Today in Palestine! ~ Headlines November 28, 2008 ~
November 29, 2008Today in Palestine! ~ Headlines November 28, 2008 ~
Weekly report on Israeli human rights violations in the occupied Palestinian territory 20-26 Nov 2008
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/
PCHR Weekly Report: 7 Palestinians injured, 32 abducted by Israeli forces; 2 dead due to occupation
In its weekly summary of Israeli human rights violations in the Occupied Palestinian Territories for the week of November 20-26, 2008, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights has reported a number of human rights violations. An elderly Palestinian man died of a heart attack when Israeli forces forced him from his home. A patient in Gaza died after being denied exit from the Gaza Strip for medical treatment, because he refused to act as an informant for the Israeli military.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Exceptions in the prosecution of Israeli occupation soldiers. Prosecution of IDF soldiers during and after the Second Intifada, 2000-2007 Full text.
http://www.yesh-din.org/sys/
Israeli troops wound three in Gaza: medics
Three Palestinians were wounded when Israeli troops backed by tanks mounted an incursion into the southern Gaza Strip on Friday, shelling suspected militants, medics and witnesses said. “The three wounded were evacuated,” said Muawiya Hassanein, who heads the emergency services in Gaza.
http://www.google.com/
Four Palestinians injured at Ni’lin anti-wall demonstration
Four Palestinians were reportedly shot by Israeli forces at an anti-wall march in the West Bank village of Ni’lin, near Ramallah, on Friday. After Friday prayers, demonstrators gathered near lands threatened with confiscation, shouting slogans and demanding help for 120 families whose lands are to be confiscated. As protesters neared the construction site, Israeli forces opened fire “from close range” with tear-gas canisters “fired directly at protesters,” as well as rubber-coated bullets, according to a statement received by Ma’an. Four injured Palestinians were taken to a hospital in Ramallah, the statement added. [end]
http://www.maannews.net/en/
International, local and Israeli activists tear-gassed in Bil’in demonstration
Israeli soldiers fired teargas, rubber-coated steel bullets and sound bombs at a group of Bil’in residents, Israeli and international activists on Friday as the group marched to the site of the separation wall in an anti-occupation protest. The protesters raised Palestinian flags and banners calling for the guarantee of Palestinian’s right to Jerusalem, the right of return, Palestinian controlled borders, access to water, the release of all Palestinian detainees from Israeli prisons and the removal of the separation wall and Israeli settlements from the West Bank and Gaza.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Two Palestinians injured by Israeli soldiers during Jayous anti-wall demonstration
Two Palestinians were injured with rubber-coated steel bullets shot by Israeli soldiers as they participated in the peaceful demonstration against the wall in the village of Jayous west of Qalqiliya on Friday. Those injured were identified as Muhamad Abdel Walid Salim and Muhamad Abdel Rahman Salim. Villagers demonstrated with activists and toured the streets of the village calling for the end of settlement construction. When the group reached what has been designated a military area Israeli troops prevented their progress and clashes ignited. [end]
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Israel attempts to avoid court challenge by returning stolen Palestinian fishing boats
Three Palestinian trawling vessels confiscated by Israeli naval forces were returned today almost immediately following yesterdays announcement that three Human Rights Groups had filed an appeal against Ehud Barak and the commander of the Israeli navy. The vessels were stolen from Gazan waters on 18th November while fishing in Palestinian territorial water.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/
stolen-palestinian-fishing-
Palestinian Journalists Bloc condemns PA arrest of reporter
The Palestinian Journalists Bloc condemned on Thursday the arrest by Palestinian security forces of Nae’l Nakhlah, a reporter for the Al-Quds newspaper in the West Bank town of Al-Bireh. The organization noted an “increase of the number of journalists arrested in the West Bank to nine in addition to three who were arrested in the Gaza Strip.”
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Palestinian Water Authority pressed Israel to ship water purification chemicals to Gaza
The Palestinian Water Authority (PWA) said on Thursday that it succeeded in pressuring Israel to allow chemicals used to purify water into the blockaded Gaza Strip. The deputy director of the PWA, Rebhi Ash-Sheikh, said Israel had blocked delivery of 100 cubic meters of Chlorine and dozens of tons of acids used to purify water for over a year. He said the authority was concerned that shortages of these chemicals would threaten the health of Gaza residents.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Al-Khudari predicts Gaza power plant to shut down before midnight; fuel supplies exhausted
Gaza’s power plant will shut-down again Friday night after the area exhausts the limited fuel transferred in on Wednesday. The black-out prediction was announced by Head of the popular committee against the siege in Gaza, Jamal Al-Khudari at a press conference in Gaza City.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Israeli administration continues to ban imports to Gaza Strip
ImageGaza /PNN – The occupying Israeli authority claims it they had intended to lift the ban on 45 trucks of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip on Thursday, but reneged because of the launch of two projectiles at Sderot. However, no armed resistance faction claimed responsibility for any such launching and no damages were reported. The truckloads were said to include chlorine to disinfect the water supply which is contaminated. The fuel necessary to run the power plant, which in turn feeds the water and sewage treatment facilities, is also banned.
http://english.pnn.ps/index. php?option=com_content&task=
Israel resumes starvation of Gaza after rocket attack
Israel on Thursday again prevented the delivery of humanitarian aid to the impoverished Gaza Strip in what the Jewish state said was a response to a rocket attack by Palestinian militants. The rocket hit an empty field in southern Israel and caused no injuries or damage, police said.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/
Another Arab ship from Qatar to sail from Cyprus to Gaza in the coming days
Palestinian legislator, head of the Popular Committee Against the Siege, Jamal El Khodary, stated on Thursday that a new Arab ship from Qatar will sail from Cyprus to the Gaza Strip in the coming days.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Qatari relief vessel to sail to Gaza soon; Libyan vessel to arrive Gaza Monday
The chairman of the Popular Committee against the Siege on Gaza MP Jamal Al-Khudari has declared the start of the “vessel peaceful uprising” to break the unjust siege on Gaza.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Gaza’s death throes, and no one’s listening
Palestinians wait to fix their old portable “primus” stoves which burn diesel fuel at a shop in the Beach refugee camp in Gaza City, 25 November 2008. (Hatem Omar/MaanImages)
What kind of government in the 21st century can deny another people basic human rights–that is, the right to food, water, shelter, security and dignity? What kind of government imposes draconian sanctions on another people for democratically electing a government not to its liking? What kind of government seals a heavily populated territory of 1.5 million people so that no person can enter or leave without permission, fishermen cannot fish in their own waters, and world food aid cannot be delivered to the starving population?
http://electronicintifada.net/
Gaza: Salvation in a News Broadcast
When Gaza’s electricity is in working order, most Palestinians in the impoverished and overcrowded Strip huddle around their television screens. It’s neither “American Idol” nor “Dancing with the Stars” that brings them together. It’s the news.
http://palestinechronicle.com/
Gaza: A Human Tragedy under Siege
The Gaza Strip has been living under an Israeli 16-month-old despicable siege, which is now reaching its most harshly shocking pinnacle. In addition to blocking the flow of food, medical supplies, and basic needs, Israel has recently barred the fuel supplies from reaching the impoverished strip.
http://palestinechronicle.com/
Hamas rips Arab League for backing Abbas
The Islamist Hamas movement which rules Gaza rejected Thursday a call by Arab states for Western-backed President Mahmoud Abbas to stay in office until unity has been restored, insisting this is a decision for Palestinian voters. “Legitimacy does not flow from any outside party but comes from the ballot box in accordance with the law.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/
Hamas to Arab States: Keep Out of Row over Abbas
The Hamas movement rejected on Thursday a call by Arab states for Western-backed president Mahmud Abbas to stay in office until unity has been restored, insisting this is a decision for Palestinian voters. “Legitimacy does not flow from any outside party but comes from the ballot box in accordance with the law and with the constitution,” Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhum said.
http://almanar.com.lb/
Abbas says Israeli should seize Arab world’s rare peace offer
BETHLEHEM, West Bank — The Palestinian president says Israel should seize the Arab world’s peace initiative as a rare opportunity. The 2002 plan offers Israel full Arab recognition if it withdraws from all the lands it captured in the 1967 Mideast War, including east Jerusalem, the West Bank, Gaza and the Golan Heights.
http://www.google.com/
Israeli court rebukes state over illegal outposts
The Christian Science Monitor-An Israeli government effort to make good on a five-year-old commitment to the US and Palestinians to rein in settlement expansion in the West Bank is coming under legal fire at home.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/
Gaza dispute may cancel pilgrimage procedures
Egypt gave permission Thursday for Palestinians to exit the Gaza Strip into Egypt to perform the annual pilgrimage in Mecca but it was unclear whether they would be able to because of registration disputes between the rival Fatah and Hamas factions. The Palestinian embassy in Cairo said it was informed by the General Egyptian Intelligence (GEI) of the government’s plans to open the Rafah crossing to allow pilgrims to enter Egypt, proceed to Jordan and finally enter Saudi Arabia.
https://mail.google.com/mail/?
Egypt to reopen Rafah for Palestinian pilgrims
Egypt will reopen the Rafah border with the Gaza Strip for three days from Saturday to allow Palestinians to leave the blockaded territory for the Muslim hajj, or pilgrimage, to Mecca. “Egypt has announced the reopening of the Rafah border for three days from Saturday… to allow the passage of some 3,000 Palestinian pilgrims who hold visas for Saudi Arabia,” the official said on Friday.
http://www.alarabiya.net/
Death of Annapolis Defines Bush Failure
The imminent departure of America’s leader from the White House, signals the end of eight disastrous years under the Bush administration. As biographers and others prepare to document a comprehensive list of the failures of George W Bush, they certainly will not be able to ignore his Middle East policies.
http://palestinechronicle.com/
A new role for Mohamad Dahlan
“…a new role for Mohammad Dahlan, or his rehabilitation so that he enters the front lines of Fatah, after his exit from Gaza. Dahlan has fervent supporters, just as he has equally ardent opponents and rivals. There are Arab and non-Arab states that support him. He is bold and intelligent and personally I do not rule out Abbas getting angry one day and resigning, leaving a vacuum….”
http://friday-lunch-club.
Lebanon to establish ties with ‘Palestine’
Lebanon has decided for the first time to establish diplomatic relations with the “state of Palestine,” and has approved the opening of an embassy in Beirut. “The cabinet has approved the establishment of diplomatic relations with the state of Palestine,” Information Minister Tarek Mitri said following a cabinet meeting late on Thursday.
http://www.google.com/
Norwegian ex-premier counters anti-Semitism accusations, slams Israel
Ex-Norwegian prime minister Kåre Willoch spoke out Thursday against Israel and a group of Israeli scholars who earlier this week held a symposium in Jerusalem devoted to accusing the Scandinavian countries of racism, anti-Semitism and Israel-hatred. “It’s a traditional deflection tactic aimed at diverting attention from the real problem, which is Israel’s well-documented and incontestable abuse of Palestinians,” Willoch, who presided as Norway’s prime minister in the 1980s, told a Norwegian daily. Willoch, a long-time critic of Israel, was reacting to accusations leveled at an event hosted on Tuesday by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, which, as reported by Haaretz, is described by the organizers as “probably Israel’s first comprehensive discussion into Scandinavia’s approach to the Jewish people and state.”
http://haaretz.com/hasen/
Trapped in Gaza with a Fulbright scholarship
University students in the Gaza Strip who want to study abroad have been facing severe restrictions since Israel imposed a blockade on the territory two years ago. Israel took the measure after the militant Hamas movement won elections in Gaza and took over control of the territory. Listen to the storyEvery year, one thousand or so Gazan students are accepted by foreign universities. But since the blockade was imposed, fewer than half of them have been able to go study abroad. One of them is Zohair Abu Shahan. This is his story.
http://www.radionetherlands. nl/thestatewerein/otherstates/
For Gazans, one abundant resource: ingenuity
Coping with lengthy power cuts has become one of the biggest challenges for 1.4 million Gaza residents as Israel’s tight blockade of the territory enters its fourth week. The closure, imposed Nov. 5 to force Gaza’s Hamas rulers to halt rocket fire on Israeli border communities, comes after 19 months of sharply restricted access to the territory. The isolation has taken its toll, causing rolling blackouts and shortages of fuel and cooking gas.
http://www.google.com/
Olive harvest suffers under the blockade
Oxfam’s Mohammed Ali Abu Najela reports on the impact of Israel’s blockade of the Gaza Strip on the territory’s olive oil industry.
The agricultural sector in Gaza has been severely affected by the ongoing conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. Since the outbreak of the Palestinian Intifada in 2000, 112,000 olive trees have been destroyed in the Gaza Strip by the conflict and Israeli military incursions. Also, one third of agricultural land-thousands of dunums (1 dunum=.25 acre) along the border with Israel-has been inaccessible to Palestinian farmers since Israeli settlements were dismantled in 2005. Israel then carved out a security zone that included valuable Gazan farming land. Farmers have been killed and injured trying to access and cultivate these lands.
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/
Gaza is Having it, its Way
In apparent shift in strategy, the Israeli government today issued two permits for new franchises in the Gaza Strip. Some are questioning whether this indicates the end of Israel’s crushing embargo, or is just another generous humanitarian move by Israel. In response to greater international calls for more aid and assistance to Gazans, many of whom suffer from mal nutrition, Israel granted two popular food chains, Krispy Kreme doughnuts (KKD) and Burger King (BKC), permission to open franchises in the Gaza Strip. This move was warmly received by the teenagers, prospective Big and Tall shop owners, cardiologists and dermatologists of Gaza. On the same day, the Israelis denied three trucks of fresh produce at the Rafah crossing. An Israeli statement linked the two as acts of solidarity with Gaza’s children.
http://www.kabobfest.com/2008/
Zionism in Leeds University Campus
Leeds University Union to vote on a motion to referendum which will label anti-Zionism as anti-Semitism and silence pro-Palestinian groups on campus. For immediate release: Leeds University Union agreed last week, by a vote of 12 to 11, to send a motion to referendum which will label anti-Zionism as anti-Semitism and silence pro-Palestinian groups on campus. The motion, shrouded in the language of combating anti-Semitism, is a reversal of a motion passed 2 years ago which gave Palestinian activists at Leeds University the rights enjoyed by their counterparts throughout the country. If passed, organisations which have an anti-Zionist platform, such as the Socialist Workers Party and the Palestine Solidarity Group will be prevented from receiving funding from the union and prevented from holding many of their events.
http://sabbah.biz/mt/archives/
Cartoon: Gaza Ghetto by Carlos Latuff
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_ ZxKAf8oOwtI/SS7SQuDHLJI/
Thursday: 8 Iraqis Killed; 43 Wounded
Excerpt: Updated at 6:55 p.m. EST, Nov. 27, 2008 Parliament today approved a contentious U.S.-Iraqi security agreement that will allow U.S. troops to stay in the country for three more years. Meanwhile, at least eight Iraqis were killed and 43 more were wounded in the latest violence. Also, the European Union has promised to take-in 10,000 Iraqis. No Coaltion deaths were reported, but a U.S. soldier who deserted his unit has applied for asylum in Germany. He had served in Iraq but refused to return, calling the war illegal.
http://www.antiwar.com/
Suicide bomber kills 12 in Iraqi Shi’ite mosque
A suicide bomber wearing an explosives-packed vest killed 12 people and wounded 17 others inside a Shi’ite mosque south of Baghdad at prayer time on Friday, police said. The U.S. military said initial reports indicated a suicide bomber killed seven worshippers and wounded 30. The attack took place a day after Iraq’s parliament passed a security pact with Washington that allows U.S. troops to remain for another three years and puts them under the control of the Baghdad government from 2009.
http://www.alertnet.org/
Iraqi Parliament approves ‘historic’ security pact with US
Iraq’s Parliament on Thursday approved a landmark military pact that will see all US troops withdraw by the end of 2011, eight years after the invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein and plunged the country into chaos. After 11 months of negotiations with Washington and a flurry of domestic political horse-trading leading up to the vote.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/
US hails approval of Iraq accord, but referendum looms
AFP-The United States on Thursday hailed the Iraqi parliament’s approval of a landmark accord for US troops to leave the country in three years, but a referendum on the deal next year could complicate withdrawal plans for the next US president.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/
With Iraqi parliament approving pact, Maliki’s stature grows
BAGHDAD _ In a country where agreements are hard to reach, Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki built a broad political coalition to muscle through a divisive U.S.-Iraq security pact that could set his place in his nation’s history as the man who ended the American occupation.
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/
We respect those who opposed the pact – PM
BAGHDAD /Aswat al-Iraq: The Iraqi Premier Nouri al-Maliki on Thursday said that he respects those who opposed the Iraqi-U.S. security pact, passed earlier today by Iraq’s Parliament, noting that the pact is a step on the way to giving sovereignty back to Iraq. “We respect those who opposed the pact on a […]
http://en.aswataliraq.info/?p=
Iraq: from SOFA to resistance
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
Sofa so disastrous
The status of forces agreement has been hailed as the end of the neocon dream in Iraq. If only that were true.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
Iraq: Cleric al-Sadr calls for peaceful protests
BAGHDAD: Iraqi Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr has called for peaceful protests after the passage of a security pact that will let U.S. forces stay in Iraq through 2011. The cleric’s spokesman says al-Sadr also wants his followers to close his offices and affiliated institutions for three days “to show the tragedy that has befallen us.”
http://www.iht.com/articles/
Sadr orders to raise black flags in mourning for signing agreement
NAJAF /Aswat al-Iraq: Shiite Cleric Muqtada al-Sadr on Friday ordered his followers to raise black flags of mourning and to close his offices for three days throughout Iraq because of approving the U.S. troop withdrawal agreement, two Sadrist officials said. Sheikh Muhanad al-Gharawi said at a press conference, attended by Lewaa Smiesim, “Sayyid Muqtada al-Sadr […]
http://en.aswataliraq.info/?p=
Security agreement puts 16,000 Iraqi detainees at risk of torture
Thousands of Iraqis detained by US forces are at risk of torture or even execution, following the ratification of a security agreement between the US and Iraqi governments. Under the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA), which will take effect on 31 December, around 16,000 prisoners held by the US will be transferred to Iraqi custody. Those at particular risk include former Ba’ath party officials or those who held posts under Saddam Hussain’s government.
http://www.amnesty.org/en/
-risk-torture-20081128
EU countries to accept 10,000 Iraqi refugees
In Brussels, German Interior Minister Wolfgang Schauble said European Union countries agreed to accept 10,000 Iraqi refugees of whom Berlin was ready to accept 2,500. On the sidelines of European Union Interior Ministers meeting, the German Minister said no conditions will be imposed on European countries in this concern. “This has to be done on a voluntary basis and in light of the reception capacities of member states,” he said. The decision has been made by EU interior ministers on Thursday and includes Iraqis inside the Union’s countries.
http://www.alsumaria.tv/en/
Winter Soldier on the Hill: War Vets Testify Before Congress
War veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan came to Capitol Hill earlier this year to testify before Congress and give an eyewitness account about the horrors of war. Like the Winter Soldier hearings in March, when more than 200 service members gathered for four days in Silver Spring, Maryland to give their eyewitness accounts of the injustices occurring in Iraq and Afghanistan, “Winter Soldier on the Hill” was designed to drive home the human cost of the war and occupation—this time, to the very people in charge of doing something about it. [includes rush transcript]
http://www.democracynow.org/
US Jews urge Obama to move embassy to Jerusalem
JERUSALEM (AFP) — A group of American Jews urged president-elect Barack Obama on Thursday to move the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, which the international community does not recognise as the capital of the Jewish state.
http://www.google.com/
Palestinian expert says Israeli torture of Palestinian prisoners is ‘routine’
November 24, 2008Palestinian expert says Israeli torture of Palestinian prisoners is ‘routine’
Written by www.daily.pk
Sunday, 23 November 2008 21:16
It came as no surprise to Abdun-Nasser Farawna when the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronot published a report about a “top secret” Israeli intelligence document authorizing the use of torture against Palestinian prisoners.
Farawna, a former prisoner and an expert in prisoners’ affairs, said torture “began in 1967 as a policy which later got legal coverage and judicial immunity. It aims at destroying Palestinian and Arab prisoners both physically and psychologically.”
To Farawna, Israel’s use of torture is neither secret nor new.
Farawna said the legalization of torture in Israel dates back at least to the report of a government commission headed by Supreme Court President Moshe Landau in 1987. Landau was charged with examining government interrogation techniques. His committee came up with a two-part report. One half of the report was kept secret and contained a list of permissible interrogation tactics.
According to Farawna, the Landau document protected Israeli intelligence officers from prosecution for torturing Palestinian prisoners. The recommendations in the document were approved by the Israeli Knesset, and have been amended since.
The central conclusion of the report, that “the exertion of a moderate degree of physical pressure cannot be avoided,” has not been changed.
Farwana explains that the newly revealed Israeli document allows interrogators to use non-traditional techniques of physical and psychological torture, including slapping, violent shaking, hunger, sleep deprivation and forcing prisoners to stand for long periods.
According to the document, officers can also exert psychological pressure by accusing the prisoner of collaboration in front of other prisoners, or revealing confidential information about him. Interrogators can also arrest family members, including women, to place further pressure, or they can threaten to demolish his family home or deport him.
Farwana asserted that Israeli interrogators are still torturing Palestinian prisoners “on a daily basis.”
According to Farawna’s own research, 95% of Palestinians who have been imprisoned in Israel have been beaten; 89% were deprived of sleep for long times; 82% were forced to stand in difficult positions for long periods; 55% were subjected to extreme hot and cold temperatures; 50% had pressure applied to their testicles.
Furthermore, Farawna said that since 1967, 70 prisoners have died in Israeli custody as a result of torture.
Judge Orders Five Detainees Freed From Guantánamo
November 21, 2008 Judge Orders Five Detainees Freed From Guantánamo
In the first hearing on the government’s justification for holding detainees at the Guantánamo Bay detention camp, a federal judge ruled Thursday that five Algerian men were held unlawfully for nearly seven years and ordered their release.
The judge, Richard J. Leon of Federal District Court in Washington, also ruled that a sixth Algerian man was being lawfully detained because he had provided support to the terrorist group Al Qaeda.
The case was an important test of the Bush administration’s detention policies, which critics have long argued swept up innocent men and low-level foot soldiers along with high-level and hardened terrorists.
The six men are among a group of Guantánamo inmates who won a Supreme Court ruling that the detainees have constitutional rights and can seek release in federal court. The 5-4 decision said a 2006 law unconstitutionally stripped the prisoners of their right to contest their imprisonment in habeas corpus lawsuits.
The hearings for the Algerian men, in which all of the evidence was heard in proceedings that were closed to the public, were the first in which the Justice Department presented its full justification for holding specific detainees since the Supreme Court ruling in June.
Judge Leon, in a ruling from the bench, said that the information gathered on the men had been sufficient to hold them for intelligence purposes, but was not strong enough in court.
“To rest on so thin a reed would be inconsistent with this court’s obligation,” he said. He directed that the five men be released “forthwith” and urged the government not to appeal.
Judge Leon, who was appointed by President Bush, had been expected to be sympathetic to the government. In 2005, he ruled that the men had no habeas corpus rights.
Lawyers said the decision was likely to be seen as a repudiation of the Bush administration’s effort to use the detention center at the American naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, as a way to avoid scrutiny by American judges. President-elect Barack Obama has promised to close the prison.
“The decision by Judge Leon lays bare the scandalous basis on which Guantánamo has been based — slim evidence of dubious quality,” said Zachary Katznelson, legal director at Reprieve, a British legal group that represents many of the detainees. “This is a tough, no-nonsense judge.”
Because of the Bush administration’s claims that most of the evidence against the men was classified, Judge Leon ordered the entire case to be heard in a closed courtroom after brief opening statements on Nov. 5.
The government argued that the six Algerians, who were residents of Bosnia when they were first detained in 2001, were planning to go to Afghanistan to fight the United States and that one of them was a member of Al Qaeda.
The five men who were ordered freed on Thursday include Lakhdar Boumediene, for whom the landmark Supreme Court ruling in June was named. The one detainee Judge Leon found to be lawfully held, Bensayah Belkacem, has been described by intelligence agencies as a leading Al Qaeda operative in Bosnia.
It was not immediately clear whether the government would appeal, but some lawyers said they considered an appeal likely.
The case has become an example of the Bush administration’s pattern of changing strategy in its long legal war over Guantánamo as the courts have scrutinized the government’s justification for its detention policies in general and its reasons for holding individual detainees.
In 2002, President Bush made the government’s allegations against the men a showcase of his administration’s approach to dealing with terrorists. He said in his State of the Union address that the six men had been planning a bomb attack on the United States Embassy in Sarajevo, Bosnia. Last month, however, Justice Department lawyers said they were no longer relying on those accusations to justify the men’s detention.
The habeas corpus cases have moved slowly despite the Supreme Court decision that directed federal judges in Washington to act quickly after nearly seven years of detention for many of the 250 men still held in Guantánamo.
Detainees’ lawyers said Thursday’s ruling by Judge Leon would be a signal to other judges that they should be skeptical of the government’s efforts to delay hearings.
P. Sabin Willett, a lawyer for the Uighurs, said that Judge Leon’s decision “sends a powerful message to all the other judges to get these cases moving.”
J. Wells Dixon, a detainees’ lawyer at the Center for Constitutional Rights, said the ruling made clear that Guantánamo Bay had failed. But, he said, “Justice comes too late for these five men.”
Earlier this week, the Justice Department filed legal motions seeking to stop more than 100 of the other Guantánamo habeas corpus cases from proceeding, a move that lawyers for detainees said was a government effort to avoid further court scrutiny.
The Justice Department lawyers argued in motions filed Tuesday that there were flaws in the ground rules of other judges for the Guantánamo cases that would require the government to reveal classified evidence.
Last month, another district court judge in Washington, Ricardo M. Urbina, ordered the release of 17 other detainees, all ethnic Uighurs from western China. The judge did not hold a hearing on the evidence in that case because the government conceded that the men were not enemy combatants.
The Justice Department won a stay of Judge Urbina’s release order and is appealing. Arguments are scheduled for Monday in the United States Courts of Appeals in Washington.
Bernie Becker contributed reporting from Washington.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/21/us/21guantanamo.html?_r=2&partner=rss&emc=rss&oref=slogin
Today in Palestine! ~ Headlines November 20, 2008 ~
Today in Palestine! ~ Headlines November 20, 2008 ~
Israeli forces raid north Tulkarem, storm Palestinian home Israeli forces raided the neighborhood of Qaffin in northern Tulkarem at dawn on Thursday, according to witnesses. Local sources reported that 15 military vehicles stormed the northern West Bank village, an operation conducted under “intensive shooting of bullets and sound bombs.”
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Israeli forces seize two Tamoun residents
Israeli military forces detained two residents of the West Bank town of Tamoun early on Thursday morning, according to witnesses.
Local Palestinian sources told Ma’an that “Israeli troops invaded the town at dawn, broke into several homes and arrested Akram Bani A’udah and Ahmad Bsharat.”
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Palestinian forces arrest 12 Hamas members in West Bank
Security forces loyalty to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas arrested 12 Hamas members in West Bank during a crackdown against the Islamic movement, Hamas said Thursday.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/
Israeli army detains several Palestinians in the West Bank
Israeli military detained late on Wednesday night more than 20 Palestinian residents in the occupied West Bank, as it dismantled a sit-in tent in the occupied east Jerusalem.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Israeli prosecutors charge Islamic leader over Syrian flag
Israeli prosecutors charged the head of an Islamic organization in Israel over his waving of a Syrian flag at a demonstration in Jerusalem on Thursday, according to a news release from the Islamic Movement. Israeli prosecutors charged Sheikh Raed Salah, who is the head of the Islamic Movement in Israel, with “lifting the Syrian flag” at a Jerusalem march, the organization said. The Israeli prosecution reportedly upheld the charge on Thursday.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Evicted settlers vandalise West Bank mosque
A group of Jewish settlers have graffitied messages insulting the prophet Mohammed on a mosque in the West Bank. Recently around 150 settlers were ordered to leave a fortified building in Hebron where they had been living since last year.
http://www.euronews.net/en/
Dichter: Disputed Hebron house will be evacuated
In meeting with senior police, Shin Bet and IDF officials, internal security minister says High Court’s decision to evacuate disputed Hebron House will be carried out in full. IDF soldiers spent morning painting over anti-Muslim graffiti sprayed by settlers on Hebron mosque.
http://www.ynetnews.com/
Settlers spray inflammatory graffiti on mosque
AP-Jewish settlers on Thursday spray-painted graffiti on a mosque slurring the Prophet Muhammad and defaced a Muslim cemetery, Israeli military officials said, threatening to worsen tensions in this volatile West Bank city.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/
Hebron: Rightists injure soldier, desecrate graves
Tensions surrounding disputed Hebron house continue to run high as settlers clash with local Palestinians, pour turpentine on soldier, spray ‘Muhammad the pig’ graffiti on mosque.
http://www.ynetnews.com/
Report on Israeli settlement in the occupied territories Nov-Dec 2008
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/
Another Palestinian family expelled from their home in East Jerusalem and hundreds of houses demolished. Israel’s colonial policies kill any chance for a peace process!
Israeli police recently expelled the Al–Kurd family from its house, in the dark of night, in the Sheikh Jarrah area in East Jerusalem. The family includes Umm Kamal, the mother, her husband – who is partially paralysed and suffering from chronic heart disease – and their 5 children. Already refugees in 1948, when they were displaced from West Jerusalem, the family has once again been dispossessed of its home, where it has been living since 1956.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/
jerusalem-and-hundreds-of-
IOA demolishes sit-in tent pitched by owners of usurped home
Large numbers of Israeli occupation policemen on Wednesday tore down the tent pitched by an old Palestinian couple who were evicted from their home by force in Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Insult added to injury as Israelis tear down tent of family evicted from Jerusalem home
Israeli security forces on Wednesday tore down a tent in which an Occupied Jerusalem Palestinian family had been living since being evicted from their nearby house earlier this month. The tent housed Fawzia al-Kurd and her ailing husband since their November 9 expulsion from their home of 52 years.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/
‘Gaza closure has no effect on Hamas’
Israel’s decision to keep the crossings into Gaza closed will remain in effect until the end of the week, defense officials said Wednesday, despite an official IDF assessment submitted to Defense Minister Ehud Barak that the restriction is not having an effect on Hamas.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/
Essential health facilities at the Al Shifa medical center stopped functioning
Dr. Hussein Ashour, head of the Al Shifa medical center in Gaza, one of the biggest medical centers in the Gaza Strip, stated that main facilities at the center stopped functioning due to the lack of fundamental equipment and tools.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Gaza: Responding to urgent medical needs of choked-off Strip
As a result of the closure imposed on the Gaza Strip since 5 November, medical facilities are once more running out of essential supplies. This has dire consequences for the health of the Palestinian population. Katharina Ritz, the ICRC’s head of mission for the occupied Palestinian territories, talks about the humanitarian situation and the organization’s efforts to respond to the most urgent needs.
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/
Health ministry: Dozens of patients may die in case of a power outage
The health ministry warned that dozens of Palestinian patients might die within half an hour if there was any power outage in the units of intensive care, heart and preterm infants in Gaza hospitals.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
UNRWA suspends financial assistance to refugees in Gaza
UNRWA has announced that it would be forced to suspend its financial assistance to refugees in the Gaza Strip due to the lack of Israeli currency in Gaza banks.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Holmes: Gaza situation desperate, unacceptable, presents collective punishment
UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs John Holmes said Wednesday that the situation in Gaza is desperate, unacceptable and the Israeli blockade is continuing, a scene which was described before as a collective punishment.
http://www.kuna.net.kw/
Hamas’s agriculture ministry warns of a nutrition crisis due to the Israeli blockade
The Hamas-run agriculture ministry warned today of a nutrition setback in the coastal Strip, unless the commercial crossings are reopened.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Gazans cook on wood fires because of power cuts
AP-While an Israeli cutoff in fuel shipments has closed down a dozen of his competitors, baker Khalil Awad stays in business thanks to a little creativity and dirty black oil drained from car engines. The cutoff in fuel shipments to the Gaza Strip’s sole power plant started a week ago in response to rocket attacks by Palestinian militants.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/
European campaign warns of Israeli attempts to dupe the world on Gaza
The European campaign to lift the siege on Gaza has warned of an Israeli attempt to draw the world’s attention away from the oppressive siege imposed on the Strip.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Palestinian rights group warns of humanitarian disaster in Gaza
The Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) warned in a report on Thursday that the Gaza Strip is facing “disaster” as a result of the “endless siege.” PCHR also blamed Israel for the ongoing clashes in Gaza. According to the center’s weekly report, Israeli troops made 30 incursions into the West Bank and Gaza, where 44 Palestinians were seized. Among them were two children from the West Bank, 15 fisherman off the coast of Gaza and three solidarity activists onboard a ship, the center claimed.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Gaza voices
Palestinians describe life under the Israeli blockade.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-
Barghouthi: IOA measures against Gaza war crime
MP Dr. Mustafa Al-Barghouthi has charged that IOA measures against Gaza constituted a war crime and a blatant violation of the international laws and the Geneva Convention.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Free Gaza Organisation meets Dr Mustapha Bargouti
So is Abbass just a tool of the Israelis? The Free Gaza Organisation meets Dr Mustapha Bargouti.
http://www.freegaza.org/index.
Al Hindy: Hamas will declare a new president after January 9
Senior Islamic Jihad leader, Mohammad Al Hindy stated in an interview with the Maan News Agency that the Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, will most likely declare a new Palestinian president replacing Mahmoud Abbas after January 9 of 2009 which marks the end of Abbas’ term in office.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Hamas slams PA marketing of the “Arab initiative” minus “the right of return”
Hamas strongly denounced the PA in Ramallah for intending to publish advertisements in Israeli newspapers in order to market the Arab peace initiative without mentioning the right of return.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Abbas mad at head of Arab League, decides to boycott foreign ministers’ meeting
Official Fatah sources revealed that PA chief Mahmoud Abbas was indignant at the Arab League secretary-general because of his refrainment from holding Hamas responsible for thwarting the dialog.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Iner-Palestinian dialogue to resume next month
Well-informed Palestinian sources revealed on Wednesday that Egypt would invite the Palestinian factions, including rival Fatah and Hamas, to Cairo on early December to resume the national dialogue.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/
Prospects of Palestinian reconciliation ‘darker than ever’
Palestinian resistance factions were roundly blamed in the mainstream media for their last-minute decision to boycott last week’s Egypt-sponsored “comprehensive dialogue” summit, ostensibly aimed at Palestinian national reconciliation. But some independent commentators say the move, led by Gaza-based resistance faction Hamas, was justified.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/
Sources: Arabs tending to find a mediator other than Egypt
Palestinian political sources revealed a tendency among Arab political leaders active in the Palestinian issue to find an alternative mediator in the inter-Palestinian dialog instead of Egypt.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
ANALYSIS /Which peace initiative will Obama back?
So who’s right, Netanyahu or Peres?Apparently neither. Obama was here in July, when winning the election seemed very far away and his main goal was not to screw up or ire anyone. Presumably he was polite, and told his hosts their proposals were “very interesting”-they leave satisfied and he hasn’t promised a thing.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Obama Tells Abbas He’ll Work for Peace
JERUSALEM — The Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, has received a courtesy phone call from President-elect Barack Obama, who confirmed that he would work for peace, a Palestinian official said Wednesday. The conversation took place Tuesday. The official, Saeb Erekat, a senior Abbas aide, said Mr. Obama had thanked Mr. Abbas for the congratulations he had extended after the Nov. 4 election. Mr. Erekat added that the two men had “reiterated their commitment to continue to work” for an Israeli-Palestinian peace based on a two-state solution.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/
Abdullah holds secret summit with Olmert, Barak
King Abdullah summons Israeli PM, defense minister to his palace in Amman, implores them not to launch operation in Gaza, stresses peace between Israel, Palestinians also a strategic interest of Jordan.
http://www.ynetnews.com/
Israeli leaders make secret journey to Jordan
AP-Israeli leaders made a secret journey to neighboring Jordan earlier this week, listening to pleas from King Abdullah II to avert a large-scale military operation in the Gaza Strip, Israeli and Jordan officials confirmed Thursday.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/
Poll indicates Likud Party preference among Israeli voters
If general elections were held today, the Israeli Likud Party would win 32 Knesset seats, while Kadima would gain just 26, according to a survey published in the Hebrew-language newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth on Thursday.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Israel calls UK stance on settlements “painful”
Israel accused Britain of a “painful attitude” on Wednesday for urging the European Union to make sure that goods made in Jewish settlements are not allowed into the bloc on preferential terms.
http://africa.reuters.com/
Hamas’ armed wing will ‘blow up the truce’ if Israel kills leaders
The armed wing of Hamas threatened on Wednesday to “blow up” the truce agreement with Israel if it kills Hamas leaders has threatened by certain Israeli leaders. Abu Ubaidah the spokesperson of Al-Qassam Brigades said: “Israeli threats and calls to carry out wide-scale aggressive operations in Gaza Strip are nothing but an attempt to console themselves after the projectile attacks they received from resistance factions especially Al-Qassam.”
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Gazans say denied right to make pilgrimage
RAFAH, Gaza Strip: Hundreds of Palestinians protested at the Gaza-Egypt border Wednesday, saying they’ve been denied the right to go to Mecca for the upcoming Muslim pilgrimage. Led by seven men in the white robes worn by Muslim pilgrims, they waved Palestinian flags and carried banners reading in Arabic, “We want to perform our religious duty away from politics. The pilgrimage must not be the subject of conflict.”
http://www.iht.com/articles/
Gaza pilgrims rally at Rafah crossing, call for allowing them to travel to Makka
Hundreds of Gaza pilgrims marched to the Rafah crossing to demand the Arab countries to expedite the opening of the crossing and facilitate the procedures necessary to perform the pilgrimage rituals.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Waqf minister calls on Hamas to respect Hajj pilgrimage
Sheikh Jamal Bawatneh, the Minister of Waqf and Religious Affairs within the Palestinian Authority (PA), said on Thursday that the ministry hopes to overcome obstacles related to the annual Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca. The minister called for Hamas to “return under the umbrella of Palestinian legitimacy,” adding that the pilgrimage “should be respected.”
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Peres: Settlement evacuation may lead to civil war
LONDON-President Shimon Peres told members of the British Parliament Wednesday that Israel would have difficulty dismantling West Bank settlements without causing a civil war in Israel.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Global media executives protest Gaza press ban
Leaders of the world’s biggest media organizations filed a protest with Israel’s prime minister Wednesday criticizing the government’s decision to ban journalists from entering the Gaza Strip for the last two weeks. The protest was the latest in a chorus of international criticism of Israel’s Gaza closure, tightened after a five-month truce began unraveling about two weeks ago in a flurry of Israeli airstrikes against militants and Palestinian rocket barrages targeting Israeli towns.
http://www.google.com/
Jordanian protesters urge Israel to end blockade against Gaza
Hundreds of Jordanians have held a demonstration in the capital Amman in protest against Israel’s blockade of Gaza, urging for an end to the worsening humanitarian conditions in the coastal enclave, daily The Jordan Times reported on Thursday.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/
The price of resisting the occupation in Israel: “leftists aren’t allowed…”
The level of repression against activists in Israel is multi-faceted, violent, and effective. There are so many examples that it is hard to choose only a few, but consider just a handful of examples from recent months.
http://www.
Activist opposes Gaza deportation
A human rights activist who was arrested while accompanying Palestinian fishermen on a trip is appealing against his deportation from Israel.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_ news/scotland/highlands_and_ islands/7738179.stm
Free Gaza Movement call for aiding Gaza through the sea
The Free Gaza Movement issued on Wednesday this open letter to all organizations delivering humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Albawaba: Despite Ban, Leviev to Sell Jewelry at Grand Opening of Atlantis Hotel in Duba
Adalah NY has learned that the jewelry of Israeli billionaire and settlement-builder Lev Leviev will be on sale at this week’s gala opening of the luxury hotel Atlantis, The Palm in Dubai. Despite Leviev’s on-going construction of Israeli settlements and claims by United Arab Emirates officials that Leviev would receive no license to sell his jewelry there, the New York-based human rights coalition Adalah-NY has confirmed that Leviev’s jewelry will be on sale at the Atlantis branch of the Levant Jewelry chain on the fabled Palm Jumeirah island.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/
-of-atlantis-hotel-in-dubai/
Second Saudi food aid shipment arrives in Gaza Strip
A convoy of food aid donated by the Saudi Arabian monarchy arrived in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, loaded with hundreds of tons of rice. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) received a previous convoy of flour last week, also from the Saudis.
UNRWA’s director of aid programs, Kathy Heward, praised Saudi Arabia’s role in delivering aid, particularly “its continued efforts to alleviate poverty among the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.”
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Who Will Stop the Settlers?
The middle-of-the-night eviction last week of an elderly Palestinian couple from their home in East Jerusalem to make way for Jewish settlers is a demonstration of Israeli intent towards a future peace deal with the Palestinians. Mohammed and Fawziya Khurd are now on the street, living in a tent, after Israeli police enforced a court order issued in July to expel them.
http://www.counterpunch.org/
Peres at Oxford
http://www.thejc.com/node/8345
Gaza: a Dire Life Zone Still Clings to Hope
Gaza Strip, 20, Nov, 2008-Following Israeli raids that killed around 15 Palestinians within one week, many rockets were fired into Israel in a reprisal of Israeli’s provocation. As usual Israel started to blame Palestinians despite it was the one who initiated with violence again. The Israeli assault was an obvious breach of an agreed calm held with Palestinian fighting groups 5 months ago. It has provoked some Palestinians to fire some light rockets into Israel. Afterwards, Israel started a new phase of collective punishment and began more violent prevocational measures against 1.5 million people.
http://palestinethinktank.com/
Israel launches Arabic YouTube channel to bypass Arab media
The Foreign Ministry has launched a YouTube channel in Arabic which is meant to bypass Arab media and give Israel’s version of current events directly to Arab viewers, Haaretz has learned.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
PA to publish first-ever ads in Hebrew explaining Arab peace plan
The Palestinian Authority is publishing for the first time on Thursday advertisements in the Hebrew-language Israeli press that present the details of the Arab peace plan.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Another Showdown in Gaza?
Gaza is bracing itself for a harsh winter. Less than a week has passed since Israel slammed shut doors to all land crossings, leaving a million-and-half hapless Palestinians to a miserable fate. We have seen the images before; long queues at petrol stations, Gaza city engulfed in an eerie darkness, children huddled together around a kitchen table doing their homework and trying to make use of little light from a burning candle.
http://palestinechronicle.com/
Issuance of building licenses down 0.2% in West Bank
The total number of building licenses issued in the West Bank decreased by 0.2 percent in the third quarter 2008 compared to the second quarter, according to a report released Thursday by the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS). But the total number of licensed dwellings increased 3.8 percent, compared with the second quarter 2008, when total licensed areas decreased by 14.9 percent, again compared to the second quarter, PCBS reported.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Ben White: Economy first in Palestine?
Ben White: For some, reviving the Palestinian economiy is the route to peace. For others, it’s the route to fragmentation.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
The Shooting of Brian Avery, and the Israeli Cover Up
While the Israeli military’s investigation into the 2003 shooting of the American human rights worker Brian Avery did little to nothing in actually investigating the near-fatal injury, it was highly effective in covering up Israeli soldiers’ involvement, thereby sheltering them from criminal charges. That became clear some time ago when, in a Jerusalem court, none other than the soldier who pulled the trigger and his commander severely incriminated the official account of the shooting on critical points.
http://palestinechronicle.com/
The Israeli Left: Yesterday’s Traitors
In the crucial battle over the national consciousness, we are experiencing great success. Let us pause to recall: In the aftermath of the 1948 war, when we said there is a Palestinian people and that peace should be made with it, there were not 100 people in Israel and the entire world who agreed. When we said a Palestinian state should be established alongside Israel, we were deemed national enemies.
http://palestinechronicle.com/
Palestinians to hand over wanted militant to LAF
Palestinian officials and Islamist figures in the southern city of Sidon reportedly started efforts on Wednesday aimed at handing over six wanted militants to the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF). Among the wanted is Abdel al-Rahman Awad, who is believed the successor of the militant group Fatah al-Islam’s leader Shaker al-Abssi.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/
Interview: Palestinians in Europe
On November 16, delegations representing Palestinian communities in EU countries gathered in Stockholm, Sweden to pave the way for a conference to be held in a European capital in May 2009. Zaid Tayem, the head of the cultural division of the Union of Palestinian Minorities in Europe and a member of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), says the May meeting will solidify Palestinian ranks and push for political representation in European parliaments.
http://english.aljazeera.net/
Palestinian Oscar hope
Take the sexiest man of the year, team him up with a statuesque Palestinian-American spoken word muse, add a fiery filmmaker who sets out to make her first feature movie and you end up with “Salt of This Sea,” this year’s official Palestinian Academy Award entry.
http://www.kansascity.com/451/
In Gaza coffee shops, men and women break strict taboos
GAZA CITY-A womens association celebrating the end of a management course, combined with a party for the 20th anniversary of the Palestinian declaration of independence is no big deal in itself.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
US to lower Israeli airport’s safety ranking
FAA issues report listing various security defects in Ben Gurion International Airport, Transportation Ministry says Mofaz has been attempting to repair dangerous situation for a year.
http://www.ynetnews.com/
Israel to hold talks with UN over IDF pullout from northern border town
Israel will commence negotiations with the United Nations over a withdrawal of the Israel Defense Forces from the northern section of the village of Ghajar, which sits along the border with Lebanon, the government decided on Wednesday.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Ghajar residents irate over possible IDF pullout
Residents of divided village outraged over Jerusalem’s decision to launch talks on ceding control of its northern section to UNIFIL. ‘We will not accept any decision that will separate families and violate our rights,’ council secretary says.
http://www.ynetnews.com/
Wednesday: 9 Iraqis Killed, 17 Wounded
Excerpt: At least nine Iraqis were killed and another 17 were wounded in today’s attacks. Also, the Iraqi governent reported that they had discovered a mass grave three months ago near Najaf. The grave contained 150 bodies killed during the Saddam era. Meanwhile, debate in parliament over a U.S.-Iraqi security agreement turned hostile and was postponed until tomorrow. Elsewhere in Baghdad, U.S. and Turkish officials joined the Iraqis for talks on the situation with Kurdistan Workers Party rebels.
http://www.antiwar.com/
U.S. military: 8 bodies found in Baghdad
The U.S. military says the remains of at least eight people have been unearthed in a mass grave in a mainly Shiite area in Baghdad.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/
US will withdraw troops if Iraq does not sign security deal
The US will withdraw its troops from Iraq if the security pact between the two governments is not signed, Iraqi media quoted a senior United States official as saying Wednesday.
http://www.monstersandcritics.
Iraqi parliament’s debate on US pact disrupted
Lawmakers loyal to Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr on Wednesday disrupted a parliamentary debate ahead of a Nov. 24 vote on a U.S.-Iraqi security agreement that would keep American troops in Iraq for three more years. Speaker Mahmoud al-Mashhadani adjourned the session until Thursday after Sadrist lawmaker Ahmed al-Massoudi aggressively approached a lawmaker from the ruling coalition who was reading aloud the text of the agreement. Al-Massoudi appeared to be on the verge of grabbing the document as lawmaker Hassan al-Sineid read it. Personal guards of Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, seated next to al-Sineid, stopped al-Massoudi from reaching the bench.
http://www.topix.net/content/
Hardline Iraqi MPs shout down US pact in parliament
BAGHDAD (AFP) – Lawmakers loyal to firebrand Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr shouted down the Iraqi parliament’s second reading on Wednesday of a military pact allowing US troops to remain in Iraq until the end of 2011. The agreement, approved by the cabinet on Sunday, has been fiercely criticised by the Sadrists, who oppose any deal with the US “occupier” and have vowed to derail it with legislative manoeuvres and mass demonstrations.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/
Iraqi Lawmakers Brawl Over Security Pact
A session of Iraq’s Parliament collapsed in chaos on Wednesday, as a discussion among lawmakers about a three-year security agreement with the Americans boiled over into shouting and physical confrontation.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/
Defense officials highly critical of U.S.-Iraq troop accord
McClatchy Newspapers-WASHINGTON — Although the Pentagon officially has welcomed the new accord on a U.S. troop withdrawal from Iraq, senior military officials are privately criticizing President Bush for giving Iraq more control over U.S. military operations for the next three years than the U.S. had ever contemplated.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/
Mosul Christians Reluctant to Return
Christians from Mosul are hesitant about returning home despite cash offerings and pledges of stronger security in and around the volatile northern city. The Iraqi government has boosted the number of security forces and troops in Mosul to 35,000 and is offering displaced Christian families up to 1.5 million Iraqi dinars (1,300 US dollars) to return to their homes. Iraqi president Jalal Talabani also earlier this month pledged 900,000 dollars to support and protect the community. An estimated 2,000 families – approximately half of Mosul’s Christian population – fled Mosul and its surrounding areas following the killings of Christians there last month.
http://www.iwpr.net/index.php?
Iraq world’s third most corrupt country
Iraq is perceived as being the world’s third most corrupt country, with only failed state Somalia and Myanmar’s military junta below it, according to the Transparency International index measuring perceptions of graft in 180 nations.
http://www.alsumaria.tv/en/
Iraq’s ‘Mulla Omars’
President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan wants to bring peace to his war-torn country. For the peace to become a reality he will need to come to terms with the fugitive Talaban leader Mulla Omar. Karzai is reported to be holding serious negotiation with Mulla Omar to persuade him to lay down arms in return for safety and other so far undeclared privileges.
http://www.azzaman.com/
Iranians urged to increase investments in Iraq
Iran is holding a trade fair in Baghdad, exhibiting its latest industries in a bid to increase volume of its exports to the country. It is the second running exhibition in the country. The Iranians are holding another fair in the northern Kurdish Province of Dahouk, which has traditionally relied on Turkish imports.
http://www.azzaman.com/
Jennifer Utz: From Baghdad to Brooklyn: My Journey with an Iraqi Refugee
“That one sounds like mortar fire,” Mohamed said to me. “And that was definitely a sniper.” My Iraqi friend and I were in Coney Island for the Friday night summer fireworks. Listening to the thunderous explosions over the water as we rode the Wonder Wheel, memories of life in war-torn Iraq inevitably came to mind. I wondered what else must be going through his head. Just two weeks ago, he had been a refugee living in the slums of Damascus, Syria.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
Lawmaker accuses Bush of secrecy over Iraq deal
The U.S. government is refusing to make public the security pact it has signed with Iraq, even though it has already been published in full in an Iraqi newspaper, a congressional hearing was told on Wednesday. Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice were holding a closed briefing for U.S. House of Representatives members on the pact signed on Monday that sets a 2011 deadline for U.S. troops to withdraw from Iraq.
http://www.reuters.com/
Docs: US relied on faulty assurance before shipping prisoners to countries with history of torture
Hundreds of pages of documents released this week show the US government relied on dubious assurances before shipping detainees to countries with a history of torture. The documents reveal for the first time the contents of a “diplomatic assurance” exchanged between the US and a foreign government. Such assurances are issued when the US is asked to extradite an individual charged with a crime to a country that has a history of torturing prisoners. The requesting country essentially promises that it will not torture the extradited individual.
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/
Why Would Obama Proffer State Gig to Clinton?
“Her top, top, top advisers told me, ‘Steve, she will animate things in the Middle East—she will deliver a Palestinian state. Gold-plated,’” said Steven Clemons, a senior fellow at the New America Foundation in Washington. Mr. Clemons also noted the irony that Mrs. Clinton potentially would be tasked with preparing the road for the direct negotiations with antagonistic foreign leaders that she excoriated Mr. Obama over during the primary. “She criticized him so much for going to meet foreign leaders without preconditions; now she is the one who is going to have to go and get all the preconditions sorted out.”
http://www.observer.com/2008/
The limits of American racism, and the Arab exception
The electoral silly season is over and it is time for a serious discussion removed from partisan passions and manipulation. Racism, the 800-pound gorilla in the American living room, has shrunk and is now no bigger than a jackass. In his eloquent endorsement of Barack Obama, another African-American statesman, Colin Powell, took direct aim at racism and pulled the trigger: “It is permitted to be said such things as, ‘Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim.’ Well, the correct answer is, he is not a Muslim, he’s a Christian. He’s always been a Christian. But the really right answer is, what if he is?” He went on to describe a photo of a Muslim American mother grieving at the tomb of her soldier son at Arlington Cemetery.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/
Dick Cheney and Alberto Gonzales Indicted in Private Prison Case in Texas
A Texas judge has set an arraignment date for Friday for Vice President Dick Cheney and former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. They were indicted this week by a Texas grand jury on state charges accusing them of responsibility for prisoner abuse in a privately-run federal jail. We speak with Willacy County district attorney Juan Angel Guerra.
http://www.democracynow.org/
–
www.TheHeadlines.org
30, 000 signatures for gay marriage
November 20, 200830, 000 signatures for gay marriage
| Written by Rachel Cook |
|
The National Union of Students (NUS) will rally in Melbourne this Saturday in support of same-sex marriage. The rally, which takes place at 1pm at the State Library, will culminate in the handing over of signatures, collected as part of the NUS petition supporting gay marriage, to Greens’ Senator Sarah Hanson-Young.Hanson-Young will take the petition to Canberra, where they will be tabled in the Senate. The petition, Equal Rights for All: Support Same Sex Marriage, End Legal Discrimination, has attracted over 30,000 signatures since January. James Vigus, queer male officer with the NUS, told MCV support for same-sex marriage covers a wide demographic. “The signatures show that it’s not just a narrow range that supports same-sex marriage. To get so many signatures from so many different places, whether it was regional or inner city, shows that there is a large sentiment for equal rights beyond the gay ghettoes. “We have signatures collected from as far away as Townsville.” Vigus said the response to the petition was in line with opinion polls that have shown the majority of Australians support the right for same-sex couples to marry. In May this year, 79 per cent of respondents to The Age readers poll, ‘Should gay couples be allowed to marry?’ said yes, while only 21 per cent said no. Last week before the Senate the Greens asked the Liberal and Labor parties to permit their senators to exercise a conscience vote on the issue of same-sex marriage. The vote was not granted, with the Minister for Climate Change and Water, Penny Wong, once again stating that the Labor Party stance on marriage is that it is between a man and woman. Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young said Labor and the Liberals had both “trumpeted” their commitment to removing discrimination against same-sex couples in Commonwealth law. “However, the Marriage Act has been a glaring omission from the suite of bills that will bring us into a new age of equality for same-sex couples. “[The Greens] are hopeful that, with a conscience vote, the issue will be debated fully, and party lines will be overridden by the understanding that true equality in law for same-sex couples includes the right to marry.” Halley Conway, co-convenor of the Victorian Gay and Lesbian Rights Lobby, is one of the speakers at this weekend’s rally. She told MCV the NUS petition sends a strong message to politicians. “If people are willing to put their name and contact details on a petition it shows elected officials that this is something they believe in,” Conway said. “Petitions are an effective way of communicating what people think en masse and NUS has done this particularly well.” Conway said she will be addressing the issue of future strategies needed to push legalising same-sex marriage. “I will be talking about where we go from here, why there is a need for concerted and multi-pronged activities across the board to see change.” In related news, the Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) Bill, which will allow for lesbians and single women to access fertility treatments and broaden surrogacy laws, last week passed a second reading in the state’s Upper House. The bill has now been referred to the seven-member Legislative Committee, which will report back to the Upper House on December 2. |
http://mcv.e-p.net.au/news/30-000-signatures-for-gay-marriage-4512.html
TUC Calls for End to Discrimination Against Transgender People
TUC Calls for End to Discrimination Against Transgender People
Brendan Barber speaks out on International Trans Memorial Day
LONDON, November 20, 2008 – The TUC is today calling on employers to stop discriminating against transgender people in the workplace on International Trans Memorial Day.
Violent attacks on gay men and women because of their sexuality are well documented – much less well known are the murderous assaults committed against transgender people.
In September 2008, at least 25 transgender people were murdered across the world, for no other reason than the fact that they were different. (source: ILGA)
International Trans Memorial Day will remember ‘trans’ people across the world who have been the victims of such crimes, and aims to bring them to public attention.
In Britain the trans community continues to face violent physical attacks, alongside prejudice and discrimination in communities and at work.
The TUC has worked with transgender union members and with representatives of the trans community to campaign for Britain’s equality laws to provide comprehensive protection from discrimination for trans people.
Although there have been improvements to the law, there remain gaps and widespread exemptions that leave trans people without full protection.
“Discrimination, hatred and violence are part of the daily lives of far too many in Britain, and employers need to make sure all their employees are working in safe environments free from discrimination.,” TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said last night.
“Unions need to step up campaigning for equality for trans people in the UK.
“We will shortly have a new Equality Act and the TUC will be pressing for complete protection for those people who identify with the opposite gender to the one that they were born.
“The murderous attacks on trans people worldwide – and the assaults we know take place in Britain – show that this community faces prejudice and bigotry.
“If Britain is to be a truly equal and inclusive society we need to understand the issues facing trans people, and develop practical steps to end discrimination in workplaces, and in society at large.”
http://ukgaynews.org.uk/Archive/08/Nov/2002.htm
Belarusians More Tolerant to Sexual Minorities than Russians?
Belarusians More Tolerant to Sexual Minorities than Russians?
Slavic Gay Pride movement opens public discussion on the rights of gays and lesbians in Belarus
MOSCOW, November 20, 2008 (GayRussia.ru) – The ‘unification seminar’ between Russian and Belarusian gay activists in Minsk last weekend – and the announcement of the creation of the Slavic Gay Pride movement with its first march on May 16 next year in Moscow – has provoked reaction not only in Russia but also in Belarus.
And the support for rights for gay men and women appears to be stronger than in Russia.
According to the website Gay.By, the Belarusian Internet radio TUT has shown interest in the concept of the Slavic Gay Pride in Moscow on Eurovision Song Contest final day.
A reporter from TUT went into the streets for some vox pops with ordinary people, asking about their attitude towards homosexual people.
The replies they go – and broadcast – were mixed, but generally supportive of gay rights. They include:
Let them marry, of course, let them have children, if they can. If they have conditions then let them do it.
● Yes, really, they should be given liberty probably
● Just that they do not propagate this massively and the issue of children should be thought out…
● Same-sex marriages? This should be thought out…
● The response to gays is the following. Kill yourself, faggots…
● If they are trying, let them try…
● Same-sex marriages are too much for our country.
● Gays are the same humans as all.
● After all they are a minority, let them gather and go to Holland, to create something together there but not here. We are rooted Slavic people and we are not destined to be gays.
● We should deal with it in a more tolerant way.
● We should have the same attitude here as in all open world.
● I think our head of state does not respond to all letters, and to this specially will not. I think they don’t have big chances… Let them write letters…
TUT.By radio reported that “Belarusian gays demand equality. They decided to send a letter to President Alexander Lukashenko, trying to attract attention to the problems of sexual minorities in this country. Moreover, Belarusian gays are going to unite in the fight for their rights with Russian gays and stage Slavic Gay Pride in Moscow during Eurovision final.”
The results of the poll conducted on TUT.By site show that around 13% have positive attitude towards homosexual people, around 25% are neutral. 38% expressed their negative attitude to gays and lesbians while 24% chose the answer “I have no connection with them”.
At the end of the radio news report the journalist suggested that “as we can see out of the responses that we got, everything is not so bad in our country.”
“I was pleasantly surprised by the responses of Belarusian respondents during the poll on the streets,” chief organiser of Moscow Pride, Nikolai Alekseev, said last night.
“They showed higher tolerance towards sexual minorities in the society. But I am glad that the movement of Slavic Gay Pride that we created less than a week ago has already lead to the start of the discussions in the society – and the media – about the rights of gays and lesbians in Belarus. This is only the beginning but it is a foundation.”
http://ukgaynews.org.uk/Archive/08/Nov/2001.htm
UrukNet - Daily Information from Occupied Iraq - newsletter 18 Nov 2008
UrukNet - Daily Information from Occupied Iraq - newsletter 18 Nov 2008
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48874 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48870 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48878 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48879 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48884 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48881 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48862 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48868 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48864 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48875 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48872 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48877 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48883 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48871 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48869 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48867
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48866 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48863 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48865 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48873 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48876
Will The Slaughter Of Iraqis By The US Military Ever Be Reported? Michael Schwartz
Will The US Government And Media Finally Report The Slaughter Of Iraqis By The US Military? I recently received a set of questions from Le Monde Diplomatique reporter Kim Bredesen about the 2007 Project Censored story about 1,000,000 Iraqi deaths due to the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq. The questions and answers are, I think, useful in framing both the untold story of the slaughter in Iraq and the failure of the U.S. media to report on its extent or on U.S. culpability for the deaths of 4% of the Iraqi population….
“Iraq out of Iraq” and other Mousetraps…
Layla Anwar, An Arab Woman Blues
…I was watching with Mom - God bless her - Al Jazeera program “Itijah al Muakess” - Opposite Directions or Views. One of the guests was an “Iraqi” Kurd, the other a Lebanese. Why on earth did Al-Jazeera feel the need to bring in a Lebanese to talk about SOFA when there are plenty of Iraqis who are opposed to the DUAL occupation ? The Kurd dismissed the question when asked about the persecution of the Iraqi Christians and literally ducked it. When grilled about American detention camps - he said ” The AMERICANS NEVER ARREST ANYONE”. Kamel and Omar, my close relatives are STILL IN DETENTION. As for Omar, we are not quite sure if he is alive or not. And Kamel is over 67 years old. If he ever makes out alive, that in itself would be a miracle. They are both detained by the Americans with NO CHARGES. At that point, Mom who was busy cleaning the Bamia - Okra or Ladies Fingers-said in her typical Iraqi fashion, “Nchab, kalb ibn al kalb.” - Shut up, dog son of a dog. My Mom is polite…
“From them the sin, and from them the forgiveness. From them the killing, and the tears. From them the massacres, and the justice of the courts.”
AL-AWDA, via Annie’s letters
Below is a letter from one of the young women attacked by on the Berkeley campus while standing in silent protest (because of anti-Arab sentiments expressed at a concert) with a Palestinian flag. The way the incident has been addressed by the university is perpetuating the racism experienced by these Palestinian students. Please support these students & help the authorities on the campus figure out who the ‘bad guys’ were in this incident. We will not stand by while those attacked are revictimized by being blamed for taking a (legal) stand against the dehumanization of Palestinians & all Arabs. This was handled badly by the school administration & we can’t let this go by without response. Please send an email to the Chancellor & student affairs…
James Zogby and the Politics of Perception
Remi Kanazi
James Zogby isn’t just an Arab American with an opinion. He is the president of the Arab American Institute (AAI), a well known writer, and an esteemed leader within the Arab American community. Many non-Arab Americans highly regard his analysis and look to his articles as a resource to understand the Middle East. This is precisely why his latest article, “Rahm Emanuel and Arab Perceptions” is so disturbing. In the piece, Zogby tries to calm the fears of Arab Americans about Barack Obama’s first appointment, Rahm Emanuel, to White House Chief of Staff. Zogby expressed shock and dismay that his constituency, once euphoric over the election of Obama, was now sending him angry and cynical letters. Zogby described the emails and calls to his office as “troubled and troubling—because much of the reaction was based on misinformation and because of what the entire episode reveals about the larger political dynamic.”…
Obama advisers: Harsh interrogators will walk
Stephen C. Webster
Even as President-elect Obama vowed “to regain America’s moral stature in the world” during Sunday’s 60 Minutes appearance, two of his senior advisers confessed there is no intent to pursue those in the Bush administration who engaged in torture. Speaking on condition of anonymity to the Associated Press, the advisers said that the plan is to put a stop to current interrogation methods and to “look forward” as opposed to focusing on prior transgressions….
Methinks they do protest too much
William Bowles
- I’m coming across quite a few essays by lefties bemoaning the fact that Barack Obama has somehow ‘let us down’. For example there’s a piece by Dave Lindorff ‘Obama’s First Big Mistake on the Job - Rescuing Joe Lieberman’. Mistake? There is no mistake. The gist of the piece is about the “treacherous” Joe Lieberman, former Dem, who when he lost the race for nomination as Democratic Senator for Connecticut, turned around and joined the Republicans and got elected. Okay, the guy is as Lindorff says, “…a wretched example of a man without principle—a back-stabbing slimeball of a politician whose only allegi[a]nce, apparently, besides to himself, is to Israel”, something else I object to in Lindorff’s piece is his qualification of his reference to Lieberman’s Zionist ‘credentials’, “Now I don’t want anyone to think I’m some rabid anti-semite. My wife and kids are Jewish, we have good friends who are Israeli, and no, I don’t think the Jews run the media or the country. I do, however, think that Joe Lieberman thinks more about what, in his warped and shriveled worldview, is good for Israel, than about what is good for America.” Come on Dave, ’some of my best friends are Jews’? There’s no need to apologize for attacking Zionism, you’ll be branded as an anti-semite no matter how much you protest that you ain’t. Get used to it…
Iran and the US-Iraq SOFA
Reza Fiyouzat, Revolutionary Flowerpot Society
… Some have argued with some justification that the Iranians are sending a signal to the president-elect Barak Obama by persuading their Iraqi brethren to go along with the SOFA deal, while others have called the SOFA deal a defeat for the Iranians. Personally, I agree somewhat with the first take, while I think the SOFA agreement in and of itself is neither a threat to the Iranians nor a boon. What the Iranians want in the region is a recognized role assigned to them by the Americans as an indispensable ‘partner’ in the workings of the major issues concerning the long-term fate of the region. And in playing a key role in the Iraqi regime signing onto the SOFA deal, they have made a showcase of their ‘indispensable’ role to the Americans. This in turn should gain them some favor in other areas of their dealings with the Americans. This, again, should show to the U.S. Leftists who think the Iranian regime has some deep-seated anti-imperialist bent that no such thing will be exhibited by the Iranian state in its current setup. They want regional hegemony and the only power that can guarantee them such a status is the U.S…
The Era of Magical Thinking: SOFA Smokescreens and Presidential Power
Chris Floyd
The American media is by and large swallowing the propaganda line that the Iraqi cabinet’s acquiescence to a “Status of Forces Agreement” (SOFA) with the U.S. occupation force means that the Iraq War will be over in 2011. This will further cement the conventional wisdom that the suppurating war crime in Iraq is now behind us, and the topic will be moved even further off the radar of public scrutiny. But as usual, there is a wide, yawning abyss between the packaged, freeze-dried pabulum for public consumption and the gritty, blood-flecked truth on the ground. As Jason Ditz reports at Antiwar.com, the so-called “deadline” in 2011 for the withdrawal of all U.S. forces remains, as ever, an “aspiration,” not an iron-clad guarantee….
Video: Taliban’s increasing clout in Kandahar
AlJazeeraEnglish
The Canadians have lost a higher percentage of their troops killed in action in Afghanistan than any other country in the multinational force. Meanwhile, as Al Jazeera’s David Chater reports, the Taliban are in full control again in many areas of Kandahar, where the group was born….
UN human rights chief calls for end to Israeli blockade of Gaza Strip
UN News Centre
The top United Nations human rights official called today for an immediate end to the Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip, which she said contravened international law and had deprived those living there of their most basic human rights for months. “By function of this blockade, 1.5 million Palestinian men, women and children have been forcibly deprived of their most basic human rights for months,” said Navi Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. “This is in direct contravention of international human rights and humanitarian law. It must end now,” she said….
Caught in Bed with Evil
Gilad Atzmon, Palestine Think Tank
Crossing points into Gaza have been shut down for almost two weeks, forcing the only power plant there to stop functioning, due to the lack of fuel. Last week, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency ran out of food and stopped rations’ deliveries to 750,000 residents of Gaza. Though the humanitarian crisis in Gaza is now immanent, Western media refrains from reporting about the emerging disaster. Apparently, there are far more interesting things to write about, much more interesting than millions of Palestinians who are being starved by the Jewish state. However the press was kind enough to report that British foreign minister David Miliband spent some time in Israel this week….
Rendered homeless, East Jerusalem’s Al Kurd family now targeted in tent
Maisa Abu Ghazaleh, PNN
Director of the Jerusalem Center for Economic and Social Rights, Ziad Hammouri told PNN today that Israeli forces have demolished 51 houses in East Jerusalem since the beginning of 2008. He said, “The delivery of demolition orders, the destruction or confiscation of houses and the construction of settlements are all being conducted frantically by the Israelis before any solution on the issue of Jerusalem can be implemented.” Hammouri added, “The new realities on the ground will be imposed de facto.” This year’s demolitions are focused on East Jerusalem’s Silwan and Beit Hanina. Prime Minister Salam Fayyad’s advisor is referring to an “open battle on Jerusalem.”…
From Kurdistan to K Street
Inside Washington’s covert foreign policy apparatus, middlemen like Shlomi Michaels are key.
Laura Rozen, Mother Jones
The routine of Washington foreign policymaking is straightforward and, well, a little boring. Presidents and secretaries of state issue pronouncements in speeches. Diplomats have discussions in ornate ceremonial rooms. That’s the official version, anyhow, and even if we’re well aware that reality departs from the C-Span, Foreign Affairs version of things, the rhythm, pomp, and ceremony shape our understanding of how countries relate to each other. This is a story of the other world, the one whose real power players never show up in the CNN headline crawl…
Index on Past, Present and Future
Sarah Meyer, Index Research
Heimat means ‘Homeland.’ A boxed edition of Edgar Reitz’s 1982 film, Heimat, just arrived. 6 disks (english subtitles) with an introductory booklet by David Parkinson. I would like to share Edgar Reitz’s outline in his press notes on Heimat, quoted by Mr. Parkinson in “Reactions and Responses.” Why? Because what seemed relevant in Germany then is now also relevant to the United States today, as the U.S. president and his retinue are getting ready to leave the White House. Hopefully there will be no more home-made disasters before this becomes an actuality…
Will It Prove to be Obama’s Cambodia?
Perils of Pakistan
GEORGE C. WILSON
President-elect Obama has committed himself to stepping up the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan. It is not an overstatement to say that he will risk his whole presidency, and perhaps even unwittingly put nuclear weapons in the hands of terrorists who might use them to attack the United States, if he leaps too far into neighboring Pakistan in pursuit of elusive victory. The rub, as the Vietnam and Iraq wars showed us all, is unintended consequences. Our military leaders can, and almost certainly will, make a strong case to Obama that there is no way to defeat the Taliban and their allied tribes in Afghanistan without cleaning out their sanctuaries just over the Afghan border in Pakistan…
President-elect Obama and the prospects for Israeli-Palestinian peace
for Israeli-Palestinian peace
United States President-elect Barack Obama’s election victory has revived hopes that stalled Palestinian-Israeli peace negotiations could finally lead to a two-state solution. Few new presidents have been greeted with such optimism and associated high expectations. However, the chances for progress depend on more than a new American president. There are several interrelated factors: US engagement, the availability of a viable peace agreement, Israeli and Palestinian internal politics and the broader international situation. An examination of these factors indicates that the optimism is unjustified…
URGENT: Kidnapped by the Israeli Navy
FreeGaza.org
Fifteen Palestinian fishermen along with three internationals have been kidnapped in Palestinian waters by the Israeli Navy. They were fishing seven miles off the coast of Deir Al Balah, clearly in Gaza fishing waters and well within the fishing limit detailed in the Oslo Accords of 1994. The fishermen and the human right’s observers were transferred from 3 separate boats to the Israeli warships. Other Palestinian fishermen reported that the 3 boats were seen being taken north by the Israeli Navy…
Obama’s “seamless transition” to endless war
Bill Van Auken
President-elect Barack Obama appeared Sunday on the CBS program “60 Minutes” for his first televised interview since his November 4 election victory. He covered a wide range of subjects with a lack of specificity and a placid tone that suggested someone who had read through stacks of briefing books, but had few defined positions of his own and was above all anxious to offend no one. When asked what he had been “concentrating on” in the past week, however, his answer was unhesitating: “Number one, I think it’s important to get a national security team in place because transition periods are potentially times of vulnerability to a terrorist attack. We want to make sure that there is as seamless a transition on national security as possible.”…
Israeli military invades Rafah city in southern Gaza
Rami Almeghari - IMEMC
Israeli military bulldozers, backed by armored vehicles, swept early on Tuesday morning into the eastern borders of Rafah city in southern Gaza Strip. Witnesses said that the Israeli bulldozers began razing farm lands just 50 to 100 meters depth into Palestinian areas, mainly in the Alnahda neighborhood. Witnesses added that the Israeli armored vehicles moved towards the Gaza international airport, and that they also razed farm lands in the area…
Democrats Cover Up Bush Era War Crimes
George Washington’s Blog
The Associated Press writes: “Two Obama advisers said there’s little—if any—chance that the incoming president’s Justice Department will go after anyone involved in authorizing or carrying out interrogations that provoked worldwide outrage.” And when Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy was asked if Bush officials could face war crimes, he responded: “In the United States, no. These things are not going to happen.” This is not entirely surprising, given that Democratic congress members Nancy Pelosi, Jane Harman and John D. Rockefeller were secretly briefed on torture many, many years ago, and yet did nothing to stop those unlawful programs…
Iraqi Sunnis Push for Referendum on Security Pact
Democracy Now!
In Iraq, the head of the Accordance Front, Iraq’s largest Sunni Arab bloc, said on Monday that the Sunni bloc still has reservations about a security pact that would let US troops stay in Iraq for another three years. Adnan al-Dulaimi, head of the Sunni bloc, told reporters that the Sunnis wanted a referendum on the pact which has yet to be approved by parliament…
Today in Palestine! ~ Headlines November 19, 2008 ~
Today in Palestine! ~ Headlines November 19, 2008 ~
Israeli Authorities demolish a Palestinian house in East Jerusalem The Israeli Authorities demolished on Tuesday a Palestinian home in Al Esawiyya town, in east Jerusalem, arrested three residents and attacked seven others including a number of women.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Abdul-Qader: Israel is launching an open war against the Palestinians in Jerusalem
Hatim Abdul-Qader, Jerusalem Affairs advisor to the Palestinian President, stated on Tuesday that Israel is waging an open war against the Palestinians and their homes in Jerusalem, and is encouraging hostile activities against the Palestinians in order to force them out of city.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Settlers block road near Nablus, stone Palestinian cars
Israeli settlers blocked the bypass road linking the West Bank cities of Nablus and Qalqilia, near the village of Madama on Tuesday night, witnesses said. Hassan Zyadeh a municipal council member in Madama said the settlers prevented Palestinian vehicles from passing into the village and pelted their cars with stones.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Israeli army stands by while settlers attack in Burin
In the village of Burin on Tuesday November 18th, armed settlers from the nearby illegal Israeli settlement of Yizhar attacked Palestinian villagers, throwing rocks and shooting in the air. At 8:40 pm, the houses of Khalib Kasam and his extended family, near Route 60, were assaulted by approximately twenty settlers. Shortly after, the mayor of Burin called the DCO (District Coordination Office) who sent the Israeli army. The army set up a checkpoint, stopping Israeli and Palestinian cars, then telling the drivers to keep going. Meanwhile, according to eyewitnesses, settlers hid in the bushes and trees 50 meters away and threw rocks at several Palestinian cars, which as a result of the checkpoint, were easy, slow-moving targets. Although the army was present during the violence, no settlers were held accountable.
http://www.palsolidarity..org/
Israel arrests Fatah leader for possession of hunting rifle
Israeli forces arrested a Fatah leader in a village near the West Bank city of Nablus on Tuesday for possession of a hunting rifle. Palestinian sources told Ma’an that Israeli troops seized 22-year-old Jamal Thabet, a member of the local Fatah committee, from his house in the village of Azmut. Israeli troops in eight military vehicles also attacked a student’s house within the same area.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Five seized at East Jerusalem house demolition protest
A Palestinian and four internationals were taken into Israeli police custody at a protest in East Jerusalem on Wednesday, according to a statement. The five were demonstrating against the demolition of a Palestinian family’s home in Sheikh Jarrah, an East Jerusalem neighborhood, where the house was demolished by Israeli forces on 9 November. The home, which belonged to the Al-Kurd family, was built on private Palestinian property, the statement claimed.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Israeli forces hold dozens of youths in raid south of Bethlehem
Israeli forces raided the village of Tuqu, south of the West Bank city of Bethlehem at dawn on Wednesday and imposed a curfew. Witnesses said that dozens of military vehicles raided the village. Israeli soldiers rounded dozens of young men into a school, where they are being interrogated. Witnesses added that Israeli troops stormed houses and damaged property. In enforcing the curfew they used a public address system to order students not to go to school and residents not to attend the morning prayer.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Hamas: Fateh forces in the arrested 17 Hamas supporters in the West Bank
Hamas movement stated on Tuesday that Fateh security forces arrested 17 members and supporters of the movement in several West Bank areas.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Israel arrests 14 Palestinians in West Bank
Israeli troops arrested 14 Palestinians in the West Bank in a continued crackdown against what the Jewish state called as wanted Palestinian activists, Palestinian sources said Wednesday. The arrests took place during raids into the cities of Bethlehem, Qalqilya, Ramallah and Hebron, according to the sources.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/
Israeli military detains four residents from Nablus City
Israeli military detained on Wednesday four Palestinian residents from the West Bank city of Nablus, as the soldiers ransacked the detainees’ houses.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Israeli forces arrest Gaza fishermen and solidarity activists
At around 9am on Tuesday, 18 November 2008, Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) attacked Palestinian fishing boats off the central Gaza Strip’s shore. IOF continued to seal off the Gaza Strip for the thirteenth day in a row, allowing only a limited number of trucks loaded with commodities and food to enter the Strip.
http://electronicintifada.net/
Fifteen Palestinian fishermen released
19th November Update: The fifteen Palestinian fishermen who were abducted from Palestinian waters by the Israeli navy on the 18th November have been released. Their boats, however, have yet to be returned.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/
Israeli military continues rampage in the Taqou’ village
Israeli military continued on Wednesday rampage throughout the West Bank village of Taqou, detaining dozens of youth after ransacking many houses.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Israeli army imposes curfew in West Bank village
AFP-The Israeli army imposed a curfew on a Palestinian village near the West Bank city of Bethlehem on Wednesday, questioning dozens of men, security sources and witnesses said.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/
Israeli court holds hearing on the file of Maghareba gate events
The Israeli court in Jerusalem held Tuesday a hearing on the file of the Maghareba gate events and the indictment charge leveled against Sheikh Ra’ed Salah and four of his colleagues.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Two Palestinian lawmakers sentenced to prison terms
Two Palestinian members of parliament were sentenced to lengthy prison terms and fined by an Israeli military court on Tuesday. Lawmaker Samir Al-Qadi was sentenced to 42 months in prison and a 7,500 shekel fine. Al-Qadi was originally sentenced to just 28 months. Bassem Az-Za’arir was sentenced to 26 months in prison and 9 months probation. Both men are members of Hamas’ Change and Reform Bloc, and are from the West Bank city of Hebron.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Israel spurns UN plea to ease Gaza blockade
AP-Israel stood fast Wednesday by its decision to clamp shut cargo crossings at the Gaza Strip, brushing off pleas to ease the blockade from United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon.
http://news.yahoo..com/s/ap/
UNRWA facing “grave and imminent financial crisis”
The United Nations’ relief agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, is facing “a grave and imminent crisis,” a senior official announced on Wednesday. The Commissioner General of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, Karen AbuZayd said the agency’s General Fund, which funds UNRWA’s core services will suffer an 87 million US dollar shortfall beginning next year.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
UN envoy urges Gaza blockade end
Aid was allowed in to Gaza on Monday but Israel then shut the crossings. The UN’s top human rights official has said Israel’s blockade of Gaza deprives Palestinians of the “most basic human rights” and should end immediately.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/
UN: Israel Violating Law in Gaza
The U.N.’s top human rights official says the Israeli blockade of Gaza is depriving Palestinians of their most basic human rights.
http://www.voanews.com/
Israel renews blockade of Gaza crossings
Reuters-Israel resealed border crossings with the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, blaming continued rocket fire at its towns, despite warnings from world aid groups of looming shortages of food and fuel in the coastal territory.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/
Egypt court says aid must be allowed into Gaza
Presently, Egypt has limited humanitarian trucks from entering Gaza as part of its border crackdown in line with Israeli policies.
http://www.afriquenligne.fr/
Statements of UN High Commissioner regarding the siege anger Israel
Israeli was “angered” by the statements of Navanethem “Navi” Pillay, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights; as she called on Israel to immediately lift its blockade over the Gaza Strip as this siege violates the international and humanitarian law.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Many sections of Shifa hospital closed because of fuel depletion
Several wards and medical equipment in the compound of Shifa hospital, one of the biggest medical institutions in Gaza, stopped operating as a result of power outages and the depletion of fuel.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Zahhar: Truce isn’t given for gratis, and those who need it should abide by it
Dr. Mahmoud Al-Zahhar has asserted Tuesday that the calm with the Israeli occupation couldn’t be given for gratis.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Hamas: The truce does not mean the resistance cannot protect its people
The Hamas Movement stated Tuesday that the truce does not mean that the Palestinian resistance is not supposed to protect the Gaza people from the Israeli aggression.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Bashour: RoR of Palestinian refugees couldn’t be compromised
Ma’en Bashour has affirmed Tuesday that the RoR was a personal, national, popular, and human right that couldn’t be compromised.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Abu Marzouk: Hamas will attend the meeting of Arab foreign ministers
Dr. Moussa Abu Marzouk, the deputy head of the Hamas political bureau, stated that Amr Moussa, the secretary-general of the Arab League, understood Hamas’s request to participate in the meeting of Arab foreign ministers to be held in Cairo on the 26th of this month.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Hamas denies reports on its acceptance to extend Abbas’ term
Palestinian Islamic Hamas movement on Wednesday denied reports that it had accepted to extend President Mahmoud Abbas’ term in exchange for joining the presidency’s institutions.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/
Islamic Jihad: Hamas will appoint own president if Abbas refuses to step down
Hamas will likely appoint its own president if Mahmoud Abbas does not step down at the end of his term on 9 January, a senior Islamic Jihad leader predicted on Wednesday. In an interview in Cairo, Islamic Jihad leader Muhammad Al-Hindi predicted “more exchange of blame, and president Abbas will find a legal [justification to stay], and he will gain Arab and European support. However, Hamas will appoint its own president, and that might be the PLC speaker.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
PA: ‘Hamas is staging Gaza blackouts’
Palestinian Authority officials in Ramallah accused Hamas on Tuesday of staging the latest blackouts in the Gaza Strip in a bid to win sympathy and incite the Palestinian public against Israel and the PA. The officials said that contrary to Hamas’s claim, there is no shortage of basic goods, medicine and fuel in the Gaza Strip, largely thanks to the many underground tunnels along the border with Egypt.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/
Ramallah Palestinian Authority blocks website reporting on corruption
The Palestinian Authority (PA) in Ramallah has blocked access to a popular news website because of the site’s reporting on widespread corruption among the entourage of PA President Mahmoud Abbas. For several days, Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip have been unable to view the website Donia al-Watan ( http://www.alwatanvoice.com) as access has been blocked through the PA-controlled telecom company. Readers outside Palestine and a few inside the country using proxies are still able to access the site. The Electronic Intifada confirmed that several users attempting to access the website in Ramallah and other parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank could not do so and instead saw a message in English stating “We are sorry, the site was blocked based on attorney General instructions [sic].”
http://electronicintifada.net/
University workers protest at prime minister’s office in Ramallah
Palestinian university workers and legislators staged a sti-in in front of the Prime Ministers’ Office in the West Bank city of Ramallah to bring attention to their fight for increased pay. Unions at universities in the West Bank and Gaza have waged a series of strikes, saying that the Palestinian Authority’s Council on Higher Education, has not addressed their concerns. Another two-day strike began on Tuesday.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Who stole Palestinian prisoners’ money?
Palestinian Ministry for Prisoner Affairs allots millions of shekels every year for residents held in Israeli prisons. Ynet learns PA has launched investigation into disappearance of inmates’ canteen allowance; senior official arrested.
http://www.ynetnews.com/
Miliband says 2009 ‘year of change’ in Mideast
AFP-Visiting Foreign Secretary David Miliband said Wednesday he hoped 2009 would see a comprehensive Middle East peace settlement given changes in the US and Israeli administrations and elections in the region.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/
Peres: Obama ‘very impressed’ by Arab League peace plan
LONDON-U.S. President-elect Barack Obama proclaimed himself “very impressed” with the Arab League’s peace plan when he discussed it with President Shimon Peres during a brief visit to Israel four months ago, Peres said Tuesday.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Obama calls Abbas, promises to back peace talks: official
AFP-US president-elect Barack Obama on Tuesday called Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas and vowed to continue pushing Middle East peace efforts, a senior official said.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/
PA negotiator: Obama told Abbas he’d spare no effort to see Mideast peace
U.S. President-elect Barack Obama has called the Palestinian president and told him that peace is a vital interest for Israelis and Palestinians.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Israel ex-army chief to stand for opposition in February poll
AFP-Israel’s former army chief Reserve General Moshe Yaalon announced on Tuesday that he will be a candidate for the right-wing opposition Likud in February general elections.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/
Yaalon: Withdrawals must end
Newest addition to Likud holds press conference with Netanyahu, says decision to enter politics followed lengthy deliberation, but he ‘couldn’t just sit idly by’.
http://www.ynetnews.com/
Palestinian PM nixes Netanyahu plan for Mideast peace
AFP-Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayyad rejected proposals by Israeli opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu for an economic solution to the Middle East conflict, in comments published on Tuesday.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/
Foreign Reporters’ Group Fights Israeli Prohibition on Entering Gaza
JERUSALEM — An association representing international news organizations is campaigning for an end to an unusual Israeli policy barring foreign reporters from entering Gaza that has lasted for almost two weeks.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/
Israel MP moves into settler house despite evacuation order
AFP-A right-wing Israeli MP on Tuesday joined a group of Jewish settlers living in a controversial house in the flashpoint West Bank city of Hebron which the High Court ordered them to evict.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/
Jewish West Bank settlers defy evacuation order
AFP-About 100 Jewish settlers on Wednesday defied a High Court order to evacuate a house in the flashpoint West Bank city of Hebron, and braced for possible confrontation with police.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/
MIDEAST: On Top of Humanitarian Disaster, A News Blackout
Israel has imposed a virtual news blackout on the Gaza Strip. For the last ten days no foreign journalists have been able to enter the besieged territory to report on the escalating humanitarian crisis caused by Israel’s complete closure of Gaza’s borders for the last two weeks.
http://www.ipsnews.net/news. asp?idnews=44745
Foreign Reporters’ Group Fights Israeli Prohibition on Entering Gaza
Israel has almost entirely sealed crossing points along its border with Gaza since a five-month cease-fire with Hamas began to unravel on Nov. 4.
http://www..nytimes.com/2008/
Khudari warns: Gaza population might march towards crossings
Alarm sirens wailed in northern Gaza on Tuesday as the anti siege committee members and foreign solidarity activists marched near Beit Hanun crossing to protest the IOA closure of all Gaza crossings.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
NY-Rights groups protest Hebron settlement fundraiser
Adalah-NY, Brooklyn for Peace rally outside Marriott Marquis hotel against fundraiser held there by settlement group, chant ‘Hebron’s settlers, Klu Klux Klan, racist groups go hand in hand’.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/
UK protestors call Peres ‘war criminal’
President’s address in front of 1,000 Oxford University students interrupted by small group of demonstrators claiming Israel ethnically cleansed Palestinians, calling for end to Gaza siege. Peres: We don’t need your permission to stay alive.
http://www.ynetnews.com/
A London demonstration protesting at Israel’s president visit to the region
Scores of British Palestinians and some solidarity campaigners staged today noon a demonstration in front of the UK parliament premises , in protest against the visit of Israeli President Shimon Peres, to the region.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Comments from the Angry Arab
“I am an avid reader of your blog and I have a story for you from Oxford. Tonight, on 18th November 2008, Balliol College of Oxford University hosted Israeli President Shimon Peres in our university’s most prestigious venue, the Old Sheldonian Theatre. They honoured him not only with this platform, to speak on the topic ‘The Globalisation of Peace’(!), but also with the announcement that this would constitute the first in a lecture series entitled ‘Peace Lectures: Inaugurated by Shimon Peres’. We, the Oxford Arab Cultural Society and the Oxford Students’ Palestine Society, alongside the Palestine Solidarity Campaign and concerned members of the public, held a demonstration outside starting over an hour before the talk, and lasting-audibly-throughout Peres’ speech. Some of us attended the lecture and, at intervals, nine students got up and made loud statements beginning ‘I represent all the Palestinians who…’ One such student was bundled out of the lecture hall. Peres was visiblyfazed by these interruptions and the sound of the protestors outside, while the audience were thus made aware of the point of view being stifled by Peres’ presence today in Oxford, and every day in Palestine. Several letters of opposition have been presented to the Master of Balliol, Andrew Graham, among which was one from a prominent group of South African anti-apartheid activists (attached below). We hope that there will be publicity for this opposition, and for the events of today, as part of our ongoing protest to show that the head of the Israeli state is not welcome here…” [end]
http://angryarab.blogspot.com/
2 arrested at Gaza protest outside Ministry of Defense
Approximately 200 people held a vigil outside the Ministry of Defense in Tel Aviv on Tuesday evening, protesting the recent flare-up of violence in the Gaza Strip and what they called the “occupation, suffocation, and liquidation” of the Palestinian people. Police arrested two protesters for disturbing the peace, but the vigil, which lasted for over an hour, was otherwise peaceful.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/
Ontario Coalition Against Poverty: Boymelgreen out of Toronto, Brooklyn and Palestine!
On November 15, as part of the International Week Against the Apartheid Wall, the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP) erected a reinforced cement wall in front of the Toronto building ‘50 On the Park’ at 50 Portland Street. This building is owned by wealthy real estate developer Leviev-Boymelgreen, which has projects in Toronto and Brooklyn, and which also builds illegal settlements in the West Bank.
http://stopthewall.org/
Cyclers against the Wall tear down the Apartheid Wall
On November 16, Forum Palestina and Palestinian solidarity activists in Rome built a mock wall across the main street, Via dei Fori Imperiali, in the center of Rome to protest the Apartheid Wall being built in Palestine. A critical mass group called Cyclers Against the Wall participated in the event, and with the wave of the “starting” flag – a Palestinian flag – the cyclists drove at the mock wall, and broke it down.
http://stopthewall.org/
‘Palestinian banks are better than Israeli banks’
Jihad al-Wazir, governor of the Palestinian Monetary Authority, was 25 years old when his father, Khalil al-Wazir-better known as Abu Jihad was assassinated. It happened in their Tunis home in April 1988.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
PNA to publish advertisement first time on Israeli media
The Palestinian National Authority (PNA) will publish its first advertisement on Israeli media this week, calling on Israelis to support a Saudi-proposed peace plan, Israeli news service Ynet reported Tuesday. The public statement will appear on Israeli newspapers as of Thursday, marking the first time that the PNA uses this channel to communicate with the Israeli public, said the report, adding that similar advertisement will be published in American and European newspapers as well.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/
Israel to boycott Durban II anti-racism conference
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni announced Wednesday that Israel has made a final decision to boycott the United Nations “Durban II” conference on human rights this spring, fearing it would be used once again as a forum for anti-Israeli sentiment..
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Target Practice in Gaza
What came first: the chicken or the egg? And who started the latest round of clashes in Gaza: the Israelis or the Palestinians? Depending on whom one asks, the answer will be different every time-the Israelis, the Palestinians, both are guilty, it depends… On November 5, Israeli forces entered Gaza, killing six Palestinians in the process. Since then, Palestinian fighters have been clashing with Israeli troops and dodging Israeli missiles.. In response to every Israeli action, they play their only card-they fire homemade rockets into Israel. To date, 16 Palestinians have been killed, with zero Israeli fatalities recorded. Palestinians say Israel made the first move by entering Gaza in an unwarranted and aggressive manner. Israel, on the other hand, says it was responding to rumors of possible kidnapping attempts against Israeli soldiers and the threat of more rocket attacks. But debating who started the latest round of violence is an unproductive pastime. Instead, considering the timing and the consequences of these hostilities yields a much more interesting though sad tale.
http://www.miftah.org/Display. cfm?DocId=18207&CategoryId=3
…
Extrajudicial Assassinations As Official Israeli Policy
Extra-judicial killings are indefensible, morally abhorrent, and illegal under international laws and norms. Article 23b of the 1907 Hague Regulations prohibits “assassination, proscription, or outlawry of an enemy, or putting a price upon an enemy’s head, as well as offering a reward for any enemy ‘dead or alive.’ ” Article 3 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) states that “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.” UDHR also recognizes the “inherent dignity (and the) equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family.”
http://globalresearch..ca/
Crossing the Line looks at Obama’s “change” for Palestine
This week on Crossing The Line: With a resounding victory, United States President-elect Barrack Hussein Obama made history on the evening of 4 November 2008. Running on the slogan “Change You Can Believe In,” many are hoping that after eight years of the Bush administration, change has finally arrived. But what about change for the Palestinians and their untenable situation? What change can Obama bring to the world’s longest-standing refugee population? We’ll speak to Kathleen and Bill Christison both formerly with the US Central Intelligence Agency about this issue.
http://electronicintifada.net/
Settler rabbi: State of Israel is an enemy of the people
“The state of Israel has become the enemy of the people and the land of Israel,” settler rabbi Shalom Dov Wolpe said Tuesday during an emergency meeting on the state’s plan to evacuate a house in Hebron whose ownership has been at the center of a bitter dispute for over a year.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Alperon’s sister: Whoever killed Ya’akov, the same will be done to his children
At around 1 P.M. Tuesday afternoon the funeral procession of underworld kingpin Ya’akov Alperon, who was killed in a car bombing in Tel Aviv Monday morning, set out from his home in Ra’anana. Hundreds of people accompanied his coffin to the cemetery at Kfar Nahman.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Israeli mob swears vengeance as it buries boss
For a moment, as the first few of the hundreds of mourners came up the cypress-lined avenue to the main cemetery on the edge of this prosperous satellite town outside Tel Aviv, the menfolk donning kippas, you could have mistaken it for any Israeli funeral.
http://www.independent.co.uk/
1024601.html
Meir Porush’s son beaten as haredi confrontations continue
In another incident demonstrating the escalating tensions between rival camps within the haredi community, the son of United Torah Judaism MK Meir Porush was beaten and knocked to the ground Monday. Yisrael Porush confirmed that he had been attacked but added that he did not want to provide details of the incident for fear it would lead to the desecration of God’s name.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/
A secular mayor for Jerusalem
THE hollowness of Israel’s rhetoric about “united Jerusalem” is never starker than on local election day, when the city’s 537,000 adults, together with the rest of Israel, can go to the polls to pick their new mayor. Among Jerusalem’s Palestinians, who make up some 30% of the citizenry, hardly anyone bothers to vote. In East Jerusalem, the mainly Arab part of the city captured and annexed by Israel in 1967, polling stations in schools and public buildings stay yawningly empty, apart from a trickle of municipal employees and their families.
http://www.economist.com/
Britain resumes high-level intelligence links with Syria: report
AFP-Britain re-established high-level intelligence links with the Syrian authorities as Foreign Secretary David Miliband visited Damascus, the Times newspaper said Wednesday citing senior Syrian officials.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/
Peres: Withdrawal from the Golan will only be under Israeli conditions
Israeli President, Shimon Peres, said that if Syria wants the Golan Heights back it must proof that it is ready for peace, and must change its policies, such as its relation with Iran and Hezbollah.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Israel may cede control of Lebanon village to UN
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is expected to call several senior defense officials Wednesday to discuss the possibility of pulling out of the northern part of the border village of Ghajar and relinquishing control to UN forces.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Who Will Evict Israel from Lebanon?
Northwest of Ghajar Village, South Lebanon : “We, as Lebanese, are here to confirm that we cling to freeing every grain of our soil. We will not abandon the great national cause, which is the continuation of the liberation of our land. The resistance looks forward to hoisting the flags of victory again over the Kfarshuba hills, Shebaa Farms, Ghajar and Abbasieh where 80 percent of the land is still occupied” – Sheik Nabil Qwork, Hezbollah leader addressing villagers at Abbasieh Village, 10/2008
http://www.counterpunch.org/
Tuesday: 23 Iraqis Killed, 35 Wounded
At least 23 Iraqis were killed and 35 more were wounded in the latest reports of violence. In political news, elections have been set for Jan. 31 in most of Iraq’s 18 provinces. The top Iraqi cleric gave tacit support to a U..S.-Iraqi security agreement now being debated in parliament. Meanwhile, Corruption watchdog group, Transparency International, has called Iraq the third most corrupt country in the world, and demonstrators are moving their vigil for an Iranian dissident group living in Iraq from New York to Washington.
http://www.antiwar.com/
IRAQ: At long last, an election date
Amid the drama over the Iraqi Cabinet’s decision to approve a security pact giving American forces another three years on the ground here, it was easy to miss another milestone. The Cabinet has formally announced the date for provincial elections: Jan. 31, 2009. The decision, announced Tuesday, is the first time a date has been declared. The provincial election law passed by Parliament in September only said that the vote should be held by Jan. 31 but left in the air exactly when it would happen. This gives the country’s political groups time to get ready for the official two-month campaigning period, which will begin Dec. 1. With luck and organization, it will give election officials time to arrange what is sure to be a massive undertaking.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.
Al-Jazeera Video: Inside Story-Iraq security pact-Nov 17
http://palestinianpundit.
2011 US Iraq withdrawal depends on conditions on the ground, says Admiral Mullen
US military leaders are comfortable with a 2011 deadline for the withdrawal of all US forces from Iraq but it should depend on conditions on the ground, the US military chief has said.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/
-on-the-ground-says-Admiral-
Under Iraq troop pact, U.S. can’t leave any forces behind
BAGHDAD — The status of forces of agreement between the United States and Iraq is now called the withdrawal agreement, and that’s exactly what it is: an ultimate end to the U.S.-led occupation of Iraq.
http://www.mcclatchydc..com/
Unofficial Translation of U.S.-Iraq Troop Agreement from the Arabic Text
Translated from the Arabic by Sahar Issa, Jenan Hussein and Hussein Kadhim of the McClatchy Baghdad Bureau.
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/
Maliki defends troop pact; Sadr demands its rejection
McClatchy Newspapers-BAGHDAD — Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki on Tuesday urged the Iraqi public to support the new pact that calls for withdrawing American forces as his most determined opponent, radical cleric Muqtada al Sadr, once again urged the parliament to vote down the agreement.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/
Small Iraqi party says it will not support US pact
A small Shiite party said Wednesday that a U..S.-Iraqi security pact allowing American troops to stay in Iraq for three more years infringes on Iraqi sovereignty, and vowed to vote against the deal in parliament. Even without the support of the Fadhila party’s 15 lawmakers, the agreement is likely to be approved when the 275-seat parliament votes Nov. 24. The political parties that comprise Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s ruling coalition dominate the legislature, and his Cabinet approved the deal with Washington on Sunday.
http://www.topix.net/content/
Iraq bids farewell to US arms
The security pact between the United States and Iraq closes the door to a further US military presence beyond 2011 even more tightly than the previous draft and locks in a swift end to Iraqi dependence on the US military that appears to be irreversible. What was supposed to be a client regime was instead waiting for the right moment to assert real control.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/
Iraq arrests senior Iranian commando at airport
Iraqi security forces have arrested an alleged “senior” Iranian commando from the elite Revolutionary Guard’s Quds Force at Baghdad International Airport, the U.S. military said Wednesday. The military said they suspected the man of “involvement in facilitating Iranian weapons.
http://www.alarabiya.net/
US arrests suspected Iranian agent in Iraq
AP-The U.S. military says it has arrested an alleged senior member of the Iranian security forces suspected of funneling weapons into Iraq.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/
Iraq discovers remains of 150 Kurds in south Iraq
Reuters-Iraqi officials flew the remains of 150 Kurds found in a mass grave home to Kurdistan on Wednesday, after a moving ceremony that paid tribute to victims of repression under ousted dictator Saddam Hussein.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/
Iraqis accused of killing soldiers at risk of torture, court told
Two Iraqis accused of killing British soldiers risk being tortured and executed, in violation of their human rights, if they are tried in Iraq for war crimes, the high court was told yesterday. Faisal Al-Saadoon, 56, and Khalaf Mufdhi, 58, who are being held by British forces in Basra, are accused of murdering Staff Sergeant Simon Cullingworth and Sapper Luke Allsopp in 2003.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
Straw defends his role in Iraq war after ex-law lord brands conflict ‘illegal’
Lord Goldsmith and Lord Chancellor Jack Straw defended their actions after Lord Bingham, the former senior law lord and one of Britain’s most respected judicial experts, described the military action by Britain and the US as a ” serious violation of international law”.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/
illegal.html?ITO=1490
Will The US Government And Media Finally Report The Slaughter Of Iraqis By The US Military?
I recently received a set of questions from Le Monde Diplomatique reporter Kim Bredesen about the 2007 Project Censored story about 1,000,000 Iraqi deaths due to the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq. The questions and answers are, I think, useful in framing both the untold story of the slaughter in Iraq and the failure of the U.S. media to report on its extent or on U.S. culpability for the deaths of 4% of the Iraqi population.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
Steve Fainaru on “Big Boy Rules: America’s Mercenaries Fighting in Iraq”
Top Justice Department prosecutors are reportedly reviewing a draft indictment against six Blackwater security guards who opened fire in a crowded Baghdad square more than a year ago killing seventeen Iraqi civilians. The indictments would mark the first time armed private contractors from the United States face justice. We speak to Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post correspondent Steve Fainaru about his new book Big Boy Rules: America’s Mercenaries Fighting in Iraq.
http://www.democracynow.org/
Urgent International Push for Pollard
With Prime Minister Ehud Olmert scheduled to leave in a few days for a parting visit with U.S. President George W. Bush – who will leave office in two months’ time, just a few weeks before Olmert is to be replaced –massive pressure is being exerted on Olmert to ask Bush for a pardon.
http://www.israelnationalnews.
On Rahm Emanuel
There’s been a lot of speculation about the foreign-policy implications of Rep.. Rahm Emanuel serving as Barack Obama’s White House chief of staff, much of which, of course, is …speculation. Below are two of the less fevered and somewhat more reassuring analyses of Emanuel and his views on the Middle East — one by Jim Zogby, the president of the Arab American Institute (AAI), the other by Lara Friedman, the policy and government relations director of Americans for Peace Now (APN). Both groups, of course, worked with the Clinton administration on the Oslo process and are strongly committed to a two-state solution, etc.
http://www.ips.org/blog/
NO FREE PASS FOR RAHM EMANUEL
James Zogby isn’t just an Arab American with an opinion. He is the president of the Arab American Institute, a well-known writer, and an esteemed leader within the Arab American community. Many non-Arab Americans highly regard his analysis and look to his articles as a resource to understand the Middle East. This is precisely why his latest article, “Rahm Emanuel and Arab Perceptions,”
published by The Huffington Post, is so disturbing. Remi Kanazi comments.
http://electronicintifada.net/
Obama advisers: Harsh interrogators will walk
Even as President-elect Obama vowed “to regain America’s moral stature in the world” during Sunday’s 60 Minutes appearance, two of his senior advisers confessed there is no intent to pursue those in the Bush administration who engaged in torture.
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/
Essential Reading for Obama
In the weeks until his inauguration on January 20, 2009, Barack Obama will be focusing on the most immediate tasks of assembling a new administration and familiarizing himself with the depth of domestic and foreign crises confronting the Unites States. Once in the White House, President Obama will have to grapple with the economy, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and their manifestations in the area of human rights and law. But the catalogue of failures of the outgoing administration of George W Bush is long. If President Obama is to succeed in delivering on the promises raised by his victory, he may find it useful to read some of the pages from the catalogue of failures of his predecessor. They shed light on the blunders that made America’s crises.
http://palestinechronicle.com/
Al Qaida No. 2: Obama guilty of betraying Muslim roots in backing Israel
Al Qaeda’s second-in-command urged Muslims to continue attacks on “criminal” America and slammed U.S. president-elect Barack Obama for vowing to back Israel during his campaign.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Cornel West on the Election of Barack Obama: “I Hope He Is a Progressive Lincoln, I Aspire to Be the Frederick Douglass to Put Pressure on Him”
Princeton University professor of religion and African American studies, Cornel West, speaks about the election of Barack Obama, his selection of Eric Holder to be Attorney General, the possible selection of Lawrence Summers to be Treasury Secretary and the role of the progressive left to push Obama. West is the author of the new book Hope on a Tightrope: Words and Wisdom.
http://www.democracynow.org/
The Koran, punk rock and lots of questions
This much Hiba Siddiqui knows: She is a Muslim teenager living in America. But what does that mean for her? The front door shuts with a thud, and Hiba Siddiqui heeds her father’s footsteps, heavy from a day at work, plodding across the foyer downstairs.
http://feeds.latimes.com/%7Er/
India Considers Decriminalizing Being Gay
India Considers Decriminalizing Being Gay
By On Top Magazine Staff Published: November 19, 2008
A verdict that could decriminalize being gay is expected before the end of the year by one of India’s high courts. Being gay is illegal in the world’s biggest democracy. India offers a harsh judgment for gays and lesbians – ten years to life in prison, longer than most rape or murder sentences. But a case before the New Delhi High Court seeks to reverse a holdover law instituted by the British in 1860. Many Indian leaders reject being gay on moral or religious grounds. Gay advocates, however, say India is ready for the change, arguing that the constitution is on their side. Seismic shifts in demographics may also help gay activists prevail. Three-quarters (75%) of the country’s 1.1 billion people are under 35 years-old. Many young Indians have become accustomed to the notion of gay acceptance while working for Western-based multinational companies that protect employees from discrimination based on sexual preference. This generation is more likely to embrace Western-style love marriages over India’s culture of arranged marriages. The United Nations is urging India to reverse the law and decriminalize being gay, saying it would help fight against HIV/AIDS. New infections of HIV in India among men who have sex with men continue to climb. The United Nations argues such laws hinder prevention efforts aimed at gay men. “Countries which protect men who have sex with men … have double the rate of coverage of HIV prevention services – as much as 60 percent,” Jeffrey O’Malley, director of the United Nations Development Program on HIV/AIDS, told AFP. “In China, male homosexuality has never been illegal. So there aren’t any of these legal barriers to HIV prevention work,” he said. “It’s easier to do this [prevention] work in China.” Naz India, along with the Alternative Law Forum, filed the lawsuit challenging section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, or the “Anti-sodomy law,” in December 2002. “There’s real hope that the growing freedom in love and in career mobility for new India’s young generation can start to dissolve boundaries for gay and lesbian Indians, too,” Arvind Narrain, an attorney with the Alternative Law Forum in Bangalore, told the Washington Post. http://www.ontopmag.com/article.aspx?id=2747&Category=24&MediaType=1
UN Calls For End To Israeli Blockade Of Gaza Strip
UN Calls For End To Israeli Blockade Of Gaza Strip
Wednesday, 19 November 2008, 10:45 am
http://www.scoop.co.nz/
18 November 2008 – The top United Nations human rights official
called today for an immediate end to the Israeli blockade of the
Gaza Strip, which she said contravened international law and had
deprived those living there of their most basic human rights for
months.
“By function of this blockade, 1.5 million Palestinian men, women
and children have been forcibly deprived of their most basic human
rights for months,” said Navi Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for
Human Rights. “This is in direct contravention of international
human rights and humanitarian law. It must end now,” she said.
Ms. Pillay called on the Israeli authorities to facilitate the
urgent passage of essential humanitarian goods into Gaza, including
food, medical supplies and fuel, to allow the immediate restoration
of electricity, water and other essential services, and to lift
restrictions on the movement of civilians for medical, educational
and religious purposes.
“Decisive steps must be taken to preserve the dignity and basic
welfare of the civilian population, more than half of which are
children,” she said.
Ms. Pillay welcomed the decision by Israel to allow a limited number
of trucks to enter Gaza on 17 November, but recalled its obligation
to refrain from all measures that contravene international law.
“Only a full lifting of the blockade followed by a strong
humanitarian response will be adequate to relieve the massive
humanitarian suffering evident in Gaza today,” she said.
The High Commissioner also appealed for a complete cessation of
Israeli air strikes and incursions, and of rocket fire by
Palestinian groups.
Israel bans foreign journalists from entering besieged Gaza
Israel bans foreign journalists from entering besieged Gaza
Cherrie Heywood, The Electronic Intifada, 18 November 2008
http://electronicintifada.net/
RAMALLAH, occupied West Bank (IPS) - Israel has imposed a virtual
news blackout on the Gaza Strip. For the last ten days no foreign
journalists have been able to enter the besieged territory to report
on the escalating humanitarian crisis caused by Israel’s complete
closure of Gaza’s borders for the last two weeks.
Steve Gutkin, the AP bureau chief in Jerusalem and head of Israel’s
Foreign Press Association, said that he personally “knows of no
foreign journalist that has been allowed into Gaza in the last week.”
Gutkin said that “while Israel has barred foreign press from
entering Gaza in the past, the length of the current ban makes it
unprecedented.” He added that he has received no “plausible or
acceptable” explanation for the ban from the Israeli government.
AP has relied on reports from two of its journalists who were able
to enter Gaza days before the closure began and are currently stuck
there.
A delegation of European Union parliamentarians was also prevented
from entering Gaza to assess the situation on the ground and to hold
talks with Hamas leaders. They subsequently broke the naval siege of
Gaza by entering the coast’s territorial waters from Cyprus by boat,
defying the Israeli navy.
During talks held with Hamas, the EU parliamentarians were able to
get a historic commitment from the Islamic organization to recognize
Israel’s “right to exist” within the internationally-recognized 1967
borders. Hamas further offered a long-term ceasefire in return for
Israel legitimizing Palestinian rights.
Israel also prevented twenty EU consul-generals from entering Gaza
on Thursday. On Sunday Israeli border police prevented 15 trucks
loaded with medication from entering the Gaza Strip.
EU commissioner for external relations and European neighborhood
policy, Bentita Ferrero-Waldner, has expressed strong
reservations. “I am profoundly concerned about the consequences for
the Gazan population of the complete closure of all Gaza crossings
for deliveries of fuel and basic humanitarian assistance,” Ferrero-
Waldner said in a statement Friday.
Karen AbuZayd, head of UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestine refugees,
added that it was unusual for Israel not to let basic food and
medicines in. “This has alarmed us more than usual because it’s
never been quite so long and so bad, and there has never been so
much negative response on what we need,” she said.
Israel closed the borders following a barrage of rockets fired by
Palestinian resistance fighters at Israeli towns bordering the Gaza
Strip. [sic – Israel military incursions preceded the rockets. The rockets are aimed at civilian populations rather than in military defence though. – JPLO]
The tit-for-tat violence began on 4 November when the Israeli army
launched a cross-border raid into Gaza, breaking a shaky five-month
ceasefire with Hamas. The purpose was ostensibly to destroy a tunnel
built by Palestinians allegedly to smuggle captured Israeli soldiers.
More than twenty Palestinians were killed in Israeli raids. Two
Israelis were lightly injured in the subsequent rocket attacks.
The timing of Israel’s breach of the ceasefire is curious in that
hundreds of these smuggling tunnels have existed ever since Hamas
took over the strip in June last year. They have been used to
smuggle everyday necessities as well as arms because the territory
is hermetically sealed by Israel.
John Ging, director of UNRWA in Gaza, who has lived there for the
past three years, questioned the alleged security reasoning behind
the closure. Since the ceasefire went into place this summer, Ging
said, fewer supplies have passed through the crossing than in the
beginning of 2006, when the western Negev in Israel suffered
incessant rocket fire from Gaza.
At that time the Palestinian Authority (PA), which is supported by
Israel and the United States, EU and several other states, was
ruling Gaza in a unity government with Hamas.
“Last week we were unable to feed 60,000 of Gaza’s neediest refugees
due to our warehouses running out of food. UNRWA supplies half of
Gaza’s population of 1.5 million people with emergency rations, and
20,000 people are fed per day when there are adequate supplies,”
Ging told IPS.
Seventy percent of Gaza experienced electricity blackouts after
Israel prevented deliveries of diesel fuel, forcing Gaza’s main
power plant to close down.
“The Israelis were only allowing 2.2 to 2.5 million liters of fuel
in per week prior to the closure, which was the minimum required to
operate the power plant. The plant has a capacity for 20 million
liters and this would last two months under normal circumstances and
tide over emergency periods. But this has all run out,” Ging said.
Kanan Ubeid, deputy chief of the Palestinian Energy Authority, said
at a press conference in Gaza that in addition to the shutdown of
the diesel-fueled power plant, the electric network bringing in
power from Israel collapsed due to increased pressure on the system.
Gazans also ran out of cooking gas while Gaza’s Coastal
Municipalities Water Utility (CMWU) was forced to pump tons of
untreated sewage into the ocean due to fuel shortages and the lack
of spare parts for equipment in need of repairs and new parts.
Much of this will flow back into Gaza’s underground water table, and
the threat of contaminated drinking water spreading diseases has
increased.
Meanwhile, the emergency and ambulance services director-general,
Muawiyya Hassanein, says Gaza’s health ministry is short of more
than 300 types of necessary medication.
Sammy Hassan, a spokesman from Gaza city’s main Shifa hospital said
only urgent surgery was being carried out. “We have delayed all non-
urgent surgery as our small generator has stopped working, as we
can’t import a vital spare part.
“We are down to 30,000 liters of fuel left to run the larger
generator which is used when electricity is cut. Under the current
circumstances with no electricity we require 10,000 liters per day,”
Hassan told IPS.
Philip Luther, deputy director of Amnesty International’s Middle
East program, said that Israel’s latest tightening of the blockade
had “made an already dire humanitarian situation markedly worse.
This is nothing short of collective punishment on Gaza’s civilian
population, and it must stop immediately.”
Following international pressure and protests from the EU, Israel
allowed thirty trucks of humanitarian aid to enter the strip
Monday. “It will last a matter of days,” said UNRWA spokesman
Christopher Gunness. “But then what?”
Oxfam’s spokesman in Jerusalem Michael Bailey, who coordinates a
number of humanitarian projects in Gaza, said this response was
entirely inadequate.
“Thirty trucks of aid after a closure of ten days is insufficient.
What we need is a complete revision of the embargo on Gaza. Dialogue
with the relevant political leaders is the only way forward,” Bailey
told IPS.
“Both Israel and Gaza’s other neighbors need to put the human rights
and essential needs of Gazans above all considerations if there is
to be a way out of this quagmire.”
._,___
Chronic Malnutrition in Gaza Blamed on Israel
Chronic Malnutrition in Gaza Blamed on Israel
http://www.
Donald Macintyre reveals the contents of an explosive report by the
Red Cross on a humanitarian tragedy
By Donald Macintyre
November 17, 2008 “The Independent” — - November 13, 2008 - - The
Israeli blockade of Gaza has led to a steady rise in chronic
malnutrition among the 1.5 million people living in the strip,
according to a leaked report from the Red Cross.
It chronicles the “devastating” effect of the siege that Israel
imposed after Hamas seized control in June 2007 and notes that the
dramatic fall in living standards has triggered a shift in diet that
will damage the long-term health of those living in Gaza and has led
to alarming deficiencies in iron, vitamin A and vitamin D.
The 46-page report from the International Committee of the Red
Cross – seen by The Independent – is the most authoritative yet on
the impact that Israel’s closure of crossings to commercial goods
has had on Gazan families and their diets.
The report says the heavy restrictions on all major sectors of
Gaza’s economy, compounded by a cost of living increase of at least
40 per cent, is causing “progressive deterioration in food security
for up to 70 per cent of Gaza’s population”. That in turn is forcing
people to cut household expenditures down to “survival levels”.
“Chronic malnutrition is on a steadily rising trend and
micronutrient deficiencies are of great concern,” it said.
Since last year, the report found, there had been a switch to “low
cost/high energy” cereals, sugar and oil, away from higher-cost
animal products and fresh fruit and vegetables. Such a
shift “increases exposure to micronutrient deficiencies which in
turn will affect their health and wellbeing in the long term.”
Israel has often said that it will not allow a humanitarian crisis
to develop in Gaza and the report says that the groups surveyed
had “accessed their annual nutritional energy needs”. But it warned
governments, including Israel’s, that “food insecurity and
undernutrition, including micronutrient deficiencies” were occurring
in the absence of “overt food shortages”.
A 2001 Food and Agriculture Organisation definition classifies “food
security” as when “all people, at all times, have physical, social
and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that
meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and
healthy life.”
The Red Cross report says that “the embargo has had a devastating
effect for a large proportion of households who have had to make
major changes on the composition of their food basket.” Households
were now obtaining 80 per cent of their calories from cereals, sugar
and oil. “The actual food basket is considered to be insufficient
from a nutritional perspective.” The report paints a bleak picture
of an increasingly impoverished and indebted lower-income
population. People are selling assets, slashing the quality and
quantity of meals, cutting back on clothing and children’s
education, scavenging for discarded materials – and even grass for
animal fodder – that they can sell and are depending on dwindling
loans and handouts from slightly better-off relatives.
In the urban sector, in which about 106,000 employees lost their
jobs after the June 2007 shutdown, about 40 per cent are now
classified as “very poor”, earning less than 500 shekels (£87) a
month to provide for an average household of seven to nine people.
The report quotes a former owner of a small, home-based sewing
factory, who said he had laid off his 10 workers in July
2007. “Since then I earn no more than 300 shekels per month by
sewing from time to time neighbours’ and relatives’ clothes. I sold
my wife’s jewellery and my brother is transferring 250 shekels every
month … I do not really know what to say to my children.” Others
said they were not able to give their children pocket money.
In agriculture, on which 27 percent of Gaza’s population depends,
exports are at a halt and, like fisheries, the sector has seen a 50
per cent fall in incomes since the siege began. Among the two-fifths
classified as “very poor”, average per capita spending is down to
50p a day. In the fisheries sector, which has been hit by fuel
shortages and narrow, Israeli-imposed fishing limits, “People’s
coping mechanisms are very limited and those households that still
have jewellery and even non-essential appliances sell them”.
The report says that if the Israeli-imposed embargo is
maintained, “economic disintegration will continue and wider
segments of the Gaza population will become food insecure”.
Arguing that the removal of restrictions on trade “can reverse the
trend of impoverishment”, the Red Cross warns that “the prolongation
of the restrictions risks permanently damaging households’ capacity
to recover and undermines their ability to attain food security in
the long term.”
The detailed Gaza fieldwork for the report was carried out between
May and July. An International Monetary Fund report confirmed in
late September that the Gaza economy “continued to weaken”.
Mark Regev, the spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert,
said that, contrary to hopes when Israel pulled out of Gaza, the
Gazan people were being “held hostage” to Hamas’s “extremist and
nihilist” ideology which was causing undoubted suffering. If Hamas
focused resources on the “diet of the people” instead of on “Qassam
rockets and violent jihadism” then “this sort of problem would not
exist”, he said.
Today in Palestine! ~ Headlines November 18, 2008 ~
November 19, 2008Today in Palestine! ~ Headlines November 18, 2008 ~
Report: Israel demolished 90 Palestinian houses since Annapolis The applied research institute of Jerusalem (ARIJ) reported that Israel, since the Annapolis conference, has demolished 90 Palestinian houses at the pretext of illegal construction.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Negev Bedouin mosque facing imminent demolition by Israeli government
The Israeli government is planning to demolish a recently built environmentally-sustainable Bedouin mosque in the Negev desert in the coming days. The Israeli Ministry of the Interior delivered the demolition order for the mud and straw bale structure in the village of Wadi Al-Na’am on Monday. A stop-construction order was issued in August.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
East Jerusalem home demolished; Israel to build new road in its place
Israeli forces demolished the home of Jamal Dahoud Abu Sneineh in the Al-Isawiya neighborhood of East Jerusalem on Tuesday.
Troops of Israeli police and military border guards descended on the area in the early afternoon and closed off the streets. A number of armed guards entered the home and threatened the Abu Sneineh family at gunpoint to leave the home or they would be shot.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Israeli tanks move into Gaza, level farmland
AP - Israeli tanks forged into the southern Gaza Strip on Tuesday, drawing mortar fire from Palestinian militants and intensifying violence that has chipped away at a tenuous cease-fire.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/
Israeli Authorities Order Evacuation of al-Kurd Family from Protest Tent in East Jerusalem
The al-Kurd family, who were evacuated from their home in East Jerusalem on 9 November erected a protest tent on their neighbor’s land. Israeli authorities have ordered the al-Kurd family to evacuate the protest tent in which they have been residing since being evacuated from their home (occupation-watch/occupation-
http://www.alternativenews.
IDF officials: Settlers unlikely to quit Hebron home unless forced
Settlers have three days to evacuate a disputed building in the West Bank town of Hebron, the High Court ruled Sunday. IDF officials predicted, however that settlers would not voluntarily vacate within the designated time and that forced would most likely be used to implement the evacuation.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
ISRAEL EXECUTES FOUR IN GAZA; SIEGE AFFECTS ACCESS TO DRINKING WATER
The Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) continued to seal off the Gaza Strip for the eleventh day in a row, in an escalation of the collective punishment of Gaza’s population imposed since 2000. The IOF resumed its military attacks and killed four Palestinians this morning
in an air strike in east Gaza.
http://electronicintifada.net/
Israeli military invades Rafah city in southern Gaza
Israeli military bulldozers, backed by armored vehicles, swept early on Tuesday morning into the eastern borders of Rafah city in southern Gaza Strip.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
IOF Arrests 8 Citizens in West Bank
Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) Arrested, Monday, eight Palestinian citizens, from the West Bank cities of Nablus, Jenin and Hebron. Israeli special units attacked the Old City of Nablus and arrested Mohamed abu shaweesh.
http://english.wafa.ps/?
Israeli military detains scores of Palestinians from the various West Bank areas
The Israeli military detained on Tuesday 32 Palestinian residents from different parts of the occupied West Bank, media sources and witnesses reported.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
In night of mass arrests Israeli forces detain at least 30 across West Bank
Israeli forces launched a wide-scale arrest campaign against Palestinian youth in the West Bank before sunrise on Tuesday. More than 30 individuals were taken, mostly from the Al-Fawwar refugee camp south of Hebron in the southern West Bank, and mostly men under thirty.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
ISM: Israeli Navy kidnapped 14 Palestinians, 3 Internationals in Gaza Strip
The International Solidarity Movement, (ISM) issued a press release in which it indicated that the Israeli naval vessels have kidnapped 14 Palestinian fishermen and 3 international peace activists from the Gaza shore Tuesday morning.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Israeli marine arrests int’l activists, Palestinian fishermen in Gaza waters
Israeli naval forces on Tuesday held 15 Palestinian fishermen and three international activists offshore to the west of Gaza Strip, Palestinian sources said. The three campaigners, Andrew Muncie from Scotland, Vittorio Arrigoni from Italy and Dalin Gulack from the United States, are members of the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), according to the sources. Fedaa Qastal, ISM coordinator in Gaza, confirmed that the Israeli gunboats intercepted the Palestinian fishing boats at 7 mile offshore and ordered the boats’ engines to turn off before arresting the campaigners and the fishermen.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/
Christian Peace Keeping Team-Hebron
Israeli settlers attack Palestinian shepherds and international accompaniers with large rocks. They manage to steal a donkey and stab it to death.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
Hamas: Egypt detained nine Palestinian patients
Egyptian security forces detailed nine Palestinian patients on Monday who traveled to Cairo for treatment, taking them to an unknown location, Hamas-affiliated media reported. According to Hamas’ Al-Aqsa satellite channel, Egyptian forces arrested the patients during a raid. A Three-year-old girl is reportedly among the detainees.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Families of Gaza patients: Egypt besieges Gaza for the third year in a row
The family committee of Gaza patients stated Sunday that Egypt along with Israel besieges the Gaza Strip for the third consecutive year and bar the patients from receiving medical treatment abroad.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Collaborator in Gaza sentenced to 15 years in prison
A suspected collaborator in the Gaza Strip was sentenced to 15 years in prison by the de facto government’s Court of First Instance.
According to the court decision, 12 years were given for “contacting security affiliated to a foreign entity” and 3 years for “weakening resistance morale.”
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Israeli Tanks Move Into Gaza Strip
Palestinian witnesses say Israeli tanks have moved into the Gaza Strip, further threatening a fragile cease-fire Israel signed with Hamas militants in June. The witnesses say the tanks leveled lands Tuesday along the southern Gaza border east of the city of Rafah.
http://voanews.com/english/
Olmert orders plans drawn up for massive offensive against Gaza
Interim Israeli Premier Ehud Olmert accused Hamas on Sunday of “shattering” the Gaza truce after two rockets hit Israel, which the Jewish state followed with an air strike that killed four Palestinian resistance fighters. However, Olmert, who made the comments at a weekly Israeli Cabinet meeting, did not mention the initial Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip on November 5 that killed seven Hamas members.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/
Hamas: Abbas-Olmert meeting, a mockery
Fawzi Barhoum, spokesperson of the Hamas movement, slammed the meeting which took place on Monday between the Palestinian President, Mahmoud Abbas, and Israel’s Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert, and described the meeting as a mockery and a cover-up to the Israeli crimes against the Palestinian people.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Abbas’ absence from Cairo meeting, political arrests caused Hamas to boycott talks
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ refusal to participate in meetings at the aborted Cairo Palestinian reconciliation meeting contributed to Hamas’ decision to boycott the summit, informed sources told Ma’an. This revelation is contributing to an emerging picture of Hamas’ reasons for withdrawing from the meeting, which contributed to its premature collapse.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Abbas: No partial agreements with Israel
President Mahmoud Abbas reiterated his rejection of any peace agreement that does not settle the core issues, including Jerusalem, refugees, and borders, in his negotiations with Israel. During a press conference in Ramallah with British Foreign Secretary David Miliband, Abbas said that he would not settle for half measures. He said the issues of water and security would also have to be settled, along with the release of Palestinian prisoners.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Caretaker government lashes out at Hamas
The West Bank-based Palestinian government accused the rival Hamas movement of resisting newly deployed Palestinian security forces on Monday. Riad Al-Maliki, the spokesperson of the Fatah-dominated government said that a current security campaign in the West Bank is nonetheless “going well.” “All the threats by Hamas to control the West Bank are worthless threats,” said Al-Maliki.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
What is Mahmoud Abbas waiting for?
It appears clear to all but the Palestinian president that resistance, not supine collaboration, is the only strategic option, writes Ghada Karmi* With the appalling death toll in Gaza, relentless assaults on the West Bank (in which negotiations chief Ahmed Qurei’s own bodyguard was killed), and Israel’s blatant settlement expansion, one must wonder what Israeli atrocity, if any, would make the Palestinian president change course. True, last week he raised with his colleagues the possibility of suspending peace talks with Israel if it persisted in its assaults, but he has not acted. Why not?
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/
The PA is cheating the Palestinian people
With fanfare, fireworks, military parades and a lot of rhetorical overindulgence, the American-backed Palestinian Authority of Mahmoud Abbas has been celebrating “Independence Day.”
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Is Israel Deliberately Strengthening Hamas?
The extraordinary conditions of the extreme siege and the disconnection between Gaza and the West Bank (another intentional Israeli policy) have made the possibility of holding new Palestinian general elections a very distant one. Hamas can thus bolster its rule with coercion, wages, charity and the consoling power of religion. And perhaps that is exactly what the Shin Bet, Israel Defense Forces and government want?
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Abbas said to ask Olmert to free Barghouti as goodwill gesture
Ramallah-based paper Al-Ayyam reported Tuesday that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas asked outgoing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Monday to release Fatah militant leader Marwan Barghouti a goodwill gesture.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
“Half truce” the latest in regional lexicon - By Nasser Lahham
Israeli television’s Channel Two described the relationship between Gaza and Israel as one of a “half truce.” This is a new term in the regional dictionary, with a complicated definition and characteristic argument over which half is the truce, and what the other half consists of. Putting a name to the phenomena was Israeli political analyst Audi Segal who summed up his thoughts on the Israeli cabinet’s refusal to take military action in Gaza by explaining, “there is a half truce that Israel does not want to spiral up into a military operation in the Gaza Strip at this time … [however] it does not want to keep silent as the firing of homemade shells by the Palestinian resistance factions in Gaza continues.”
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Top Obama aide denies report president-elect will back Arab peace plan
The Times cited a senior adviser who quoted Obama as telling Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas: “The Israelis would be crazy not to accept this initiative. It would give them peace with the Muslim world from Indonesia to Morocco.”
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Israel renews blockade of Gaza crossings
Israel resealed border crossings with the Gaza Strip on Tuesday citing continued rocket fire at its towns, despite warnings from world aid groups of looming shortages of food and fuel supplies in the coastal territory. Israel had allowed 33 truckloads of supplies into Gaza for the first time in two weeks on Monday, and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas he would not permit a humanitarian crisis to develop there.
http://www.alertnet.org/
Gaza Expecting The Worst
Last Friday, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called on the Israeli government to keep in mind its legal responsibility to deliver urgent and steady supply of sufficient fuel and humanitarian aid to Gaza Strip. The Israelis have blocked fuel delivery and turned away trucks with food distributed by UNRWA. Ban Ki-moon said in a statement that he is deeply concerned about the deterioration of the humanitarian situation in Gaza and the risk of a possible humanitarian disaster.
http://palestinechronicle.com/
Israel lets “few days” of food supplies into Gaza; UN: “but then what?”
Delivery of an unspecified number of aid and food trucks to UNRWA and Gaza Strip commercial dealers was confirmed on Monday after Israel threatened to withhold the supplies “depending” on the actions of resistance groups, who launched projectiles at the Negev Monday afternoon. Thirty-three trucks filled with frozen meat, dairy products, medicines and UNRWA food aid waited at the Gaza border since Sunday, when they were turned back on the orders of Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Siege up close: desperate father declares hunger strike “until something changes”
Fatima Ayaad is five-years-old, she lives in the Zaitoun neighborhood of Gaza city and on Saturday she asked her mother what chicken tasted like, because she had forgotten. Fatima has eleven brothers and sisters; her father Jumaa has been unemployed since the first Intifadah in 1987. He wanders the streets of Gaza City night and day looking for work, odd jobs, anything to put food in front of his family.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Humanitarian aid boosts troubled Gaza truce
Israel’s decision to allow a limited supply of aid into the Gaza Strip may strengthen the fragile ceasefire.
http://www.thenational.ae/
Supplies will soon run out
Food distribution to half the Gaza Strip’s 1.5 million population resumed amid UN warnings that supplies will run out.
http://www.thenational.ae/
Gaza will run out of wheat Thursday; handful of mills working to process remaining grain
Flour mills in Gaza will shut down on Thursday because there is no more wheat in the Strip with which to make flower. Gaza has experienced wheat shortages since June 2007, said Fattouh, but said shipments of wheat were totally stopped two weeks ago. He said that there was a signed agreement with Israel to allow 450 tons of wheat daily into the Strip. For most of the siege there were 300 tons a day shipped into the area. “No ton is shipped now,” Fattouh lamented.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Day in Photos: Gaza Strip
A Palestinian smuggler climbs a tunnel in Rafah in the Gaza Strip, near the border with Egypt. Hoses that run through the tunnel are used to transport fuel from Egypt into Gaza. Israel and Palestinian militants in Gaza have been engaged in fighting for the last two weeks, and Israel has closed the territory’s border crossings, halting shipments of food, fuel and other basic supplies. (Khalil Hamra / Associated Press)
http://www.latimes.com/la-
Palestinian PM: Construction in settlements will destroy the peace process
Palestinian Prime Minister and Finance Minister Salam Fayyad called on the international community to up the pressure on Israel to suspend all construction in the settlements and implied that the Palestinian Authority could apply to the International Court of Justice in this regard, adopting the example of the separation fence.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Livni: “Settlements issue, over exaggerated”
During her meeting with the British Foreign Minister, David Miliband, Israeli Foreign Minister, Tzipi Linvi, claimed that the issue of settlements in the occupied territories is “an over exaggerated thing” and demanded the UK to lift the restrictions on importing products manufactured in Israeli settlements, in addition to voiding arrest warrants against a number of Israeli military officials.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Gaza media blackout an unprecedented violation of press freedom, say journalists
Israel has continued to bar international journalists from the besieged Gaza Strip for at least a week in what media condemned on Monday as an unprecedented violation of press freedom. Steve Gutkin, the AP bureau chief in Jerusalem and the head of the Foreign Press Association told Ma’an that he knows of no foreign journalist that has been allowed into Gaza in the last week.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Putting a final end to the Israeli soldiers’ arbitrary humiliations on our people
Ramallah, 18-11-08: Dr. Mustafa Barghouthi MP, the Secretary General of the Palestinian National Initiative, strongly condemns the public humiliation carried out by the Israeli army on a Palestinian youth this Tuesday. The young man was arrested and stripped publicly at Beit Iba checkpoint, West of the city of Nablus. Dozens of soldiers surrounded the boy and searched him, while he was standing naked in the eye of the crowd. The Israeli army claimed he was in possession of explosive devices.
http://www.palestinemonitor.
Dershowitz: I helped keep Carter silent
Why didn’t Jimmy Carter speak from the podium at the Democratic National Convention? Alan Dershowitz said he had something to do with it. In an interview with Shalom TV, the Harvard Law School professor says he “pushed” Barack Obama “very hard to make that decision,” Dershowitz said in an interview with Shalom TV. “Barack Obama had to make a choice between his Jewish supporters and his anti-Israel supporters like Jimmy Carter, and he did not choose Jimmy Carter. And that was an embarrassment for Jimmy Carter and a show of disrespect.” “It was a good decision, a wise decision, a moral decision,” Dershowitz added.
http://blogs.jta.org/politics/
President Obama and the Prospects for Israeli-Palestinian Peace: An Analysis
President-elect Barack Obama’s election victory has revived hopes that stalled Palestinian-Israeli peace negotiations could finally lead to a two-state solution. Few new presidents have been greeted with such optimism and associated high expectations. However, the chances for progress depend on more than a new American president. There are several interrelated factors: U.S. engagement, the availability of a viable peace agreement, Israeli and Palestinian internal politics and the broader international situation.
http://zcommunications.org/
FEATURE-Israelis and Palestinians find peace on the playground
Israeli and Palestinian youngsters are finding some common ground on a school playground. Basketball games, hosted in Jerusalem by Hand in Hand, one of the few Israeli public schools where Jews and Arabs study together, are giving youths aged 10 to 16 a chance to try to bridge a wide political and religious divide.
http://www.alertnet.org/
Open Appeal to Australian Prime Minister: Help Gaza
I am writing to you about the situation in Gaza and the urgent need for the world community – including Australia – to require Israel to relieve the immediate humanitarian crisis. It may be objected that Gazans are, in some way, to blame for their own appalling plight. That is false for several reasons.
http://palestinechronicle.com/
Choice for Obama lies on the road to Jerusalem
The challenge for a US president rests in separating the urgent from the important. I once heard an official in George W. Bush’s National Security Council describe the dilemma. Such is the pressure of events, he observed, that for the White House, the long term usually means “later this afternoon”. Most presidents wind up imprisoned by the immediate.
http://www.gulfnews.com/
Family’s eviction draws global outrage
The middle-of-the-night eviction last week of an elderly Palestinian couple from their home in East Jerusalem to make way for Jewish settlers is a demonstration of Israeli intent towards a future peace deal with the Palestinians. Mohammed and Fawziya Khurd are now on the street, living in a tent, after Israeli police enforced a court order issued in July to expel them.
http://www.thenational.ae/
No man’s land: Iraqi-Palestinians in Al Tanf camp
Mon, 11/17/2008 - 18:20 - Al Tanf camp for Palestinian refugees from Iraq has to be in the top five of worst situated refugee camps in the world. It violates every principle of proper camp siting. In the no man’s land between Syria and Iraq, it is within the border zone itself. It is completely exposed on one side to a highway, where trucks alternately speed by or sit idle for hours at a time waiting to make the border crossing. A 20-foot high concrete wall forms a second boundary. The site itself is in a culvert about 10 feet below the highway, making it a flood plain when it rains heavily. Refugees live in tents in the exposed area, forced to endure summer temperatures that climb well over 100 degrees and winter weather that drops near zero. Last winter, tents collapsed under a heavy snow fall.
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/
Two thousand angry protesters cut electricity and build road blocks at Beit Fajjar Stone Factory
Two thousand workers in the Beit Fajjar Stone factories staged aggressive strike action south of Bethlehem on Saturday and 1,000 participated Sunday, calling for better wages and regular pay, as well as strict adherence to the Palestinian Labor Law. Workers erected barriers around the factories, preventing trucks from delivering supplies or exporting stone products. Large numbers of strikers were posted around the several compounds to prevent the use of alternative entry or exit points. Some said the electricity in some factories was also cut off.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Lloyds TSB Tells IBB to Ceases Dealings with Interpal
No reason at all is given for this draconian and punitive measure, taken without any consideration for the thousands of contributors who have placed their faith in us to assist the needy of Palestine – and who want to continue to do so.” Hewitt added that “it will be an administrative nightmare to transfer the thousands of standing orders that we have, etc. By acting in this way, Lloyds TSB has treated IBB with contempt. Their action sends a signal to other Muslim charities – as well as the bank’s 50,000 Muslim account holders – that their accounts can be closed down without warning or explanation at any time. It is, at the very least, an example of the utter lack of respect faced by the Muslim community from some hostile quarters in this country.”
http://almanar.com.lb/
Worried West Bank settlers try wine and a bus tour
Israel’s West Bank settlers have been ratcheting up their violence, defying their own government and flouting international public opinion. But on Monday a settler group tried another tack — wooing foreign journalists with a bus tour featuring a glass of merlot and a visit to a home overlooking the site where the biblical Israelites housed Moses’ stone tablets.
http://www.google.com/
Israel wants more Palestinians to join army
The Israeli government has begun to actively promote voluntary army service for Palestinian-Israelis. The Knesset, the Israeli Parliament, is meanwhile considering plans to make civil service compulsory for all Israeli citizens, including Palestinian-Israelis. The Palestinian community in Israel - the remnants of the indigenous population who were not ousted or fled from their land in the face of a Jewish terror campaign that preceded the creation of Israel - is opposing the plans. Leaders say the proposals are only a way of getting rid of Palestinian identity.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/
How did IDF gain control over half of the country?
Some countries have an army, and some armies, like the Israel Defense Forces,have a country. According to a recent study on the defense establishment and land in Israel, various defense bodies lord over half the land. The army tops the list, but they all largely do as they please with respect to planning and development. The result is that while the rest of the country adopts orderly processes, starting from national and regional master plans, much of the state land remains managed separately. The existence of this kingdom may be essential, but its size and management methods have yet to face serious public scrutiny.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
Turkey donates 15 fully equipped ambulances to Palestinians
Turkey has donated 15 fully equipped ambulances to the Palestinians on Tuesday, the semi-official Anatolia news agency reported.
The ambulances, which are worth approximately 1 million U.S. dollars, have been presented to the Palestinian Health Ministry in Ramallah by the Turkish International Cooperation Agency (TIKA), said the report.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/
Free Gaza to Aid Agencies: “Deliver it by Sea?”
The Free Gaza Movement today issued this open letter to all organizations delivering humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip. Israel’s closure of its land borders with Gaza, and Egypt’s submission to Israeli pressure to close the Rafah border is a humanitarian disaster for 1.5 million Palestinians. The United Nations announced last Thursday that inside Gaza it had run out of the food essentials to supply 750,000 desperately needy citizens. “This has become a blockade against the United Nations itself,” a spokesman said.
http://www.freegaza.org/index.
UN SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY MEMBER COMPANY TIED TO SETTLEMENTS
UNITED NATIONS (IPS) - A company that is a member of the UN Global Compact for corporate social responsibility has ties to production in an Israeli settlement on the West Bank considered illegal by the United Nations. A spokesperson for the company, Vileda said he was unaware of the contract with a manufacturer in the West Bank. However, a representative of Plasto confirmed that the
company was a subcontractor for Vileda.
http://electronicintifada.net/
GROUPS PROTEST SETTLEMENT FUNDRAISER AT NEW YORK HOTEL
Eight groups representing tens of thousands of people in the United States, Palestine and Israel have called on the Marriott Marquis hotel in Manhattan to cancel the 17 November dinner for the Brooklyn-based Hebron Fund aiming to raise money for Israeli settlers in the Israeli-occupied West Bank city of Hebron. In a 7 November letter the groups stated: “The Marriot Marquis will be facilitating activities that directly violate international law and US foreign policy, actively promote racial discrimination, and, at least indirectly, support brutal Israeli settler attacks on Palestinian civilians and the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from Hebron.”
http://electronicintifada.net/
Norwegian groups demand apology for government cooperation seminar with Israeli partners
Norwegian civil society groups were outraged that their government went ahead with a seminar on trade and research aimed at enhancing Norwegian cooperation with Israel. The seminar was held on 3 November and hosted by State Secretary of the Norwegian Foreign Ministry Raymond Johansen in Oslo amidst protests from The Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee (BNC), the Socialist Youth League of Norway and several Norwegian unions.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Trade fair to showcase handicrafts of UNRWA’s cash-for-work beneficiaries in Jenin, West Bank
East Jerusalem, 17 November 2008 - Under the auspices of the Jenin Governorate and Municipality – and in cooperation with UNRWA’s Cash-for-Work Project – the Refugee Affairs Committee will be holding a Palestinian handicrafts fair on 18 – 20 November 2008 in Jenin.
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/
“Occupied Space 2008″ adds Palestinian color to London’s art world
Using what they call the “simplest language,” the Eltiqa Group for Contemporary Art seeks to challenge the harsh obstacles of life in their native Gaza: “we color life for the others.” In the past month some of their work has reached London as part of a new exhibition organized by the UK Palestine Solidarity Campaign in association with the A.M. Qattan Foundation. Occupied Space 2008: Art for Palestine brought together over 100 works not only from Palestinian artists, but from those across the globe from Algeria, Tunisia and Jordan to the UK to China. Isabelle Humphries reviews for The Electronic Intifada.
http://electronicintifada.net/
Disinvestment From West Bank Settlements Gains Momentum
JERUSALEM — In an endeavor to breathe some life back into the moribund Israeli-Palestinian conflict the British government is taking steps to encourage disinvestment from illegal Israeli settlements in the Palestinian West Bank by labeling all produce manufactured and produced by settlers.
http://www.metimes.com/
momentum/6762/
Movie Review: Waltz With Bashir
Waltz With Bashir is a breath-taking new Israeli film, an animated documentary directed by Ari Folman. In 1982 (First Lebanon War), Folman was a 19-year-old IDF infantry soldier. Twenty-four years later, in 2006, Folman is surprised to find out that he does not remember a thing from that war or the massacres in Sabra and Shatila. The film is a journey into Folman’s lost past.
http://palestinechronicle.com/
Palestinan film wins silver at 14th Cairo Arab Media Festival
The Palestinian film Kaffa! won silver this week at the Fourteenth annual Cairo Festival for Arab Media in the category of short film, in a pool of 33 films. Kaffa!, which means “enough” in Arabic, was produced by the Ma’an TV Network in 2008 and tells the story of internal political division through the lens of a Palestinian family whose sons are affiliated with different political factions. The tragic-comic film calls to action all sides and begs for an effort to heal the rift between brothers.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Arab culture conference highlights importance of advancing Arabic language
Arab culture ministers issued a statement on advancing the Arabic language at the end of their two-day conference here Monday, Syria’s official SANA news agency reported. In the Damascus Statement for the Advancement of the Arabic Language for Moving towards Knowledge Society, the ministers affirmed that the Arabic language and Arab culture are the basis of cultural unity and national identity.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/
An Unforgettable Moment
When I told this to Anwar Sadat, he laughed: “The moment the door of your airplane opened, all Israelis held their breath. I live on a main street in Tel-Aviv, and at that moment I looked out at the street below. It was totally empty. Nothing moved, except one cat which was probably hurrying home to the television.”
http://palestinechronicle.com/
West Bank Looting
For a thousand years the ruins of Khirbet Tawas, a Byzantine jewel crowning a gentle slope planted in olive trees, stood southwest of Hebron. Graceful rows of columns stretched the length of the basilica, watching over the church’s ornate mosaic floor. Then, in 2000, the second intifada struck with the force of an earthquake. As Palestinians fought Israeli troops, the West Bank became all but ungovernable. Soon the Israelis set up a web of security checkpoints, sealed off the region, and barred most Palestinians from working inside Israel. Jobless men looked for cash wherever they could find it. Armed with shovels, a small band descended on Khirbet Tawas.
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.
Rights groups slam Katsav’s new office
After state grants former president luxury office, women’s groups launch letter to Finance Ministry asking why it had altered its decision to supply suspected sex offender with modest means. ‘This constitutes contempt for complainants,’ letter says.
http://www.ynetnews.com/
UK: Every school to get Holocaust specialist under anti-racism initiative
Every secondary school is to get a Holocaust specialist to ensure that the subject is taught comprehensively and sensitively.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/
Monday: 18 Iraqis Killed, 45 Wounded
At least 18 Iraqis were killed and another 45 were wounded in the latest attacks. Another seven people were injured during an explosion blamed on a defective pipeline. No Coalition deaths were reported. Meanwhile, the Iraqi parliament began debate on a U.S.-Iraqi security agreement, raising hope that a vote on the pact will take place on Nov. 24. The agreement will, among other things, allow U.S. troops to remain in Iraq for three more years.
http://www.antiwar.com/
Bomber Kills 15 In Iraq
A suicide car bomber yesterday killed 15 people, including seven policemen, and wounded 20 in Iraq’s volatile northern Diyala province.
http://www.nypost.com/seven/
Dabbagh: Iraq gov’t endorsed two pacts
The Iraqi government says the cabinet has approved two agreements with the United States not just one pact as many people presume.
http://www.presstv.ir/Detail.
Why Did the Iraqi Cabinet Approve SOFA Now? (Two Hints: Obama and Iran)
The election of Barack Obama changed Iran’s calculus, and so Iran decided, very subtly, to shift to neutral on the pact. As a result, many politicians in Iraq who are either influenced by Iran or who are outright Iranian agents now support the pact.
http://www.alternet.org/
hints:_obama_and_iran%29/
Iraqis believe security pact to cause division
IRAQ / Aswat al-Iraq: Ismail al-Difaai, an Iraqi citizen, believes that the cabinet’s approval of the security agreement draft with the U.S. will cause division among Iraqi political parties. “Signing the agreement will lead to a division between all political blocs and parties,” al-Difaai, 49 from Sadr City, told Aswat al-Iraq.
http://en.aswataliraq.info/?p=
Observations on the security agreement
http://arablinks.blogspot.com/
Sadr Denounces Pact with US Occupier as Disgrace
Iraqi cleric Sayyed Moqtada al-Sadr said Monday that the Iraqi government’s approval of the controversial Iraq-US military pact that seeks to organize the US occupation presence constituted “the first signs of disgrace and dishonor,” calling on the Iraqi parliament to reject it “without hesitation.”
http://almanar.com.lb/
Militias lack strength to mount Iraq uprising: US commander
AFP - Iranian-backed “special groups” lack the strength to mount an uprising in Baghdad’s predominantly Shiite Sadr City district, having suffered heavy losses, a US brigade commander said Monday.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/
Iraqi cleric repeats concerns on US-Iraq pact
AP - Iraq’s top Shiite cleric said Tuesday that the U.S.-Iraqi security pact would only be viable if the country’s main political groups backed it and it restored the country’s full sovereignty.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/
Premier of Iraq Is Quietly Firing Fraud Monitors
The government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki is systematically dismissing Iraqi oversight officials, who were installed to fight corruption in Iraqi ministries by order of the American occupation administration, which had hoped to bring Western standards of accountability to the notoriously opaque and graft-ridden bureaucracy here.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/
Iraq says 300 officials charged with corruption
Iraq has charged more than 300 officials with corruption this year and courts handed down 86 convictions, its corruption watchdog said on Tuesday, as a nation awash in oil money fought back against graft. Iraq is perceived as being the world’s third most corrupt country, with only failed state Somalia and Myanmar’s military junta below it, according to the Transparency International index measuring perceptions of graft in 180 nations.
http://www.alertnet.org/
Mask Ban Upsets Iraqis Hired as U.S. Interpreters
The U.S. military has barred Iraqi interpreters working with American troops in Baghdad from wearing ski masks to disguise themselves, prompting some to resign and others to bare their faces even though they fear it could get them killed.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/
Top judge: US and UK acted as ‘vigilantes’ in Iraq invasion
One of Britain’s most authoritative judicial figures last night delivered a blistering attack on the invasion of Iraq, describing it as a serious violation of international law, and accusing Britain and the US of acting like a “world vigilante”. Lord Bingham, in his first major speech since retiring as the senior law lord, rejected the then attorney general’s defence of the 2003 invasion as fundamentally flawed.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
Al-Qaeda ‘awakens’ in Iraq
The policy of al-Qaeda in Iraq in its fight against Awakening Councils in Sunni tribal areas has been to assassinate the movement’s leaders. Al-Qaeda has now set its sights on recruiting council youths disenchanted by the Iraqi government’s attempts to integrate them into the regular security forces.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/
THE ROVING EYE A pact with the devil
WASHINGTON - The big bang is not that Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s majority Shi’ite/Kurdish 37-member cabinet in Baghdad has approved the draft of a security pact with the George W Bush (and Barack Obama) administrations allowing the US military to stay in Iraq for three more years; it’s that the 30-strong Sadrist bloc will move heaven and Earth - including massive nationwide protests - to bloc the pact in the Iraqi National Assembly.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/
Iraqi voices
Views on the recently struck deal on US troops.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-
Pact, Approved in Iraq, Sets Time for U.S. Pullout
Iraq also obtained a significant degree of jurisdiction in some cases over serious crimes committed by Americans who are off duty and not on bases.” *Note posted on Angry Arab by Nir Rosen: “This is a scam. It’s not Vietnam where they go to bars and brothels. Americans dont go off bases in Iraq when they are off duty. So there will never be a case of an American soldier or Marine committing a crime off duty, they are always on duty, but it allows the Iraqis to claim a small victory”.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/
All aboard the Baghdad Metro
The Iraqi capital’s first commuter train is slow but steady through streets often tied up by checkpoints and bombings. Just beware the crossing cars, stone-throwing youths and meandering cows. Don’t be put off by the sign, which reads “Cent al B ghd d Stat on.”
http://feeds.latimes.com/%7Er/
US again misfires on Iranian arms in Iraq
WASHINGTON - Last April, top George W Bush administration officials, desperate to exploit any possible crack in the close relationship between Iraq’s Nuri al-Maliki government and Iran, launched a new round of charges that Iran had stepped up covert arms assistance to Shi’ite militias.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/
Anti-war veterans deploy 4,171 toy soldiers at gas station
In a daring guerrilla raid earlier this fall, members of the Los Angeles chapter of Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) infiltrated a local gas station to deploy a battalion of 4171 toy soldiers, together with a sign reading, “Price of Gas: 4171 U.S. Soldiers.”
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/
Why Guantanamo Must Be Closed
Excerpt: On Sunday, in his first television interview since winning the presidential election, Barack Obama repeated his campaign pledge to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay and to ban the use of torture by U.S. forces.
http://www.antiwar.com/
AIPAC’s Man in the Obama Camp
Excerpt: Barack Obama’s first appointment, that of Chicago Congressman Rahm Emanuel as his chief of staff, is quite frankly unsettling and suggests that voters who had hoped for real change in Washington will be disappointed.
http://www.antiwar.com/orig/
A time to speak out
The birth of Independent Jewish Voices in Britain caused some envious glances from across the Atlantic. “Of course it’d happen in the UK first,” said the veteran American Jewish peace activist. “They create a diverse – however temporary – coalition, and get a major newspaper to do their publicity for them. We’d never be able to pull something like that off here.” For anyone involved in Israeli-Palestinian peace advocacy in the US Jewish community, such statements were all too common as word began to filter out about the emergence of Independent Jewish Voices (IJV) last year.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
Pakistan bans Bollywood "gay" buddy movie
November 18, 2008Pakistan bans Bollywood “gay” buddy movie
The High Court in Lahore has issued ban on an Indian film after a petitioner claimed it “propogates homosexuality.”
Dostana, which is hyped as Bollywood’s first gay-themed comedy, cannot be shown anywhere in Pakistan as a result of Friday’s court ruling.
The judge ordered that a copy of the script be prepared for a later hearing and that the Pakistan Film Censor Board should block any screenings.
Dostana is similar in plot to last year’s Hollywood effort I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry.
Two Indian men in Miami pretend to be a gay couple to rent an apartment, and later to gain an immigration permit.
The slapstick comedy of errors has a cameo from Big Brother contestant Shilpa Shetty.
There is no actual gay relationship, but the two male leads share a kiss and it is being hailed as a breakthrough in Indian cinema.
“Dostana is a fun way to pave the way eventually for a Bollywood Brokeback Mountain-type film,” producer Karan Johar said.
It is the first Bollywood film entirely set in Miami - it would be unrealistic to set Dostana in India as homosexual acts are illegal there.
Last week the High Court in Delhi finished hearing arguments in a suit brought by gay rights activists seeking to overturn a colonial-era law banning “unnatural sex.”
Chief Justice AP Shah has reserved judgement and asked both sides to submit transcripts of their oral arguments.
The government of India has been arguing for the retention of Section 377, the law that criminalises same-sex acts.
Section 377 was enacted in 1860 under the British Raj in line with the anti-sodomy laws in England at the time.
The law punishes anyone who “voluntarily has carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal” by imprisonment and criminalises a whole range of sexual acts from mutual masturbation, to fellatio and anal sex.
UrukNet - Daily Information from Occupied Iraq - newsletter 16 Nov 2008
UrukNet - Daily Information from Occupied Iraq - newsletter 16 Nov 2008
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48815 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48818 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48813
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48812 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48810
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48819 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48802 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48817 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48816 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48814
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48811 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48807
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48806 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48805 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48820 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48804 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48801 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48800 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48798 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48808 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48809
Urgent Invitation to Ban Ki Mon: A Visit Gaza Gamal N. El Khoudary, Chairman of Popular Committee Against Siege PCAS
Dear highly respected Ban Ki Mon, we would like to pass our greetings and regards from the Gaza Strip. We would like to invite you urgently to pay a visit for the Gaza strip. People are slowly dying as UNRWA halted its services and a total power blackout imposed by Israel. Your expected visit to Gaza would show your interest in saving people lives. Power, food, medicine, treatment and all aspects of life vanished from the Gaza strip. The 7 crossings are totally closed with no glimpse of hope to re-open them again. Israel went on more deep flagrant violations of all human laws as she blocked the UNRWA aids into Gaza…
No Title.
Layla Anwar, An Arab Woman Blues
There is no Title to this post. I will let you make your own. I am in a very strange kind of mood. I am listening to Tracy Chapman. I like that singer a lot. There is something very genuine about her. I guess she represents 1% of the American population. A 1% hope. If I were a gambler, I would say that the odds are not in my favor. Not with a 1% for sure. I still can’t shake off that strange feeling off my shoulders…It must have been that interview with that young Afghani girl, who found her foot in tiny pieces whilst she was with other women in a garden, celebrating something. She said ” I saw my foot lying next to me in pieces. My cousin was also laying dead right next to me…They (the Americans) saw that we were only a group of women, and they attacked us nonetheless. The Americans are animals”….
The occupation cannot stay
Serene Assir in Madrid interviewed Mohamed Al-Faidhi, spokesman of the Association of Muslim Scholars in Iraq, on the future of the Iraqi resistance and the inevitability of US withdrawal
Serene Assir
…What is known from a reading of history is that resistance undergoes three phases. The first phase is a phase of reaction. This was perhaps the most difficult phase because the occupation tried to cover up the existence of any kind of resistance, to the extent that it would persecute journalists who would indicate the existence of such a resistance. In this phase, we were the main proclaimer of the resistance, who said that there was a resistance, and provided proof of it. There is a second phase to resistance, and that is the process of different activities becoming clear under titles and slogans, core or otherwise. This is the phase that the resistance is currently living…
Under siege: 70% of Gaza blacked out; Israel turns away convoy carrying medicine
Ma’an news
Seventy percent of the Gaza Strip is blacked out on Sunday night after Israel blocked deliveries fuel for Gaza’s power plant for the fifth consecutive day, a high-ranking Palestinian energy official said. Kan’an Ubeid, the deputy chief of the Palestinian Energy Authority, said in a press conference in Gaza that in addition to the shutdown of the diesel-fueled power plant, the electric network bringing in power from Israel collapsed due to increased pressure on the system…
Iraqi Cabinet Okays US Pact
Antiwar.com
The Iraqi cabinet has approved the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) with the United States, in a vote that was surprisingly one-sided. 27 of 28 cabinet members voted in favor of the agreement, and the deal will now be sent to parliament for consideration. The vote became much easier after Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani indicated he would not object to the deal so long as parliament supported it. The current, and evidently final draft of the SOFA came only after the Iraqi government requested over 100 amendments to the previous “final” draft. The US withheld its response until after its own elections, and accepted most, but not all, of the changes…
Pakistan The Next US Target
Pakistan Daily
Bill Kristol, a Fox Television commentator and arch American neoconservative revealed recently what many had long suspected was US thinking about the current international situation. Kristol recounts that in a 90-minute, mostly off-the-record meeting with a small group of journalists in early July, President Bush “conveyed the following impression, that he thought the next president’s biggest challenge would not be Iraq, which he thinks he’ll leave in pretty good shape, and would not be Afghanistan, which is manageable by itself… It’s Pakistan.” We have “a sort of friendly government that sort of cooperates and sort of doesn’t. It’s really a complicated and difficult situation.” Right on cue, presidential candidate Barack Obama took the baton from Bush in his speech on July 15, in which he argued that more focus and resource were required on both Afghanistan and Pakistan…
The Unfolding Nightmarish Script…
Layla Anwar, An Arab Woman Blues
Obama the Booma wins the elections, and the first thing he does, apart from having J.Biden and M.Albright, the Iraqi baby killer on board, he makes inflammatory speeches about fighting terrorism in Afghanistan where the Talibans are winning. And who is he going to ask for help in his fight against “terrorists” in Afghanistan? Iran of course. If Obama calls on Iran to help him win the war in Afghanistan, do you think that has no price tag attached ? Don’t you think that perhaps Obama’s “gift” to Iran is part of that comprehensive deal that I referred to above ? And what is that comprehensive deal, apart from the Iranian nuclear dossier ? Southern Iraq. Yes Southern Iraq. Re-read that article. The argument for a independent state of Basra, read Southern Iraq, is “more political stability.” That was/is Biden’s argument. But I thought we had stability in Iraq with Maliki and the surge no ? So what are they telling us now - that if this does not go through, there will be more carnage, of Sunnis in particular ? Like what ? Have the ARAB Sunni population dwindle down from 55% to less than 20% to 0% ? …
Israel out to bring Gaza to its knees
JONATHAN COOK
The latest tightening of Israel’s chokehold on Gaza – ending all supplies into the Strip for more than a week – has produced immediate and shocking consequences for Gaza’s 1.5 million inhabitants. The refusal to allow in fuel has forced the shutting down of Gaza’s only power station, creating a blackout that pushed Palestinians bearing candles on to the streets in protest last week. A water and sanitation crisis are expected to follow. And on Thursday, the United Nations announced it had run out of the food essentials it supplies to 750,000 desperately needy Gazans. “This has become a blockade against the United Nations itself,” a spokesman said….
Barack Obama brings hope of Iran talks, says Shimon Peres
Richard Beeston, TimesOnLine
Israel believes that there is a chance for dialogue with Iran if Barack Obama succeeds in uniting the international community behind a common policy. Shimon Peres, the Israeli President who arrives in London tonight Monday, said that his country’s most implacable foe could be brought to the negotiating table depending on a new political climate and economic factors, in particular a falling oil price…
Olmert The Liar
Moon of Alabama
Interim Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert accused the Islamist Hamas movement on Sunday of “shattering” the Gaza truce after two rockets hit Israel, prompting an air strike which killed four Palestinian militants. … “The responsibility for the shattering of the calm and the creation of a situation of prolonged and repeated violence in the south of the country is entirely on Hamas and the other terror groups in Gaza,” Olmert told ministers. Israel accuses Hamas of ’shattering’ Gaza truce The truce was broken by Israel twelve days ago. As the Guardian reported on November 5….
* * * NOT SATIRE * * *
Maliki nominated for Nobel Peace Prize
AKI-Adnkrons
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has been nominated for the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize, according to the news agency Voices of Iraq. The Iraqi government reportedly nominated al-Maliki for his role in maintaining peace and security in war-ravaged Iraq….
Shame and Disgust
Robert Thompson, Axis of Logic
… We are horrified that our elected representatives should ignore all rights to Freedom, Equality or Brotherly Love for such defenceless people as ordinary Palestinians, ordinary Lebanese, ordinary Iraqis and ordinary Afghans. We are shocked that our same representatives should fail to boycott the Zionist ’state of Israel’ in ther hope of obliging it to comply with so many ignored United Nations Resolutions, and to condemn its cruelty towards those whom it has killed, maimed and/or dispossessed in pursuance of its fundamental policy of ethnic cleansing. All these terrible failings cause us to feel shame….
Knesset MP calls for making lives of Gaza people insufferable
Palestinian Information Center
Gideon Ezra, a member of the Knesset for Kadima and a former minister of internal security, called on the Israeli government to tighten the noose on the Gaza Strip’s people and make their lives intolerable. “We must use the means available to make the lives of Gaza residents difficult as long as the lives of the inhabitants of villages and cities surrounding the Strip are unbearable because of the repeated Palestinian rocket attacks,” Ezra told the Hebrew radio. The Israeli official called on his government to enforce its decision to fortify the buildings in the Israeli settlements around Gaza, noting that this decision does not include all settlements….
Israel denies access of 15 trucks to Gaza, loaded with medicines
Rami Almeghari - IMEMC
Chief of emergency and ambulance department at the Hamas-run health ministry, announced on Sunday that the Israeli occupation authorities denied today access to Gaza of 15 trucks, loaded with medicine. Abu Hasanin said that the Israeli authorities, at the Karni crossing, to the east of Gaza city, prevented the entry of the said shipment, in a time the Strip lacks more than 300 medicines…
Israeli Soldiers kidnap children in east Jerusalem
Saed Bannoura - IMEMC
Palestinian sources reported on Sunday that Israeli soldiers and policemen kidnapped 10 Palestinian children in Al Bustan neighborhood, near the Al Aqsa Mosque in East Jerusalem, and took them to an unknown destination. The sources added that the ages of the detained children are no more than 13, and that they were abducted for allegedly obstructing the work of municipality workers who were preparing for demolishing more Palestinian homes in the neighborhood…
George W Bush could pardon spies involved in torture
Tim Shipman in Washington
Senior intelligence officers are lobbying the outgoing president to look after the men and women who could face charges for following his orders in the war on terrorism. Many fear that Barack Obama, who has pledged to close the Guantanamo Bay detention camp and put an end to the policy of extraordinary rendition, could launch a legal witch hunt against those who oversaw the policies after he is sworn in on Jan 20….
SAME SHIT DIFFERENT CENTURIES (Part Five)
Malcom Lagauche
…This is the fifth of five parts of “Eulogy on King Philip. For more than a year, the Wampanoag won battle-after-battle against the pilgrims. But, disease and lack of food helped destroy what the pilgrims couldn’t: the Wampanoag tribe. Even in this, the methods used were almost identical to those employed by the U.S. today in showing victory. Metacomet’s wife and son were captured and sold into slavery. Once the U.S. occupied Iraq, Saddam Hussein’s wife and daughters quickly left the country before they were captured. Today, they live in exile and are on Interpol’s list of wanted terrorists…
Shiite Bloc Fails to Go to Meeting on Iraq-U.S. Pact
KATHERINE ZOEPF and ATHEER KAKAN, AP
Iraq’s political leaders held a high-level meeting on Saturday to gauge support for a security agreement that will determine the future role and presence of American forces in Iraq before crucial votes in the cabinet and Parliament. But the most powerful Shiite bloc in Parliament, the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, did not attend, and the meeting ended without any clear public resolution. The agreement, which Iraq and the United States have been negotiating for months, faces a vote by the cabinet, which is expected on Sunday, and then a vote in Parliament, which has not set a date for it. The agreement will replace the United Nations mandate authorizing American military operations in Iraq, which expires on Dec. 31….
“When the Liaison Israeli Military & PA Security Sevices Accelerate - the Enemy Will Not Be Scrutinized”
Hiyam Noir, PalestineFreeVoice
On Friday, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called the Israeli government, regarding its legal responsibility to deliver urgent and steady supply of sufficient fuel and humanitarian aid to Gaza Strip.The Israelis have blocked fuel delivery and turned away trucks with food distributed by UNRWA. Ban Ki-moon said in a statement that he is deeply concerned about the deterioration of the humanitarian situation in Gaza and the risk of a possible humanitarian disaster…
Video: The Suffering of Iraqi Christians
Shababek
IOF raid kills four NSB fighters
Palestine Solidarity Campaign
An Israeli reconnaissance plane fired at least one missile at a group of fighters of the Nasser Salahuddin Brigades, the armed wing of the popular resistance committees, east of Gaza on Sunday killing all four of them, medical sources reported. They told the PIC that the four bodies were burnt and torn apart after the missile directly targeted them. The sources pointed out that a number of other casualties in the same aerial bombing were carried to the Shifa hospital…
UrukNet - Daily Information from Occupied Iraq - newsletter 15 Nov 2008
November 17, 2008UrukNet - Daily Information from Occupied Iraq - newsletter 15 Nov 2008
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48796 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48799 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48793
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48789
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48795 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48794 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48791 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48790 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48788 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48787 I guess I just don’t understand politics. Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48786 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48785 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48784
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48783 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48782 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48781 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48779 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48778 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48780
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48792 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48803
Actions needed: As time runs out Gazans slowly dying Popular Committee Against Siege (PCAS)
Power, food, medicine, treatment and all aspects of live vanished from the Gaza strip. The 7 crossings are totally closed with no glimpse of hope to reopen them again. Israel went on more deep flagrant violations of all human laws as it blocked the UNRWA aids into Gaza. 750.000 UNRWA’s beneficiaries are exposed to hunger and lack of food. On Saturday, the United Nations offices closed its food aid distribution centers and 20,000 Gazans walked away empty-handed from the UN food distribution centers. More than 1 million live in deep darkness since 2 days as 80% of Gaza strip out of power….
Iraqis Believe Americans Bombing Them to Promote SOFA
Anwar Ali
It seems to me that things are getting worse. This week I was at the scene of a bombing, reporting a news story about three explosions in Adhamiya. They were horrible explosions, all at the same time in a very crowded Shia neighborhood. I remember the smell of the blood, the flies all around and the injured people, the broken glass and the destruction…. Some people are saying that the Americans are making the bombings to make Iraqis believe that it is very important for them to stay in Iraq, that they are still needed. The Americans say that when they withdraw from Iraq violence will increase. Is that a threat? You can read it as a threat, or you can read it as an expectation. Some Iraqis take it as a threat. Some people are asking: “Are the Americans punishing us with bombings because Iraq has refused to sign the SOFA?” [Status of Forces Agreement]. Here that is a reality, people think it…
Iraq Detention Imams Work for $2 Billion Private Equity Fund
Nick Mottern and Bill Rau, t r u t h o u t | Report
When Iraqi imams sit down with prisoners at a US detention center in Iraq to discuss Islam, they are working for a subsidiary of Global Innovation (GI) Partners LLP, a California- and London-based private equity firm that claims to have “$2 billion in capital under management.” GI Partners sells, among other things: base maintenance for US military forces in Iraq; psychiatric care in the United Kingdom; in-room television and movies for hotels; wine, movie production studios and pubs. GI Partners also manages hundreds of millions of dollars for California and Oregon public employees pension funds and, according to the GI Partners Web site, pension funds in the Netherlands and the Middle East. The imams join the GI Partners world when they go to work for Russian and East European Partnerships (REEP) Inc., the GI Partners subsidiary hired by the US military to run Islamic discussion, civics and vocational programs in its Iraq detention centers….
Shi’ites call for Basra to be mini-state
AP
Two Shi’ite lawmakers have called for a referendum on turning the oil-rich province of Basra in southern Iraq into a mini-state. The push signals a renewed effort by Shi’ites to grant regions self-rule in what would be a federalist system of government. Sunnis oppose the idea, fearing it could lead to the country’s eventual break up or isolate them from oil wealth concentrated in mainly Shi’ite and Kurdish areas…
Israeli Deputy Defense Minister; “Gaza invasion, a matter of time”
Saed Bannoura - IMEMC
Israeli Deputy Defense Minister, Matan Vilnai, stated on Friday that a large-scale invasion of Gaza is only a matter of time and added that the army was prepared to invade the Gaza Strip and fight Hamas. Vilnai stated that the offensive would be large and Hamas fighters would suffer a major blow because the offensive “would be very effective”. He also said that he talked about a large-scale offensive but did not mention reoccupying the Gaza Strip…
O’Hanlon Gives Obama Some Bad Advice
Robert Dreyfuss
…I have a news flash for Petraeus. The Taliban think they’re winning because they are winning. Sending more troops won’t help. It will only inflame right-wing Muslims to support the Taliban more strongly, build Pashtun nationalism, destabilize Pakistan, and kill a lot of Afghan civilians. Here’s an alternative strategy for Obama: “withdraw and negotiate….
AMSI to the Iraqi Soldiers: Follow Barzan
Association of Muslim Scholars in Iraq (AMSI)
The Association of Muslim Scholars in Iraq (AMSI) called on employees of all state Guard to follow the example of heroic soldier (Barzan Mohammad Abdullah al Hadidi), who declined to humiliation and took revenge for his dignity. This soldier who took lives of a number of brutal warmongering U.S. soldiers and did like what any honorable Iraqi did firing on the soldiers, killing four of them and wounding three others…
Kurds alarmed by SOFA
Roads to Iraq
…The whole time, Kurds were the only political bloc supported the approval of the security agreement. Not anymore, Kurdish MP Mahmud Othman said: I don’t support the signing of the agreement … it will strengthen the Iraqi government … The U.S. forces will withdraw from the country ….There no reference to the protection of the Kurdistan region. Othman said that there are two articles, Iraq government can use against the Kurds…
Iraq’s Cabinet to vote on security pact with US
HAMZA HENDAWI and QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA, AP
Iraq’s Cabinet will vote Sunday on a security pact with Washington that would keep U.S. forces in the country for another three years, a major step in efforts to balance Iraqi demands for national sovereignty with the security concerns of the two allies. In a bid to secure support for the agreement from the country’s top Shiite cleric, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Saturday dispatched two senior lawmakers to see Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani in the holy city of Najaf, south of Baghdad, with a copy of the pact’s final draft…
Valedictory hot air
Rice’s last and final visit to Israel/Palestine is conclusive proof that the neocons achieved nothing and could offer nothing
Khaled Amayreh
The 24th visit of US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to Palestine-Israel this week didn’t differ much from her previous visits, especially in substance. Rice, who held meetings with Israeli and Palestinian Authority (PA) officials, followed by joint press conferences in both West Jerusalem and Ramallah, essentially regurgitated the same platitudes and false promises she voiced ever since she assumed the top diplomatic post nearly four years ago. Finding virtually nothing to clutch to in terms of hard achievements in the so- called peace process, Rice put a brave face on her apparent colossal failure to get Israel to end its decades-old occupation of the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza Strip…
An Embarrassment Of Laundry Lists
Winter Patriot
…When the telecoms wanted legal immunity for their lawbreaking activities, Barack Obama said he would try to prevent that from happening. Then he voted for a law that made it happen. When the big banks wanted $700 billion of your money, with public opinion running 100-to-1 against the idea, Barack Obama voted for the bill that gave that money away. He needed your support then; he slapped you across the head. You voted for him anyway. Those bills were always going to pass. They didn’t need his vote. He could have voted against them, as a token gesture. But he didn’t. He didn’t even pretend to be on your side, even though he needed your support so very much. And you gave it to him anyway. And now … he doesn’t need you anymore. He’s already made his intentions as clear as day … and yet here you come with your Dear Santa letters full of free advice — advice your man has already rejected. If he didn’t even bother pretending to be serious when he needed your support, what makes you think he’ll listen now, when he doesn’t need you at all?…
UN closes Gaza aid centers, citing lack of food
DIAA HADID, AP
Gazans seeking food aid walked away empty-handed from locked United Nations distribution centers Saturday after a strict Israeli border closure depleted U.N. food reserves. Israel sealed Gaza’s borders nearly two weeks ago as part of a new round of fighting with Gaza’s Hamas rulers. Hamas rocket fire on Israeli border towns and Israeli air strikes on Gaza militants have eroded a truce that had largely held for five months…
Iraq: Sunni roadblock to U.S. security agreement
Ned Parker, LATimes
Iraq’s Vice President Tariq Hashimi and his Sunni Iraqi Islamic Party could very well prove to be the force that blocks a U.S.-Iraq security agreement from being signed this year. Hashimi insisted this month that the pact be put before a popular referendum. His party members concede such a referendum would not be possible until sometime next year. Hashimi indicated his stance at the same time Shiite lawmakers close to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki have made clear they are now supporting an agreement for U.S. forces to stay in the country for another three years….
Video: Gaza humanitarian crisis
AlJazeeraEnglish
Inside Story questions the ‘blame game’ being played by the parties while the people of Gaza continue to suffer. Israel has refused permission for a convoy of trucks containing basic humanitarian supplies to deliver their loads to the Gaza Strip. Initially, the authorities had said they would allow passage for the 30 truckloads of drugs and food….
UN on Gaza: “People are going to start getting hungry”
Ma’an news
The situation in the Gaza Strip is shifting from “collective punishment to genocide,” said Jamal Al-Khudari, member of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) and head of the popular committee against the siege in Gaza. The trickle of humanitarian aid previously allowed into Gaza, on which 80 percent of the population depended, has now been stopped for nine days by the Israeli army. The delivery of medical supplies and industrial fuel donated by the European Union (EU) has also been blocked. The fuel was needed to power Gaza’s sole power plant, which has now shut down, leading to rolling blackouts throughout Gaza…
Second Fiddle to Israel
Khaled Amayreh
Hamas and the Palestinian Authority (PA) have been trading harsh accusations as to who bears responsibility for the open-ended postponement of Egyptian-sponsored national reconciliation talks that were due to take place in Cairo earlier this week. Citing Hamas’s decision to boycott the much-heralded talks, PA and Fatah leaders and spokespersons denounced the Islamic movement for being “unserious and insincere” about the restoration of Palestinian national unity…
Sabra, Shatila and Collective Amnesia
Gilad Atzmon, Palestine Think Tank
Waltz With Bashir is a breath-taking new Israeli film, an animated documentary directed by Ari Folman. In 1982, Folman was a 19-year-old IDF infantry soldier. Twenty four years later, in 2006, Folman is surprised to find out that he does not remember a thing from that war or the massacres in Sabra and Shatila. The film is a journey into Folman’s lost past. The documentary is set as a chain of animated interviews and conversations between Folman and his military associates, psychologists and Ron Ben Yishai, the legendary Israeli TV reporter who was among the first to report on the Sabra and Shatila Massacres. The setting aims at building a coherent personal past narrative out of the broken memories of others. The film is highly sensitive and emotionally moving….
OBAMA - WIPING THE SLATE CLEAN
Media Lens
In 1997, the British media filled with talk of “historic” change. Blair’s victory that year “bursts open the door to a British transformation,” the Independent declared. (Neal Ascherson, ‘Through the door he can begin to create a freer land,’ The Independent, May 4, 1997) A Guardian leader saluted the nation: “Few now sang England Arise, but England had risen all the same.” (Leader, ‘A political earthquake,’ The Guardian, May 2, 1997) The editors predicted that, by 2007, Blair’s triumph would be seen as “one of the great turning-points of British political history… the moment when Britain at last gave itself the chance to construct a modern liberal socialist order.” (Ibid) The Observer assured readers that the Blair government would create “new worldwide rules on human rights” and implement “tough new limits on arms sales.” This, after all, was the dawn of Blair’s “ethical” foreign policy. It was a dawn of the dead - Blair left behind him the almost unimaginable horror of Iraq and Afghanistan… Over the past two weeks - one decade and three wars later - the same media have been insisting, as one, that US president-elect Barrack Obama is another “new dawn”…
The upcoming confrontation, Maliki and the Kurdish Coalition
Roads to Iraq
Maliki wanted to change the constitution few days ago (…) Questioning the Constitution means: - The relationship between the Kurds and other Iraqi political components is very close to another phase of internal conflict. Seeing Maliki’s attempts to improve his relations with Sadrists, raises some doubts that Maliki wants to split the United Shiites Alliance into: Al-Hakim’s Supreme Council with its Kurdish Coalition alliance - and Maliki’s Dawa Party with the Sadrists alliance [other small parties, and the tribal councils]…
U.S. helicopter down in Iraq’s Mosul leaving two dead
Reuters
Two U.S. soldiers were killed in a helicopter accident in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul on Saturday, a military spokeswoman said. The helicopter involved was an OH-58 Kiowa Warrior, a small scout helicopter fitted with weapons. It hit overhead cables as it was attempting to land. “There has been a helicopter incident in Mosul. They’re classifying it now as a hard landing when it came in contact with wires,” Captain Charles Calio said earlier on Saturday…
November 15, 2008: 4 US GIs, 16 Iraqis Killed; 75 Iraqis Wounded
Margaret Griffis, Antiwar.com
At least 16 Iraqis were killed and 75 more were wounded in the latest round of violence. Four U.S. servicemembers died in separate incidents, including a helicopter crash in Mosul. Meanwhile, Iraqi and U.S. negotiators have agreed on a draft of a controversial U.S.-Iraqi security pact that will allow U.S. troops to remain in Iraq after December. The draft now goes to the Cabinet and then Parliament for approval….
UrukNet - Daily Information from Occupied Iraq - newsletter 14 Nov 2008
November 16, 2008UrukNet - Daily Information from Occupied Iraq - newsletter 14 Nov 2008
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48770 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48765 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48761 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48778 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48776 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48771 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48772 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48774
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48756 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48768 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48767 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48763 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48762 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48773
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48775
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48777 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48759
Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48757 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48760 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48764 Read the full article / Leggi l’articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.de/?p=48769
US Covers Up their Murders and Sexual Abuses in Iraq Kawther Salam
Why does the US occupation and the Iraqi government cover up such incidents? How many such incidents have the governments cover up? Why did they decrease the number of victims in their reports? Omar Abdullah Tawfiq is an Iraqi soldier. One month ago, on October 11, 2008, he opened fire at a number of U.S. troops during a nightly raid carried out jointly by the Iraqi army and U.S. Soldiers in sites in Al-Mosul which were suspected locations of the so-called “Al Qaeda” (civilians). Omar killed four American soldiers and injured two. Iraqi military sources declared that the soldier Omar Abdullah Tawfiq lost control of himself when he saw US marines sexually harassing an Iraqi girl of 17 in a house owned by an old man, her father….
Chronic malnutrition in Gaza blamed on Israel
An explosive report by the Red Cross on a humanitarian tragedy
Donald Macintyre, Independent
The Israeli blockade of Gaza has led to a steady rise in chronic malnutrition among the 1.5 million people living in the strip, according to a leaked report from the Red Cross. It chronicles the “devastating” effect of the siege that Israel imposed after Hamas seized control in June 2007 and notes that the dramatic fall in living standards has triggered a shift in diet that will damage the long-term health of those living in Gaza and has led to alarming deficiencies in iron, vitamin A and vitamin D. The 46-page report from the International Committee of the Red Cross – seen by The Independent – is the most authoritative yet on the impact that Israel’s closure of crossings to commercial goods has had on Gazan families and their diets…
Taleban vow to win Afghan fight
“Al-Qaeda had been brought to Afghanistan by the Americans, not by the Taleban”
BBC News
The Taleban’s senior spokesman has used a rare radio interview to call for all foreign forces to leave Afghanistan. Speaking by telephone from a secret location in the region, Zabihullah Mujahid also derided US President-elect Barack Obama. Fielding questions from BBC World Service listeners, he said Mr Obama’s plans to deploy more troops would not defeat the Afghan insurgency… The spokesman denied his movement financed itself from the drugs trade, a statement our correspondent says is unlikely to be taken seriously in Western capitals. He criticised the US for attacking Afghanistan in 2001, and said there was no proof that Osama Bin Laden was behind the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. Al-Qaeda, he said, had been brought to Afghanistan by the Americans, not by the Taleban…
OBAMA - WIPING THE SLATE CLEAN
Media Lens
In 1997, the British media filled with talk of “historic” change. Blair’s victory that year “bursts open the door to a British transformation,” the Independent declared. (Neal Ascherson, ‘Through the door he can begin to create a freer land,’ The Independent, May 4, 1997) A Guardian leader saluted the nation: “Few now sang England Arise, but England had risen all the same.” (Leader, ‘A political earthquake,’ The Guardian, May 2, 1997) The editors predicted that, by 2007, Blair’s triumph would be seen as “one of the great turning-points of British political history… the moment when Britain at last gave itself the chance to construct a modern liberal socialist order.” (Ibid) The Observer assured readers that the Blair government would create “new worldwide rules on human rights” and implement “tough new limits on arms sales.” This, after all, was the dawn of Blair’s “ethical” foreign policy. It was a dawn of the dead - Blair left behind him the almost unimaginable horror of Iraq and Afghanistan… Over the past two weeks - one decade and three wars later - the same media have been insisting, as one, that US president-elect Barrack Obama is another “new dawn”…
Declaration of Independence 20 years later: heightened concern over internal divide and Jerusalem
Fadi Yacoub, PNN
In spite of Israeli occupation and siege, 20 years ago today the late President Yasser Arafat decided to declare Palestinian independence. It was in Algiers in 1988 that Arafat, as Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, delivered his Palestinian Declaration of Independence. Today Palestinians salute the anniversary with sorrow for the fragmentation of the internal scene. On the occassion, PNN spoke with leaders from the leftist parties and those of Fateh and Hamas….
Gaza: Israeli blockade worsening humanitarian crisis
Amnesty International
Amnesty International is urging the Israeli authorities to allow the immediate passage of humanitarian aid, medical supplies and fuel to the Gaza Strip. Amnesty International Middle East and North Africa Programme Deputy Director Philip Luther said: ‘Israel’s latest tightening of its blockade has made an already dire humanitarian situation markedly worse. This is nothing short of collective punishment of Gaza’s civilian population and it must stop immediately.’ Even the trickle of humanitarian aid previously allowed into Gaza (on which 80% of the population depends) has now been stopped for nine days by the Israeli army…
How US claims about Syria became media facts
Unwary journalists who repeat US army claims about Syria and Iraq become tools in a propaganda war
Sharif Nashashibi, Guardian
In any conflict, warring parties strive to convince the public that justice is on their side. The most effective way of doing this is through the media. It is imperative that journalists cast a critical eye on information they receive to avoid becoming unwitting tools in the propaganda war. In particular, they should not report claims as facts. There were several fundamental failings in the British press coverage of the recent US raid into Syria. For example, Richard White in the Sun and the Independent correspondent Patrick Cockburn both reported as fact that the raid killed Abu Ghadiya, an alleged al-Qaida figure who smuggled fighters into Iraq…
Video: Aftershock
IOF soldiers reveal how to brutally repress Palestinian civilians
Haitham Sabbah
“Whilst I was there, I lost all my faith in the Israeli army. They put it right in your face: ‘Go be the oppressors for your people. Force yourselves upon them’. They told us…’take these bats wrapped up in plastic and…calm things down’…We had skulls on our helmets, dude. We walked around with machetes, all kinds of crazy stuff. Sheriff badges. We’d improvise some very unique solutions”. This is Ehud, speaking 12 years after having served in the occupied Palestinian territories. Like the thousands before him, he was a paratrooper in the Israeli army during the first Palestinian intifada (1987-1993). Some of the improvised solutions he came up with while serving in the occupied territories included attaching the plus and minus cables from a two-way radio battery to the ears of a Palestinian to give him an electric shock…
Torture – Yes We Can?
Obama and the national security question: the sellout accelerates
Justin Raimondo
Most politicians wait at least until they’ve been sworn in before they start breaking their campaign promises. In this sense, as in so many others, Barack Obama represents an entirely new phenomenon: the politician who preemptively reneges. A recent Wall Street Journal piece describing the transition process as it relates to intelligence-gathering reveals we aren’t going to see much change in this vitally important realm, the one in which the Bush administration truly made its blackest mark. This will “create tension within the Democratic party,” we are told, apparently because even the worst party hacks will have a hard time going along with the revised Obama Doctrine on the issue of torture. According to the Journal, Obama’s advisors on intelligence matters are “centrists” in the Clinton mold and outright Republicans, who favor torture “with oversight.” These, we are told, are the “pragmatists,” likely candidates for positions in Obama’s national security bureaucracy. “He’s going to take a very centrist approach to these issues,” avers Roger Cressey, who served as a counter-terrorism official under Clinton as well as Bush II. It’s a grotesque commentary on the moral health of the nation when advocacy of torture is considered “centrist.” One shudders to imagine what it means to be right-of-center….
Obama transition points to more war and repression
Bill Van Auken
President-elect Barack Obama owes his victory, both in the Democratic primaries and the general election, in large part to the overwhelming hostility of the American people to the years of military aggression, torture, extraordinary rendition, domestic spying and all of the other crimes that will constitute the indelible legacy of the Bush administration. Thanks to his carefully calibrated criticisms of these policies, as well as his indictment of his principal Democratic opponent, Senator Hillary Clinton, for her October 2002 vote authorizing the US invasion of Iraq, Obama’s “change you can believe in” was perceived by many, both in the US and abroad, as a promise that his election would signal an end to militarism and attacks on democratic rights…
Statement about pronouncing a Death Sentence for Al-Mujahid (Kareem Ibrahim Saleh Al-Qaragholi)
The Jihad and Change Front - 1920 Revolution Brigades
Every day passes the fourth occupation government increased its blight and adds shameful acts to (her) history which is full of hasten for the sake of pleasuring the occupation; it comes with unimaginable acts for the most subtle mind people. Thus every day Iraq afflicts with the troubles of people who claim that they belong to it. Since the occupation came with its four governments dolls, they begin to do such an acts, and now its fourth government do not getting bored from monitor the heroic Mujahedeen and uproot them with a pretext of terrorism, but this time it employed the judiciary organization; to pronounce unfair death sentences on them… an embarrassing thing for all people with honor in the world. It was not a surprise for what happened in the recent days of pronouncing a death sentence to Al-Mujahid (Kareem Ibrahim Saleh Al-Qaragholi); but the strange thing is that they announced it with arrogant and without fear…
Buzzwords, Politics and US Elections
Ramzy Baroud
…The fact is, both candidates, McCain and Obama, had much more in common than they would care to admit, as they voted to fund the Iraq war, supported offshore drilling, backed the plan to bail out Wall Street, appealed to the ‘middle class’, never the many millions of poor Americans, and brazenly demonstrated their undying love for Israel, right or wrong. Any truly independent assessment would most likely show that commonalities between both candidates – especially towards the end of their campaigns – ran too deep that would render designations of them as ‘opponents’, engaged in constant ‘debates’, particularly puzzling….
In Italian - On the Drillers.
Layla Anwar, An Arab Woman Blues
…As you may well know, Muqtada Al-Sadr and his drilling Mahdi army spared none in Iraq. Sunnis, Christians, Palestinians, Gays, Secularists , Baathists, Nationalists, patriotic anti-Occupation, women, men, children….And as you may well know, Muqtada Al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army collaborated and propped up the various sectarian fascist Shiite governments that came into place with the Anglo-American occupation. Be it the Jaafari government or the current Maliki government. And engaged his own Sadrist party in the political process as well. And as you may well know, the Mahdi army was a crucial tool in implementing the ethnic cleansing that took place in Iraq, as per the directives of America and its zionistic plans and the subsequent exile of millions of Iraqis for the most part SUNNIS AND CHRISTIANS….
Sources: Hamas looking to postpone national dialogue in order to avoid extending Abbas’ term
PNN
Informed Palestinian sources disclosed today that Hamas wants to delay the comprehensive Palestinian dialogue in Cairo until after the ninth of January 2009 when Mahmoud Abbas’ presidential term ends. When the Hamas party declared it would boycott the internal dialogue just a day before it was slated to begin, most indicators pointed to a reticence by leaders outside of Palestine. The Gaza government was viewed as largely supporting the meeting. However within a day the party said there was no internal discord. It should be noted that the Hamas movement works on consensus decision making which includes the outside leadership, the Gaza leadership and members on the chapter level. Postulations as to why Hamas had boycotted the meeting included specifically outside control and a general disdain for Egypt… A source close to the Hamas leadership, who spoke with the daily Al Quds Al Arabi on the condition of anonymity, said that there were two main points that caused the party to cancel its participation in the dialogue…
US Attack Kills 12 In Pakistan
AlJazeera.net
At least 12 people have been killed in a missile strike said to have been carried out by a US drone in a Pakistani tribal region. The raid is thought to have killed pro-Taliban fighters, five of them foreigners, Pakistani officials said on Friday. Previous bombing raids by the US, in which civilians have died, have been condemned by the Pakistani government which argues that they infringe on the country’s sovereignty…
Iraq’s Maliki to urge his Cabinet to endorse security pact with U.S.
Ned Parker, LATimes
Reporting from Baghdad — Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki will urge his Cabinet to endorse a contentious security agreement with the United States and will give an address backing the pact ahead of a vote in parliament, one of his trusted confidants said today. Maliki, who until now had not endorsed the agreement and had criticized U.S. negotiating positions during the summer, decided to publicly support the accord after U.S. officials accepted most of the changes to the text requested by the Iraqi government at the end of October and then agreed to two final changes to the text, said Shiite Muslim lawmaker Sami Askari, the confidant….
UNRWA: Gaza Strip ran out of food supplies amidst catastrophic human condition
Palestinian Information Center
The UNRWA, the UN agency that caters for Palestinian refugees, has announced Thursday that food supplies and basic needs in Gaza Strip had ran out due to the Israeli rejection to allow the agency trucks into the populated Strip. John Ging, the operations manager of the UNRWA in the Strip said in a press statement that the agency won’t be able to bring food supplies into Gaza Strip as a result of the Israeli refusal to open the border-crossings with Gaza, describing the situation there as “catastrophic”. He added that UNRWA ran out of supplies on Thursday evening and will not be able to distribute more unless the crossings are opened and food aid is allowed in…
In direct violation of the Road Map, Barak approves settlement construction in the W. Bank
Saed Bannoura - IMEMC
Israeli online daily, Haaretz, reported on Friday morning that Israel’s Defense Minister, Ehud Barak, approved in recent months plans for the construction and marketing of hundreds of units in illegal West Bank settlements. A number of settlements are east of the annexation wall, which means that these settlements are even outside of the large settlement blocs that Israel’s refuses to evacuate under any peace deal with the Palestinians….
Iraq’s top Shiite cleric to let govt decide on US pact
AFP
Iraq’s top Shiite Muslim cleric will leave it to the government to decide on a controversial US military pact, but associates of the reclusive leader said it must respect Iraqi sovereignty. Grand Ayatollah Ali Husseini al-Sistani — revered as the highest religious authority by Iraq’s Shiite majority — rarely involves himself in politics and usually communicates his views only through associates. “The Guide (Sistani) called for general elections which produced the country’s government and the parliament,” a religious official close to Sistani told AFP on condition of anonymity…
Targeting Hugo Chavez
Stephen Lendman
Since taking office in February 1999, America’s dominant media have relentlessly attacked Chavez because of the good example he represents and threat it might spread in spite of scant chance it will in today’s climate. Yet some of his fiercest critics maintain pressure and show up often on the Wall Street Journal’s op-ed page. Most recently on November 10 by its America’s columnist, Mary O’Grady. Her style is agitprop. Her space a truth-free zone. Her latest in an article headlined “Hugo Chavez Spreads the Loot” referring to what The New York Times calls “Suitcasegate.”…
Stuck in Boredom…
Layla Anwar, Uncensored Arabwomanblues
…People are just so caught up in their own little bubbles…and I guess am caught up in mine. But there is a little difference here. X. can find other Babettes, Bernadettes and Georgettes on a new camping trip. Y. can change departments, bosses, offices or jobs… But If I leave my “bubble” where will I go to ? I guess my only “consolation”, short of an adequate term, is to remember that another 4 million or so are stuck in the same bubble as I. In all likelihood they are as estranged as I am and are thinking along the same lines - Where will we go to ? Yes indeed, them and I are very stuck. And seems like we will remain so for quite a long time…
Today in Palestine! ~ Headlines November 15, 2008 ~
Today in Palestine! ~ Headlines November 15, 2008 ~
PCHR Weekly Report: 4 Palestinians killed, 7 injured by Israeli forces http://www.imemc.org/article/
Forty-five Palestinian homes and farms issued demolition orders in Idhna, West of Hebron
On November 3rd, 25 Palestinian homes and five farms in Idhna were issued demolition orders of their homes for the 23rd of November. The order claims that the homes were “built without permission” of the Israeli authorities.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/
-orders-in-idhna-west-of-
In direct violation of the Road Map, Barak approves settlement construction in the W. Bank
Israeli online daily, Haaretz, reported on Friday morning that Israel’s Defense Minister, Ehud Barak, approved in recent months plans for the construction and marketing of hundreds of units in illegal West Bank settlements.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Israel’s Barak approved settlement construction: report
AFP - Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak approved dozens of construction projects in Jewish settlements in the West Bank in recent months despite international commitments to freeze such activity, the Haaretz daily said on Friday.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/
Palestinian PM: Peace process endangered by settlements
Salam Fayyad says during visit to France ‘efficient international action needed to change status quo, put pressure on Israel to respect its obligations in accordance with Road Map for peace initiative’.
http://www.ynetnews.com/
Israeli forces kill four Gazans on seventh day of total closure
On Wednesday, 12 November 2008, Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) carried out an incursion into al-Qarara town and killed four Palestinians. IOF continues to seal the Gaza Strip’s borders and impede entry of food, medical supplies and fuel for the seventh day in a row. According to Al Mezan investigations, at around 10am on Wednesday, 12 November 2008, Israeli troops infiltrated nearly 300 meters inside agricultural lands in the al-Wad area to the northeast of Khan Younis city.
http://electronicintifada.net/
Testimony: Israeli navy shoots and wounds fisherman off Gaza coast
I live in the Sultan neighborhood in Rafah with my parents, three brothers, and three sisters. In 2006, I began to work as a fisherman. My father taught me the trade and I worked with him for about two months. Then I went to work with Omar al-Bardawil. Omar has two boats, one a motorboat and the other a rowboat. When gas is available in the Strip, we use the motorboat, and when there isn’t gas, we use the rowboat.
http://electronicintifada.net/
Israeli settlers assault Palestinians and peace activists near Hebron
At least ten Israeli settlers from the illegal settlements built atop southern Mount Hebron assaulted a number of Palestinians and peace activists on Saturday.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Demonstration held against Homesh settlement
Palestinians held a demonstration against the return of settlers to the Homesh settlement, between Jenin and Nablus. The settlement, evacuated during Sharon’s “disengagement”, is set to be repopulated by Jewish settlers. The demonstration was organized by a committee comprising representatives from the villages of Burqa, Bizzariya, Silat ad-Dhahr, Sabastiya, and Beit Imrin. These villages, all located in the area of Homesh, will be affected by the resettlement and closures, confiscations, and expansions that will inevitably ensue.
http://stopthewall.org/
Ramallah villages rally in protest of road closures
Palestinians living near the northern West Bank city of Ramallah marched on Friday in response to calls by a local council to protest checkpoints that obstruct movement in the surrounding villages. The residents, along with Israeli and other international peace activists assembled between the villages of Ras Karker and Dir Ibzeegh on a road used by 14 villages that are populated by about 35,000 Palestinians.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Two wounded in a nonviolent demonstration at an evacuated settlement
Two Palestinian civilians were wounded as they tried to enter the evacuated Israeli settlement of Homesh near Nablus.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Israeli troops attack nonviolent protestors in Bethlehem
Israeli troops assaulted nonviolent anti-wall protest in the West Bank village of Al-Ma’asara near Bethlehem.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Three nonviolent protestors wounded in Nilin demo
At least three civilians have been wounded, one in the head, during an anti-wall protest in the West Bank town of Nilin near Ramallah.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Israeli troops wound four nonviolent protestors in Bilin
At least four nonviolent protestors were wounded in the weekly nonviolent protest in Bilin west of the West Bank city of Ramallah.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Nine residents of Ni’lin arrested for particpation in popular resistance against the apartheid wall
Eight people have been arrested during Israeli invasions of Ni’lin on the nights of November 10th and 11th. Another resident of Ni’lin also decided to turn himself in to Israeli authorities after his home had been invaded by the army for several consecutive nights while his wife and children were harassed by the soldiers looking for him.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/
-resistance-against-the-
PA forces beat, detain fans at football match; fire into crowd
Palestinian Authority (PA) security forces fired on football fans Friday night at a match in progress at the Askar Refugee Camp, witnesses told Ma’an. The match was being played between the Askar Youth team and the Tulkarem Youth Center in Jenin when PA security forces unexpectedly attacked people in the crowd at the amphitheater, reportedly beating several Palestinians with batons and detaining dozens of youths.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Hebron man sentenced to death by firing squad, PCHR appeals to Abbas
A Bethlehem military court sentenced a Palestinian to death on Wednesday after convicting him of treason. Ayman Ahmed Awwad Daghamgha from the Al-Arroub refugee camp north of Hebron and member of the Palestinian General Intelligence Service (PGIS) was found guilty of having collaborated with Israel since 1999.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
UN on Gaza: “People are going to start getting hungry”
The situation in the Gaza Strip is shifting from “collective punishment to genocide,” said Jamal Al-Khudari, member of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) and head of the popular committee against the siege in Gaza. The trickle of humanitarian aid previously allowed into Gaza, on which 80 percent of the population depended, has now been stopped for nine days by the Israeli army. The delivery of medical supplies and industrial fuel donated by the EU has also been blocked. The fuel was needed to power Gaza’s sole power plant, which has now shut down, leading to rolling blackouts throughout Gaza.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Chronic malnutrition in Gaza blamed on Israel
The Israeli blockade of Gaza has led to a steady rise in chronic malnutrition among the 1.5 million people living in the strip, according to a leaked report from the Red Cross.
http://www.independent.co.uk/
-1019521.html
U.N. Shuts Down Gaza Food Distribution Program
The United Nations has shut down a food distribution program that feeds 750,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip after U.N. officials said their warehouses were empty and could not be restocked because of an Israeli blockade.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/
world/mideast
Al-Jazeera Video: Inside Story - Gaza humanitarian crisis - Nov 14
http://palestinianpundit.
Ging appeals for world intervention to save Gaza from imminent disaster
John Ging, the director of UNRWA operations in the Gaza Strip, on Saturday called on the world officials to pressure Israel into ending its collective punishment of the Gaza Strip inhabitants.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Gaza closure concerns EU commissioner
An European Union (EU) official said Friday he was “profoundly concerned” with the effect Israel’s decision to close all Gaza border crossings may have on the area’s population. “I am profoundly concerned about the consequences for the Gazan population of the complete closure of all Gaza crossings for deliveries of fuel and basic humanitarian assistance,” Bentita Ferrero-Waldner, commissioner for External Relations and European Neighborhood Policy, said in a statement..
http://news.xinhuanet.com/
Blockaded Gaza ‘faces disaster’
The UK-based aid agency Oxfam has warned of catastrophe for Gaza and nearby areas of Israel if a truce agreed last June is not maintained.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/
Israel/Occupied Palestinian Territories: Israeli blockade causes worsening humanitarian crisis in Gaza
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/
Israeli army blocks deliveries to Gaza
The Israeli army has completely blocked the delivery of urgently needed humanitarian aid and medical supplies to the Gaza Strip for more than a week. Very little fuel has been allowed in. Amnesty International urged the Israeli authorities on Friday to allow their immediate passage. “This latest tightening of the Israeli blockade has made an already dire humanitarian situation markedly worse. It is nothing short of collective punishment on Gaza’s civilian population and it must stop immediately,” said Philip Luther, Deputy Director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Programme.
http://www.amnesty.org/en/
VIDEO:IOF soldiers reveal how to brutally repress Palestinian civilians
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
Army to court martial soldiers who filmed themselves while humiliating a bound Palestinian
Israeli sources reported that the army decided to court martial Israeli soldiers who filmed themselves humiliating and abusing a bound Palestinian man at a roadblock in the occupied West Bank.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
Hamas protest in Gaza over West Bank arrests
AFP - Thousands of Hamas supporters rallied in Gaza City on Friday to denounce what the Islamists says is the arrest of hundreds of its members by Palestinian authorities in the West Bank.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/
Hamas supporters protest against Abbas’ Fatah movement
Hamas supporters demonstrate against Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah movement in Gaza city, November 14, 2008. The security forces of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Friday arrested 17 Hamas members across the West Bank. Hamas boycotted an Egyptian-led efforts to reconcile it with Fatah due to the West Bank crackdown. (Xinhua Photo)
http://news.xinhuanet.com/
Hamas accuses Abbas of cutting lines of national dialogue after arresting Naseef
The Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, has accused PA chief Mahmoud Abbas of cutting all lines of national dialogue, and held him responsible for the arrest of the Hamas leader Rafat Naseef.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Hamas rallies against “criminal” PA security services, Israeli army
Hamas leaders rallied against Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian Authority (PA)’s security services in a televised media offensive in Gaza City on Friday afternoon. Hamas spokesperson Mushir Al-Masri described President Abbas as the “leader of a gang” during the rally held outside Gaza’s parliament building.
http://www.maannews.net/en/
Bahar calls for exposing crimes of Abbas’s security apparatuses
Dr. Ahmed Bahar, the acting PLC speaker, has called on the Arab masses to organize marches to denounce the crimes committed by the PA chief Mahmoud Abbas’s security apparatuses in the West Bank.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Sources: Hamas looking to postpone national dialogue in order to avoid extending Abbas’ term
Informed Palestinian sources disclosed today that Hamas wants to delay the comprehensive Palestinian dialogue in Cairo until after the ninth of January 2009 when Mahmoud Abbas presidential term ends.
http://www.imemc.org/article/
MIDEAST: Palestinian Factions Torture Opponents
Unity talks between the two main Palestinian political factions Hamas and Fatah failed before they even began this week following Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas’s refusal to release 400 Hamas prisoners held in PA jails in the West Bank.
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.
Abbas to meet Olmert despite IOF escalation in Gaza
PA chief Mahmoud Abbas is to meet with Israeli premier Ehud Olmert on Monday to discuss the settlement process, Saeb Uraikat, who is in charge with the PLO’s negotiation, said on Saturday.
http://www.palestine-info.co.
Gov’t source: Gaza truce can still be resumed
Top government official says it’s not too late to resume ceasefire with Gaza Strip. Nonetheless, ‘if Hamas completely violates the truce, it will a hefty price ‘. Source says Israel not afraid to break truce.
http://www.ynetnews.com/
Hamas not to renew ceasefire
Hamas to demand new conditions for any ceasefire talks, including prior opening of crossings; Islamic Jihad member warns of imminent suicide attacks.
http://www.ynetnews.com/
Hamas: Israelis won’t live in peace unless Palestinians do
The Islamic Hamas movement on Saturday vowed not to allow the Israelis to live in peace unless residents of the Gaza Strip enjoy it.
“The Israelis will not enjoy quietness while the Palestinian people live in bloodshed,” said Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/
In 2006 letter to Bush, Haniyeh offered compromise with Israel
In the second paragraph, Haniyeh laid out the political platform he maintains to this day. “We are so concerned about stability and security in the area that we don’t mind having a Palestinian state in the 1967 borders and offering a truce for many years,” he wrote. Haniyeh called on Bush to launch a dialogue with the Hamas government.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/
EU parliamentarian: “Hamas is fighting an occupation”
The assault on Chris Davies, Liberal Democrat party spokesman for the environment for the north west of Britain and a member of the European Union’s parliamentary delegation to the Palestinian Legislative Council, has delivered a firm political message to the European parliament..
http://electronicintifada.net/
French, Palestinians call US Mideast role crucial
AP - French and Palestinian officials are calling on the administration of U.S. President-elect Barack Obama to quickly take a leading role in the Middle East peace process.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/
Switzerland leans on Israel to stop home demolitions in Jerusalem
Switzerland on Friday condemned the destruction of Palestinian homes in Occupied Jerusalem and said it had made representations to the Israeli Foreign Ministry on the issue. The Swiss Foreign Ministry said it was “deeply worried” and called on “the Israeli government to put an immediate end to operations of destruction carried out under the name of ‘administrative demolitions.’”
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/
Foreign Reporters Furious over Gaza Ban
Foreign journalists are furious that the Israeli Defense Ministry’s closure of Gaza Strip crossings has barred them from entering. They were given no formal notice of the ban. Instead, reporters found out the hard way last week that they could not get into the Strip, either by phone or at the Erez crossing to northern Gaza, according to Conny Mus, a reporter for the Dutch television station RTL.
http://almanar.com.lb/
Mind your own business, settler leader tells Rudd
NADIA Matar, the leader of the Israeli settler movement Women in Green, has a message for Kevin Rudd. “The incredible audacity of you!” she shouted from her home in Efrat, a Jewish settlement of 7700 people in the West Bank. Last weekend, the Rudd Government reversed Howard-era policy and voted in support of a United Nations resolution calling on Israel to stop building settlements in the occupied West Bank.
http://www.theage.com.au/
Settlers Who Long to Leave the West Bank
I get threatening phone calls telling me I am going to be killed,” he said. “Today, I carry a gun because I am afraid of the Jews, not the Arabs.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/
oref=slogin
Palestinian refugees in the Arab world: the right to have a right
The borders between states in the Arab East were historically porous so that refugees were able to move quite easily. Waves of refugees were able to be managed with tremendous tolerance: 800,000 Palestinians, 1 million Iraqis in the 1990s and 2.4 million Iraqis since 2003, 1 million Sudanese since the 1990s.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/
Friday: The day in photos
Israeli soldiers scuffle with an Israeli activist today during a demonstration against construction of a barrier near the West Bank village of Maasarah, near Bethlehem. Israel says the barrier, aimed at sealing off the Jewish state from the West Bank, is necessary for security; Palestinians see the move as a unilateral redrawing of the border.
http://www.latimes.com/news/
Eviction in battle for East Jerusalem
Fawzia al-Kurd, 52, raises her black cloak to show the bottoms of the pyjamas she is still wearing several days after she and her wheelchair-bound husband were forced from the home he had lived for five decades.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/
SJP Statement on violent anti-Palestinian attack on campus
According to dozens of witnesses on the scene, three organizers for the “Zionist Freedom Alliance” attacked one male and two female Arab students who stood nearby the event holding a Palestinian flag. The assailants were identified by the Daily Californian to include current ASUC student senator John Moghtader, Cal alumnus Gabe Weiner, and performer Yehuda De sa. The paper also reported that all three had been cited by the UC Police Department on several counts of battery.
http://calsjp.org/2008/11/14/
Tell Oxford not to create lecture series in Peres’ honor
Oxford University’s Balliol College has decided to honor Shimon Peres and the apartheid state of Israel by inviting him to speak in Oxford, and by planning to establish a lecture series in his name. Peres will deliver his lecture on Tuesday, 18 November 2008 under the title “The Globalization of Peace.”
http://electronicintifada.net/
UN social responsibility member company tied to settlements
A company that is a member of the UN Global Compact for corporate social responsibility has ties to production in an Israeli settlement on the West Bank considered illegal by the United Nations. A spokesperson for the company, Vileda said he was unaware of the contract with a manufacturer in the West Bank. However, a representative of Plasto confirmed that the company was a subcontractor for Vileda.
http://electronicintifada.net/
Israel Tightens Chokehold on Village of Entrepreneurs
Excerpt: The sun is sinking fast behind the trees of an olive grove on the outskirts of the West Bank village of Nilin. After a day of confrontations between the Israeli army and the Palestinian villagers over Israel’s building of its separation wall on Nilin’s land, the soldiers appear finally to have gone.
http://www.antiwar.com/orig/
Palestinian children draw anti-siege paintings in Gaza
Palestinian children draw anti-siege paintings in Gaza, November 14, 2008, as Gaza plunges into darkness after its main power plant shut down due to Israel’s embargo. (Xinhua Photo)
http://news.xinhuanet.com/
Mending the broken wing
Thousands of hectares of land have been confiscated, hundreds of olive trees were uprooted and tens of thousands of trees were burned at the hands of Israeli occupying forces. In Palestinian villages, where social and economic development is sustained from the land, the villagers are left asking: What’s left for next generations?! Abdallah Mesleh reflects on the significance of the harvest to his besieged village of Nilin.
http://electronicintifada.net/
Video: “Nahr al-Bared: Transitions”
More than a year after their homes were destroyed during the battle between the Lebanese army and the militant Islamist group Fatah al-Islam, the majority of the Palestinian refugees from the Nahr al-Bared camp in northern Lebanon find themselves in a difficult situation. Not able to return to their homes, stuck in pre-fabricated housing units and mostly unemployed, many feel frustrated and hopeless that things will improve.
http://electronicintifada.net/
…
Palestine is the Key to World Peace
Dear Mr Obama, Salaam, I am not sure if this will ever pass your eyes. At a time when the whole world is excited about your landmark election and everybody who is somebody is talking about your meteoric rise, this is likely to be dismissed as just another outpouring of emotions from the Middle East. But write I must. And I hope to God it does find its way to your table. Even if it doesn’t, I’ll at least have the consolation of having tried to persuade you what the world, especially the Middle East, expects from you and what a great opportunity you have of changing it for the better.
http://palestinechronicle.com/
Meet the Palestinian Seinfeld. Who knew?
“I’m totally secular, but I’m scared like hell of God.” Sayed Kashua says this with the kind of neurotic, biting humor that has led many people - critics, fans and others - to compare him to Woody Allen. A Palestinian Woody Allen?
http://www.sfgate..com/cgi-
Saturday: 2 US GIs, 12 Iraqis Killed; 42 Iraqis Wounded; US Copter Crash
Excerpt: At least 12 Iraqis were killed and 42 more were wounded in the latest round of violence. Two U.S. servicemembers died in separate incidents, but the casualty figures, if any, from a U.S. helicopter crash in Mosul were unknown.
http://www.antiwar.com/
Iraqi prime minister now backs U.S. security accord
Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki has informed Iraq’s presidency council that he now supports a security agreement with the United States, a Shiite Muslim legislator who’s close to the premier said Friday.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/
Iraq’s al-Sadr renews threats to attack US
Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr on Friday renewed threats to resume attacks on U.S. forces, and the country’s top Shiite cleric was quoted as saying he would intervene if a proposed U.S.-Iraqi security pact infringed on Iraqi sovereignty.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
Counting the dead gets more complicated in Iraq
AP - This much is agreed — a double bombing in Baghdad struck a school bus and those responding to the first blast. But the difference in casualty figures was stark. Iraqi officials said 31 people died; the U.S. military put the death toll at five..
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/
Last Iraqi refugees leave Saudi Arabia
The Rafah Refugee Camp in Saudi Arabia is now empty of its Iraqi refugees who had fled there during the 1991 Gulf War. The camp was established mainly to receive Iraqi army personnel who laid down their guns and surrendered to U.S. troops and Iraqi opponents who rose against the rule of Saddam Hussein in the uprising that took place in southern Iraq.
http://www.azzaman.com/
U.S. May Buy 10,000 All-Terrain, Blast-Proof Trucks
The U.S. military will seek to buy as many as 10,000 all-terrain, blast-proof trucks in an “urgent'’ competition to begin by Dec. 1. The trucks will be called MRAP All-Terrain Vehicles, or M-ATV.
http://www..bloomberg.com/
Rise of sexual terrorism in Iraq
Abu Ghraib. Haditha. Guantanamo. These are words that shame our country. Now, add to them Mahmudiya, a town 20 miles south of Baghdad. There, this March, a group of five American soldiers allegedly were involved in the rape and murder of Abeer Qassim Hamza, a young Iraqi girl. Her body was then set on fire to cover up their crimes, her father, mother, and sister murdered. The rape of this one girl, if proven true, is probably not simply an isolated incident. But how would we know? In Iraq, rape is a taboo subject. Shamed by the rape, relatives of this girl wouldn’t even hold a public funeral and were reluctant to reveal where she is buried.
http://www.alternet.org/
How the Iraq war humiliated the British
The fact that we’re hanging around there still today (over 4,100 soldiers) is a testimony to President Bush’s desire not to lose the fig leaf of his biggest partner in the entire endeavour. Only now, with Obama preparing to move into the White House, can the British finally leave – a reality that Maliki confirmed in October when he sealed the humiliation, tersely informing the British that “their services were no longer required”.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
Israeli PM Candidate’s Website Looks A Lot Like Obama’s… (PHOTO)
JERUSALEM — Click on the Russian-language version of the campaign Web site of Benjamin Netanyahu, the conservative Likud leader running for prime minister of Israel, and up pops a picture of the candidate with Barack Obama. On the Hebrew version, Mr. Obama is not pictured. But he is, in fact, everywhere.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
School District Nixes Arabic Classes
Students in two Chicago’s west suburban high school districts won’t get a chance to study Arabic next year, despite interest from local families. Two districts recently decided they won’t add Arabic classes, disappointing many in the local Muslim community. They’re not the only ones who think Arabic is a smart choice for American kids.
http://www.chicagopublicradio.
Nasrallah: Don’t pin your hopes on Obama
Hezbollah leader Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah has cautioned the Arab world against expecting a change in US foreign policy with Obama.
http://www.presstv.com/detail.
Documents linking Iran to nuclear weapons push may have been fabricated
November 14, 2008The documents in question were acquired by U.S. intelligence in 2004 from a still unknown source — most of them in the form of electronic files allegedly stolen from a laptop computer belonging to an Iranian researcher. The US has based much of its push for sanctions against Iran on these documents.
The new evidence of possible fraud has increased pressure within the IAEA secretariat to distance the agency from the laptop documents, according to a Vienna-based diplomatic source close to the IAEA, who spoke to RAW STORY on condition of anonymity.
The laptop documents include what the IAEA has
These technical papers, along with some correspondence related to the alleged secret Iranian program — referred to by the IAEA as “alleged studies” — have been the primary basis during 2008 for the insistence by the US-led international coalition pushing for sanctions against Iran that the Iranian case must be kept going in the United Nations Security Council.
Handwritten Notes
According to a February 2006 Washington Post article, the United States and its allies believe that Kimia Maadan is a front for the Iranian military.
One of the communications included in the laptop documents – a letter allegedly sent to Kimia Maadan from an unnamed Iranian engineering firm in May 2003 – is at the center of the authenticity argument.
This letter is described in the May 26, 2008 IAEA report as “a one page annotated letter of May 2003 in Farsi.” According to a US source who has been briefed on the matter, the letter has handwritten notes on it which refer to studies on the redesign of a missile reentry vehicle.
Last January, however, Iran turned over to the IAEA a copy of the same May 2003 letter with no handwritten notes on it. This was confirmed by the director of the IAEA Safeguards Department, Olli Heinonen, during a February briefing for member states. Heinonen referred to “correspondence” related to Kimia Maadan that is “identical to that provided by Iran, with the addition of handwritten notes.”
Notes on the Heinonen briefing, compiled by unnamed diplomats who attended it, were posted on the website of the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security.
The copy of the letter without the handwritten notes was part of a larger collection of documentation concerning Kimia Maadan provided to IAEA by Iran in response to a request for an explanation of that firm’s role in the management of the Iranian Gchine uranium mine.
After the IAEA received the copy of the letter without notes from Iran, some officials began pushing for an acknowledgment by the Agency that there were serious questions about the whether the laptop documents were fabricated, according to the Vienna-based source close to the IAEA.
“There was an effort to point out that the Agency isn’t in a position to authenticate the documents,” said the source.
Heinonen and other IAEA Safeguards Department officials have continued, however, to defend the credibility of the document in question.
According to an American source briefed on the dispute, the defenders of the authenticity of the version of the letter with the handwritten notes say that the appearance of the clean copy can be attributed to Kimia Maadan making multiple copies of the original which have been circulated to various staff members.
Only an Ore-processing Plant
The new Iranian documentation, described in the February 22, 2008 IAEA report, proved to IAEA’s satisfaction that the Kimia Maadan Company had been created in May 2000 solely to carry out a project to design, procure and install equipment for an ore processing plant.
The documents also showed that the core staff of Kimia Maadan was able to undertake the work on ore processing only because the nuclear agency had provided it with the technical drawings and reports as the basis for the contract.
“Information and explanations provided by Iran were supported by the documentation, the content of which is consistent with the information already available to the agency,” the IAEA concluded.
Marie Harff, a spokesperson for the CIA, declined to comment.
Additional Doubts About the Letter
A PLC system is one of many types of technology that the United States has long sought to deny to the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran. Iran had informed the IAEA even before 2006 that Kimia Maadan had assisted the AEOI in getting around that denial strategy by procuring various technologies for the planned uranium conversion facility at Esfahan.
Given that Kimia Maadan’s role in procurement for the conversion facility was both unrelated to its technical work for the AEOI and part of a covert effort to get around U.S. restrictions, it seems unlikely that they would have made multiple copies of the letter. Even if multiple copies were made, the firm would certainly have taken normal security precautions for a document of that type, marking each copy with a number or name.
A security procedure of that kind would have identified any missing copies. However, this was not the case with the 2003 letter. The United States, as its reason for refusing to provide a copy of the document to Iran, has argued that it would allow Iranian security personnel to identify the person who wrote the notes from their handwriting, according to the US source who has been briefed on the matter.
Another problem with the handwritten letter is the absence of any logical link between the subject of the letter and the alleged work on redesign of the missile. PLC systems, which are used for automation of industrial processes, such as control of machinery on factory assembly lines, would have been irrelevant to the technical studies on redesigning the Shahab-3 missile.
Other Documents Also Under Suspicion
The IAEA’s May 2008 report describes a flowsheet under Kimia Maadan’s name, showing a “process for bench scale conversion of uranium oxide” to UF4 (uranium tetraflouride), also known as “green salt.” The project number shown in the disputed documents for the “green salt” subproject is 5.13.
However, Heinonen stated that the number given to the Gchine subproject was 5.15. According to the documents obtained by the IAEA from Iran last January, this was the number of the uranium ore processing project that was assigned in 1999 by the civilian AEOI, not by the Iranian Defense Ministry. This would mean that the author of the document used the project number 5.13 for the “green salt” subproject based on their knowledge of the AEOI numbering system and not on a military designation.
In his February 25 briefing, Heinonen additionally referred to an alleged letter sent by Kimia Maadan – as manager of three subprojects – to the “missile re-entry vehicle” project, asking for a “technical opinion” on the plans for equipment for a proposed “green salt” conversion facility.
However, it is difficult to understand why the team working on redesigning the missile would be asked for a “technical opinion” on equipment for a uranium conversion facility.
A spokesperson for the State Department’s Office of Arms Control and International Security, which is responsible for IAEA affairs, said in an e-mail that specialists in the office “aren’t able to comment” on the subject of the intelligence documents now being considered by the IAEA.
The IAEA also declined to comment.
Toward a Showdown on the Contradictions
The next IAEA report, due out in mid-November, will include the first response by the Agency to a confidential 117-page Iranian critique of the laptop documents, according to the Vienna-based source.
In the past, IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei has shown an ability to face off with the United States when evidence has been called into doubt. The infamous “Niger forgeries” – documents that purported to show an agreement between Niger and Iraq for the purchase of uranium oxide – were used by the White House as part of its case for war against Iraq.
In response, ElBaradei sent a letter to the White House and the National Security Council in December 2002, over three months before the US launched the Iraq War, warning that he believed the documents were forgeries and should not be cited as evidence of Iraqi intention to obtain nuclear weapons.
When ElBaradei received no response from the Bush administration, he went public to debunk the Niger forgeries. In a speech at the United Nations in March 2003, he declared that the IAEA, after “thorough analysis,” had concluded that the documents alleging the purchase of uranium by Iraqi from Niger “are in fact not authentic.”
The anomalies that have been revealed by the Iranian documents obtained from Iran last January may not be as obvious as the ones that made it clear the Niger documents were fabrications. Nevertheless, they appear to be red flags for IAEA analysts concerned with the issue.
Suspicion has surrounded the “alleged studies” documents from the beginning, because the United States has refused to say who brought the collection to US intelligence four years ago.
Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)
__._,_.___
