risks from the outbreak of avian influenza. All of this is likely to add up to more refugees falling below the poverty line and becoming dependent on humanitarian assistance.” However, Ging warned that UNRWA does not yet have the money to meet today’s needs and is facing a bill of almost $900,000 in penalties for port and other charges arising from the Karni closure.

-Ends-

For more information please contact:

Jerusalem: Johan Eriksson
Office: 972-2-589-0249
Mobile: 972-59-428-056

Gaza: Adnan abu Hasna
Office: +972-8-677-7531
Mobile: +972-59-428-61

Jamal Hamad
Mobile: 972-599-416-877

Amnesty International Calls for Halt to Gaza Attacks

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
11 April 2006
Public Statement

Israel/Occupied Territories: Israel must halt attacks on Gaza residential areas – children killed

Amnesty International is calling on the Israeli army to end immediately its air bombardments and shelling of civilian residential areas in the Gaza Strip. At least two Palestinian children have been killed and tens of other civilian bystanders injured in recent days during the course of such attacks; at least 15 other Palestinians, most of them reported to be members of armed groups, were killed.

Hadeel Ghaban, a seven-year-old girl, was killed on 10 April 2006 when Israeli troops fired artillery shells at her home in the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Lahia. The child’s mother and a dozen of her siblings and other relatives, including several children, were injured in the attack. Three days earlier, a five-year-old boy, Bilal Abu al-‘Einein, was killed in an Israeli air strike as he was standing near a car with his 14-year-old brother and their father. The boys’ father and three other men were also killed and several other bystanders, including two children, were injured in the attack. The four men who were killed in the attack were reported to be members of a Palestinian armed group but not to have been involved in any armed confrontation at the time when they were targeted by the air strike.

Commenting on this 7 April attack, the Israeli army stated: “In a security forces activity tonight in the southern Gaza Strip, the IDF carried out an aerial attack against a vehicle carrying terrorists as it was leaving a training camp of the Popular Resistance Committees organization. Terrorists were using the camp for terror training and weapons training.” The statement failed to mention the killing of the five-year-old child.

Israeli army and Defense Ministry sources were reported by the Israeli media to have expressed regret over the killing of Hadeel Ghaban but to have vowed to continue intensive attacks on the Gaza Strip. On 11 April, Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz was reported to have stated that “As long as it’s not quiet here [in Israel], it won’t be quiet there [in Gaza.]”

Expressions of regret by Israeli army and government officials for the killings of Palestinian children and other bystanders ring hollow as repeated attacks by Israeli troops on densely populated residential areas continue to claim the lives of Palestinians, including children, in situations where they pose no threats to the lives of Israelis.

Another example is the killing of three Palestinian children, 14-year-old Ahmed al-Sweifi and Ra’ed and Mahmud al-Batash, aged 11 and 17, in an Israeli air strike in the afternoon of 6 March in Gaza City. The children were walking in the street when an Israeli missile hit a passing car in which two members of a Palestinian armed group were travelling, killing the two passengers of the car and the three children.

More than 15 Palestinian children have been killed and dozens have been injured in Israeli army attacks throughout the West Bank and Gaza Strip since the beginning of this year. They were among some 75 Palestinians killed by Israeli troops in the past three months, during which scores of Palestinians, including children, have been injured. Many of those killed were members of Palestinian armed groups who were targeted while they were not involved in armed attacks or confrontations.

The Israeli authorities have long pursued a policy of extrajudicial executions as a substitute for arrest and prosecution of Palestinians involved in attacks against Israelis. Hundreds of bystanders have been killed in such attacks, in addition to the targets of the attacks. Since Israel redeployed its troops from inside the Gaza Strip in September 2005, Israeli forces have stepped up air strikes and artillery attacks against different areas of the Gaza Strip. The Israeli authorities contend that such attacks are in response to frequent mortar and rocket attacks by Palestinian armed groups launched from the Gaza Strip against Israeli towns and villages near the Gaza Strip. Although they have rarely caused Israeli fatalities or casualties, these Palestinian attacks are unlawful and should stop immediately.

Israeli forces, for their part, must put an immediate end to the frequent, disproportionate and excessive use of force against Palestinians. Such attacks continue to cause death and injury to Palestinian children and other bystanders, and constitute violations of international law.