Welcome Information Connoisseurs

Welcome Information Connoisseurs

Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Israeli child-killing strategy; also: casualty figures fiddled

From Richard Seymour, author of The Liberal Defense of Murder:

Amira Hass, in a powerful Dec. 31 article for Ha'aretz, writes: "This isn't the time to speak of ethics, but of precise intelligence. Whoever gave the instructions to send 100 of our planes, piloted by the best of our boys, to bomb and strafe enemy targets in Gaza is familiar with the many schools adjacent to those targets - especially police stations. He also knew that at exactly 11:30 A.M. on Saturday, during the surprise assault on the enemy, all the children of the Strip would be in the streets - half just having finished the morning shift at school, the others en route to the afternoon shift." [http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1051028.html]

This is an important insight. Israel's control of the situation is immense. They have detailed intelligence, sattelite imagery (which they like to show off at press conferences), sophisticated guidance technology, etc. It has planned this assault for months in advance, and its leadership is ostentatiously proud of how all the branches of military and intelligence, from Shin Bet to the Southern Command, have gelled in this attack. If an assault on major public facilities is timed to coincide with children being in the streets, this is not accidental: it is intended to leave a number of children lying in their own blood, and terrorise others.

Palestinian men not counted as civilian casualties

So far, we have been given the impression in media reports that the majority of those killed have been in some sense not civilians. The UN has suggested that of its estimate of 320 deaths, about 62 are civilians... I had assumed that this was because the majority of those killed were policemen and, for some reason, we are all going along with Tel Aviv in not considering this a civilian profession. However! Apparently, I was under-estimating the creativity of the statisticians, for here's a weird thing: the UN's tally of the civilian dead "does not include civilian casualties who are men." [ABC News, Dec. 30, 2008; http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/12/30/2456334.htm]

There is no such thing as a civilian adult male in Gaza! According to this supposed scourge of Israel, any Gazan male with a bit of size on him is fair game.

Israeli power is, of course, extremely creative in determining the fields of law, morality and knowledge within which it operates. After all, when the IDF (Israeli military) slaughtered women outside a mosque in plain view not only of the public but of the cameras, it was immediately explained by Israeli spokespeople and their apologists that the women were in fact part of a cunning Hamas military operation to stop morally upright Israeli men from killing morally degenerate Palestinian men. So, they were a legitimate target. 

And besides, it was hinted, why do they get to wear the veil? What are they hiding? So, if needs must, the very category of civilian, adult or child, male or female, can be conjured out of existence. And then Lt Gen Ashkenazi can come out to the podium and explain: "our intelligence shows that 1.5 million terrorists were eliminated today..."

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Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Israeli onslaught on Gaza: a crime that cannot succeed

The US-backed attempt to bring Hamas to heel by overwhelming force is in fact more likely to boost the movement's appeal

by Seumas Milne
s.milne@guardian.co.uk
The Guardian (UK) | December 30, 2008
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/dec/30/israel-and-the-palestinians-middle-east

Israel's decision to launch its devastating attack on Gaza on a Saturday was a "stroke of brilliance", the country's biggest selling paper Yediot Aharonot crowed: "the element of surprise increased the number of people who were killed." The daily Ma'ariv agreed: "We left them in shock and awe."

Of the ferocity of the assault on one of the most overcrowded and destitute corners of the earth, there is at least no question. In the bloodiest onslaught on blockaded Gaza since it was captured and occupied by Israel 41 years ago, at least 310 people were killed and more than a thousand reported injured in the first 48 hours alone.

As well as scores of ordinary police officers incinerated in a passing-out parade, at least 56 civilians were said by the UN to have died as Israel used American-supplied F-16s and Apache helicopters to attack a string of civilian targets it linked to Hamas, including a mosque, private homes and the Islamic university. Hamas military and political facilities were mostly deserted, while police stations in residential areas were teeming as they were pulverised.

As Israeli journalist Amos Harel wrote in Ha'aretz at the weekend, "little or no weight was apparently devoted to the question of harming innocent civilians", as in US operations in Iraq. Among those killed in the first wave of strikes were eight teenage students waiting for a bus and four girls from the same family in Jabaliya, aged one to 12 years old.

Anyone who doubts the impact of these atrocities among Arabs and Muslims worldwide should switch on the satellite television stations that are watched avidly across the Middle East and which - unlike their western counterparts - do not habitually sanitise the barbarity meted out in the name of multiple wars on terror.

Then, having seen a child dying in her parent's arms live on TV, consider what sort of western response there would have been to an attack on Israel, or the US or Britain for that matter, which left more than 300 dead in a couple of days.

You can be certain it would be met with the most sweeping condemnation, that the US president-elect would do a great deal more than "monitor" the situation and the British prime minister go much further than simply call for "restraint" on both sides.

But that is in fact all they did do, though the British government has since joined the call for a ceasefire. There has, of course, been no western denunciation of the Israeli slaughter - such aerial destruction is, after all, routinely called in by the US and Britain in occupied Iraq and Afghanistan.

Instead, Hamas and the Palestinians of Gaza are held responsible for what has been visited upon them. How could any government not respond with overwhelming force to the constant firing of rockets into its territory, the Israelis demand, echoed by western governments and media.

But that is to turn reality on its head. Like the West Bank, the Gaza Strip has been - and continues to be - illegally occupied by Israel since 1967. Despite the withdrawal of troops and settlements three years ago, Israel maintains complete control of the territory by sea, air and land. And since Hamas won the Palestinian elections in 2006, Israel has punished its 1.5 million people with an inhuman blockade of essential supplies, backed by the US and the European Union.

Like any occupied people, the Palestinians have the right to resist, whether they choose to exercise it or not. But there is no right of defence for an illegal occupation - there is an obligation to withdraw comprehensively. During the last seven years, 14 Israelis have been killed by mostly homemade rockets fired from the Gaza Strip, while more than 5,000 Palestinians were killed by Israel with some of the most advanced US-supplied armaments in the world. And while no rockets are fired from the West Bank, 45 Palestinians have died there at Israel's hands this year alone. The issue is of course not just the vast disparity in weapons and power, but that one side is the occupier, the other the occupied.

Hamas is likewise blamed for last month's breakdown of the six-month tahdi'a, or lull. But, in a weary reprise of past ceasefires, it was in fact sunk by Israel's assassination of six Hamas fighters in Gaza on November 5 and its refusal to lift its siege of the embattled territory as expected under an Egyptian-brokered deal. The truth is that Israel and its western sponsors have set their face against an accommodation with the Palestinians' democratic choice and have instead thrown their political weight, cash and arms behind a sustained attempt to overthrow it.

The complete failure of that approach has brought us to this week's horrific pass. Israeli leaders believe they can bomb Hamas into submission with a "decisive blow" that will establish a "new security environment" - and boost their electoral fortunes in the process before Barack Obama comes to office.

But as with Israel's disastrous assault on Lebanon two years ago - or its earlier siege of Yasser Arafat's PLO in Beirut in 1982 - it is a strategy that cannot succeed. Even more than Hezbollah, Hamas's appeal among Palestinians and beyond doesn't derive from its puny infrastructure, or even its Islamist ideology, but its spirit of resistance to decades of injustice. So long as it remains standing in the face of this onslaught, its influence will only be strengthened. And if it is not with rockets, its retaliation is bound to take other forms, as Hamas's leader Khalid Mish'al made clear at the weekend.

Meanwhile, the US and Israeli-backed Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas has been further diminished by being seen as having colluded in the Israeli assault on his own people - as has the already rock-bottom credibility of the Egyptian regime. What is now taking place in the Palestinian territories is a futile crime in which the US and its allies are deeply complicit - and unless Obama is prepared to change course, it is likely to have bitter consequences that will touch us all.

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Israelis kill five sisters: Tahrir, Ikram, Samur, Dina & Ayah

Family Mourns 5 Daughters as Civilian Death Toll Mounts

By Sudarsan Raghavan and Islam Abdel Kareem
Washington Post | December 30, 2008

JERUSALEM, Dec. 29 -- Trapped in the rubble, Iman Balousha, dressed in her green pajamas, said she could hear her sisters' cries. "Mother! Mother! Where is my mother? Pull me out!" Their muffled voices slipped through the toppled bricks.

Early Monday, an Israeli airstrike on the Jabalya refugee camp in the Gaza Strip destroyed the family's house, located next to the Emad Aqeel mosque, the intended target, which was also flattened. Rescuers tried frantically to save the girls. Iman was lucky: She was half-buried in the debris.

One by one, the cries stopped, Iman recalled in an interview. She could see the leg of her 4-year-old sister, Jawaher, whom her family called Ayah. She could touch her hair. But minutes later, Ayah stopped breathing.

"I've lost five sisters," Iman, 16, said at a relative's house Monday evening, her soft voice fading. Tears slid down her face. Her mother, Samira, held her 16-month-old son, whose face was bruised and specked with dried blood.

"Does my 12-days-old baby have a rocket with her?" Samira demanded. "Or my son, does he have a missile with him? Or did my daughters have AK-47s beside them? Why did they target them?" The five daughters who died were ages 4 to 17.

Concerns mounted over the growing toll on civilians in the Gaza Strip as Israeli jets carried out airstrikes for the third straight day. Many of the casualties have been civilians who live around targets in the densely populated strip. The United Nations on Monday said at least 57 Palestinian civilians have been killed since the Israeli offensive began Saturday, based on visits to hospitals and medical facilities. Officials described that number as conservative.

In total, over three days, 364 Palestinians have been killed and hundreds more wounded, said Gaza medical officials, in the deadliest wave of attacks in Gaza since Israel captured control of the seaside territory from Egypt in 1967. Hamas has retaliated, firing a barrage of rockets into southern Israel that has killed four Israelis.

"The Israelis say they are targeting Hamas, but they are targeting the innocent kids who are sleeping," Samira said.

On Monday, the U.N. Relief and Works Agency said an Israeli missile targeted policemen standing near a Gaza government building, across the street from a U.N. training center. Eight students, ages 18 to 20, were killed while waiting for a U.N. bus to take them home, and 19 were injured. Eight remained in critical condition Monday, the agency said in a statement.

"They are tragic illustrations of how civilians are so vulnerable in this conflict, when such overwhelming means of force is used in such a tight and densely populated part of the world," said Christopher Gunness, a U.N. spokesman, referring to the deaths of the students and Iman's sisters.

On Monday, U.N. officials complained to the Israeli government after a U.N. building was severely damaged by two missiles targeting an adjacent guesthouse used by the Hamas government in Gaza.

Human rights groups demanded that Israel and Egypt open up humanitarian corridors into the Gaza Strip for the delivery of aid. Gazans are facing shortages of medical personnel, medicine, food, electricity and water, aid workers said.

"The horrific death toll risks growing due to the unavailability of adequate medical care for the hundreds of injured," Amnesty International said in a statement, appealing to Israel and Egypt to allow the Palestinian wounded to be treated in their countries. "It is utterly unacceptable for Israel to continue to purposefully deprive 1.5 million people of food and other basic necessities."

Seeking Comfort in Their House

When the airstrikes began Saturday, Samira and her nine children were at her father's house. They decided to return to their own house because "there was no difference anywhere in Gaza," Samira said. Her eldest daughter, Tahrir, she said, remarked that she would "rather live all together or die all together."

So they returned to their house. They felt some comfort living next to a mosque, which would not be targeted, they thought.

At 10 p.m. Sunday, Samira said goodnight to her seven daughters. They all slept in the same bedroom in the tiny house without electricity in this sprawling refugee camp. Before she left the room, she doused the kerosene lamp. "I was worried that an airstrike would rattle the house and the lamp would fall and burn down the room," Samira said.

Then she and her husband, Anwar, took their son, Muhammed, and baby daughter, Bara, to their room.

The mosque next door was an Israeli target. It was named after Emad Aqeel, a Hamas member who died fighting Israel. Hamas controls many mosques across Gaza, which serve as key venues for winning popular support.

Samira and Anwar recalled waking up to Bara and Muhammed's screams. They were covered in rubble. Some bricks had struck the boy's face; the girl had been tossed from the bed. Anwar remembers telling his wife to utter shehada, the prayer Muslims say before they die.

Somehow they managed to push away the rubble and move through the darkness. Neighbors were trying to remove the debris. Samira grabbed Muhammed and handed him to a rescuer; Anwar picked up Bara and stumbled outside to the street. Samira went to her daughters' room.

"I found a mountain of concrete over my daughters," Samira said. "I could do nothing. So I ran out in the street, screaming."

" 'There are seven girls in the room,' I yelled. 'Please go and bring them out.' " Neighbors took her to a hospital. A relative told her all the girls were alive.

Inside the room, Iman struggled to escape. She cried for help. Finally the rescuers heard her and pulled her out. "Where is my father? Where is my mother?" she asked. A few minutes later, her sister Samah, 10, also emerged.

"I didn't see my other sisters until I was saying goodbye to them at the morgue," Iman said, sobbing.

As she spoke in her relatives' house, Samira looked at her baby son's bruised face and shooed away the flies around his head. "I hope the Israelis' heart will be harmed like they hurt my heart," she said.

Iman's grandmother was there. Suddenly, another airstrike hit nearby, the sounds crashing through the house.

"Please, God, save our children," the grandmother screamed.

'Why Me? Why My Family?'

Anwar Balousha entered his shattered house Monday evening. Bruises covered his face. His head was wrapped in a bandage. He could barely walk. With the help of his relatives, he hobbled around the rubble. Water dripped from a still-intact ceiling.

In his daughters' room, he found a framed verse from the Koran. It read: "Nothing will happen to us but the things that God wrought for us."

It used to hang above his daughters' bed.

Standing there, Anwar remembered how Tahrir excelled at her studies. He struggled to understand how a poor unemployed day laborer could suffer so much in one night.

"I don't have anything to do with any Palestinian faction. I have nothing to do with Hamas or anyone. I am just an ordinary person."

"Why me? Why my family?" he asked no one in particular. He sobbed. "I have lost Tahrir, Ikram, Samur, Dina and Ayah. I have lost five daughters. I loved them all." He looked around.

"I am ready to die 100 times to bring back my daughters."

Kareem reported from the Jabalya refugee camp.

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Monday, December 29, 2008

Gaza: the logic of colonial power

As so often, the term 'terrorism' has proved a rhetorical smokescreen under cover of which the strong crush the weak

by Nir Rosen
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/dec/29/gaza-hamas-israel
December 29, 2008 

Once again, the Israelis bomb the starving and imprisoned population of Gaza. The world watches the plight of 1.5 million Gazans live on TV and online; the western media largely justify the Israeli action...

The powerful – whether Israel, America, Russia or China – will always describe their victims' struggle as terrorism, but the destruction of Chechnya, the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, the slow slaughter of the remaining Palestinians, the American occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan – with the tens of thousands of civilians it has killed … these will never earn the title of terrorism, though civilians were the target and terrorising them was the purpose.

Counterinsurgency, now popular again among in the Pentagon, is another way of saying the suppression of national liberation struggles. Terror and intimidation are as essential to it as is winning hearts and minds.

Normative rules are determined by power relations. Those with power determine what is legal and illegal. They besiege the weak in legal prohibitions to prevent the weak from resisting. For the weak to resist is illegal by definition. Concepts like terrorism are invented and used normatively as if a neutral court had produced them, instead of the oppressors. The danger in this excessive use of legality actually undermines legality, diminishing the credibility of international institutions such as the United Nations. It becomes apparent that the powerful, those who make the rules, insist on legality merely to preserve the power relations that serve them or to maintain their occupation and colonialism.

Attacking civilians is the last, most desperate and basic method of resistance when confronting overwhelming odds and imminent eradication. The Palestinians do not attack Israeli civilians with the expectation that they will destroy Israel. The land of Palestine is being stolen day after day; the Palestinian people is being eradicated day after day. As a result, they respond in whatever way they can to apply pressure on Israel. 

Colonial powers use civilians strategically, settling them to claim land and dispossess the native population, be they Indians in North America or Palestinians in what is now Israel and the Occupied Territories. When the native population sees that there is an irreversible dynamic that is taking away their land and identity with the support of an overwhelming power, then they are forced to resort to whatever methods of resistance they can.

Not long ago, 19-year-old Qassem al-Mughrabi, a Palestinian man from Jerusalem drove his car into a group of soldiers at an intersection. "The terrorist", as the Israeli newspaper Haaretz called him, was shot and killed. In two separate incidents last July, Palestinians from Jerusalem also used vehicles to attack Israelis. The attackers were not part of an organisation. Although those Palestinian men were also killed, senior Israeli officials called for their homes to be demolished. 

In a separate incident, Haaretz reported that a Palestinian woman blinded an Israeli soldier in one eye..."The terrorist was arrested by security forces," the paper said. An occupied citizen attacks an occupying soldier, and she is the terrorist?

In September, Bush spoke at the United Nations. No cause could justify the deliberate taking of human life, he said. Yet the US has killed thousands of civilians in airstrikes on populated areas. When you drop bombs on populated areas knowing there will be some "collateral" civilian damage, but accepting it as worth it, then it is deliberate. When you impose sanctions, as the US did on Saddam era Iraq, that kill hundreds of thousands, and then say their deaths were worth it, as secretary of state Albright did, then you are deliberately killing people for a political goal. When you seek to "shock and awe", as president Bush did, when he bombed Iraq, you are engaging in terrorism.

Just as the traditional American cowboy film presented white Americans under siege, with Indians as the aggressors, which was the opposite of reality, so, too, have Palestinians become the aggressors and not the victims. Beginning in 1948, 750,000 Palestinians were deliberately cleansed and expelled from their homes, and hundreds of their villages were destroyed, and their land was settled by colonists, who went on to deny their very existence and wage a 60-year war against the remaining natives and the national liberation movements the Palestinians established around the world. 

Every day, more of Palestine is stolen, more Palestinians are killed. To call oneself an Israeli Zionist is to engage in the dispossession of entire people. It is not that, qua Palestinians, they have the right to use any means necessary, it is because they are weak. The weak have much less power than the strong, and can do much less damage. The Palestinians would not have ever bombed cafes or used home-made missiles if they had tanks and airplanes. It is only in the current context that their actions are justified, and there are obvious limits....Can an Iraqi be justified in attacking the United States? After all, his country was attacked without provocation, and destroyed, with millions of refugees created, hundreds of thousands of dead. And this, after 12 years of bombings and sanctions, which killed many and destroyed the lives of many others.

I could argue that all Americans are benefiting from their country's exploits without having to pay the price, and that, in today's world, the imperial machine is not merely the military but a military-civilian network. And I could also say that Americans elected the Bush administration twice and elected representatives who did nothing to stop the war, and the American people themselves did nothing. From the perspective of an American, or an Israeli, or other powerful aggressors, if you are strong, everything you do is justifiable, and nothing the weak do is legitimate. It's merely a question of what side you choose: the side of the strong or the side of the weak.

Israel and its allies in the west and in Arab regimes such as Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia have managed to corrupt the PLO leadership, to suborn them with the promise of power at the expense of liberty for their people, creating a first – a liberation movement that collaborated with the occupier. Israeli elections are coming up and, as usual, these elections are accompanied by war to bolster the candidates. You cannot be prime minister of Israel without enough Arab blood on your hands

An Israeli general has threatened to set Gaza back decades, just as they threatened to set Lebanon back decades in 2006. As if strangling Gaza and denying its people fuel, power or food had not set it back decades already.

The democratically elected Hamas government was targeted for destruction from the day it won the elections in 2006. The world told the Palestinians that they cannot have democracy, as if the goal was to radicalise them further and as if that would not have a consequence. Israel claims it is targeting Hamas's military forces. This is not true. It is targeting Palestinian police forces and killing them, including some such as the chief of police, Tawfiq Jaber, who was actually a former Fatah official who stayed on in his post after Hamas took control of Gaza. What will happen to a society with no security forces? What do the Israelis expect to happen when forces more radical than Hamas gain power?

A Zionist Israel is not a viable long-term project and Israeli settlements, land expropriation and separation barriers have long since made a two state solution impossible. There can be only one state in historic Palestine. In coming decades, Israelis will be confronted with two options. Will they peacefully transition towards an equal society, where Palestinians are given the same rights, à la post-apartheid South Africa? Or will they continue to view democracy as a threat? If so, one of the peoples will be forced to leave. Colonialism has only worked when most of the natives have been exterminated. But often, as in occupied Algeria, it is the settlers who flee. Eventually, the Palestinians will not be willing to compromise and seek one state for both people. Does the world want to further radicalise them?

Do not be deceived: the persistence of the Palestine problem is the main motive for every anti-American militant in the Arab world and beyond. But now the Bush administration has added Iraq and Afghanistan as additional grievances. America has lost its influence on the Arab masses, even if it can still apply pressure on Arab regimes. But reformists and elites in the Arab world want nothing to do with America...

(Emphasis supplied)

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Sunday, December 28, 2008

Egyptian regime tricked Hamas into not evacuating

Editor's note:  Egypt is a dictatorship. "Democracy" is a joke there, yet it enjoys full US support and American taxpayer largesse because the Egyptian regime - despite much official safety valve hot air to the contrary - is a satrapy of the Israeli state. The Bush regime's talk of encouraging "democracy" in the Middle East is a farce. No matter how tyrannical an Arab state (Jordan, Saudi Arabia), if it covertly cooperates with Zionism, that is the sole criterion for a US buttress of a corrupt regime. 
 
Egypt stabbed Hamas in back


Egypt collaborated with Israel by deliberately misleading Hamas and allowing Tel Aviv to deal a blow to the movement, a report claims.  Citing diplomatic sources, the London-based daily al-Quds al-Arabi reported Sunday [Dec. 28] that Egyptian Intelligence Minister Omar Suleiman had deceived Hamas into believing that Israel would not launch an attack on the Gaza Strip in the near future.  According to the report, the misinformation lured Hamas into not evacuating its security compounds and headquarters.

Suleiman convinced a number of Arab leaders that Israel was intending to launch only limited operations into the Gaza Strip to mount pressure on Hamas ahead of signing a new ceasefire agreement, the report added.  Egypt told Hamas on Friday evening that Israel had agreed to begin talks on a ceasefire and would not attack Gaza before Cairo ended its diplomatic efforts, the daily quoted Hamas sources close to former Palestinian Foreign Minister Mahmoud al-Zahar as saying.  The report added that Egypt's assurance persuaded Hamas not to evacuate its security compounds in accordance with routine procedures in place after any threats by Israel.

http://www.presstv.ir/ detail.asp...ionid=351020202 [Ken Waldron]

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Talmudic arithmetic in Gaza

"Today... the essential calculation... has been blatantly revealed.... One Israeli life is worth a hundred Palestinian lives."

By John Berger
12.27.2008 | http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org

"We are now spectators of the latest - and perhaps penultimate - chapter of the 60 year old conflict between Israel and the Palestinian people. About the complexities of this tragic conflict billions of words have been pronounced, defending one side or the other.

Today, in face of the Israeli attacks on Gaza, the essential calculation, which was always covertly there, behind this conflict, has been blatantly revealed. The death of one Israeli victim justifies the killing of a hundred Palestinians. One Israeli life is worth a hundred Palestinian lives.

This is what the Israeli State and the world media more or less - with marginal questioning - mindlessly repeat. And this claim, which has accompanied and justified the longest Occupation of foreign territories in 20th C. European history, is viscerally racist. That the Jewish people should accept this, that the world should concur, that the Palestinians should submit to it - is one of history's ironic jokes. There's no laughter anywhere. We can, however, refute it, more and more vocally. Let's do so."

John Berger is an English art critic, painter, and novelist. Two years ago, he launched an appeal for worldwide cultural boycott against the Israeli state: John Berger, "We Must Speak Out," Guardian, 15 December 2006; and "John Berger and 93 Other Authors, Film-makers, Musicians and Performers Call for a Cultural Boycott of Israel," Ramallah, 15 December 2006. 

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Saturday, December 27, 2008

The Israeli Nazis and the Palestinian Allies

The latest Israeli slaughter in Gaza and the rockets of Hamas in the context of Allied "Good War" morality

by Michael Hoffman

Copyright©2008. All Rights Reserved
www.RevisionistHistory.org

The latest Israeli war crime in Gaza reminds me of a central idea of a book I hope to one day complete on the Cryptocracy's great game with Islam, in this case pertaining to the morality message of World War II.

In World War II the Allies conducted themselves, as Franklin Roosevelt stated, as though the entire German people were collectively involved in a conspiracy against civilization. With this rationale in hand, the Allies proceeded to terrorize the German people as no people have ever been terrorized by a state. Every instrument of the terrorist was employed: assassination, bombing and mass murder. Rather than being condemned or prosecuted, the Allied terrorism was characterized as history's one, certain "Good War" and I will not exhaust you with a litany of the other sterling sobriquets with which moralists and alleged humanitarians have laurel-wreathed the Allied bloodbath.

The Muslims, along with the rest of the world, observed the Allied morality play and in the midst of the West's media blitz have had a center seat at all of the movies, documentaries and official commemorations of the heroism and goodness of the Allied attacks on civilians, on the basis that the Germans, including German women, children, infants and the unborn of pregnant German mothers, were occupiers, colonizers, aggressors and exterminators who got what they deserved.

I have witnessed no serious attempt anywhere across the spectrum of western public opinion to overthrow World War II Allied morality. If anything, it has become more extravagant in its claims of moral purity and ethical crusading.

The Palestinians, having learned the lesson of World War II as perpetually imparted by Hollywood and New York, identify the Israelis as Nazis who colonize, occupy and yes, exterminate -- in so far as they are able in a media age where little is done in secret that escapes hand-held video cameras and Internet blogs.

For example, in the Gaza ghetto, for years the Israelis have forced 1.5 million people to go without food, medical care, heating fuel, electricity, clean water and facilities and infrastructure necessary to life or even a half-way decent standard of living. In response to these Nazi-like actions by the Zionists, Hamas fires primitive rockets at Zionist civilians. The West tends to see only the Hamas rockets, not the record of Israeli mass murder, dispossession and occupation which led to the rocket fire.

According to the Allied logic of World War II, Hamas is completely in the right and nothing Hamas does to the Nazi-Israelis is wrong; in fact, the Hamas rocket fire must be classed, by Allied logic, as a step on the path toward civilization and against barbarism.

This writer believes that attacks on civilians are always wrong, whether they be German, Palestinian or Israeli. But the West can't have it both ways: it can't teach, as it has for generations, that one may burn and slaughter German civilians righteously, without restraint of any kind, and then celebrate that terrible carnage for the next six decades in every possible forum, while telling Hamas and the Palestinians that they dare not imitate the Allied/World War II example. Muslims have no regard for western hypocrisy and they will hurl themselves at the Israelis as the Allies hurled themselves at the Germans and this will probably continue for as long as the Allied slaughter of Germans is held to be the gold standard of ethical conduct in war.

Those who uphold the myth of Allied morality ought to uphold Palestinian resistance to Israeli conquest and slaughter. In view of this, the Israeli-Nazi attacks today in Gaza will only further enflame the resolve of Arabs and Muslims throughout the world to resist by any means -- including guns and bombs -- the "collectively guilty" 21st century Israeli people, just as the Allies murdered, burned and bombed the "collectively guilty" German people of the 1940s. Few in the West today view the Allies as terrorists and few in Islamic countries view Hamas as terrorist.

The next "Good War" has only just begun.

Hoffman is co-author of The Israeli Holocaust Against the Palestinians. His latest work is Judaism Discovered: A Study of the Anti-Biblical Religion of Racism, Self-Worship, Superstition and Deceit, now in its second printing, in spite of having been banned by Amazon.com (the only book about Judaism which has that distinction). Ordering information is here: http://www.revisionisthistory.org/page1/news.html

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Saturday, December 20, 2008

Judaic Hollywood: No longer in denial of the facts


Editor's note: The technology that made movies possible was invented by Thomas Edison. Cinema was created and raised to an art by D.W. Griffith. Both men were gentiles. They quickly lost control over their invention/art form, however.

How Jewish is Hollywood?


by Joel Stein
jstein@latimescolumnists.com

Los Angeles Times, December 19, 2008

I have never been so upset by a poll in my life. Only 22% of Americans now believe "the movie and television industries are pretty much run by Jews," down from nearly 50% in 1964. The Anti-Defamation League, which released the poll results last month, sees in these numbers a victory against stereotyping. Actually, it just shows how dumb America has gotten. Jews totally run Hollywood.

How deeply Jewish is Hollywood? When the studio chiefs took out a full-page ad in the Los Angeles Times a few weeks ago to demand that the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) settle its contract, the open letter was signed by: News Corp. President Peter Chernin (Jewish), Paramount Pictures Chairman Brad Grey (Jewish), Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Robert Iger (Jewish), Sony Pictures Chairman Michael Lynton (surprise, Dutch Jew), Warner Bros. Chairman Barry Meyer (Jewish), CBS Corp. Chief Executive Leslie Moonves (so Jewish his great uncle was the first prime minister of Israel), MGM Chairman Harry Sloan (Jewish) and NBC Universal Chief Executive Jeff Zucker (mega-Jewish)...SAG President is Alan Rosenberg (take a guess)....entertainment super-agent Ari Emanuel (Jew with Israeli parents) ...AMC President Charlie Collier, turned out to be Jewish.

...As a proud Jew, I want America to know about our accomplishment. Yes, we control Hollywood. Without us, you'd be flipping between "The 700 Club" and "Davey and Goliath" on TV all day... I don't care if Americans think we're running the news media, Hollywood, Wall Street or the government. I just care that we get to keep running them.

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Friday, December 19, 2008

The Secret Motivation of "Deep Throat"

Also: The rationale for the lies and deceit of the New York Times
It's not hard to see that W. Mark Felt, the "Deep Throat" informer who passed away yesterday and who helped blow the cover off Watergate, was motivated not by noble Constitutional motives (in 1980 Felt was convicted of violating the Constitutional rights of Americans), but by rage at President Richard Nixon for failing to nominate him to head the FBI.

At Felt's trial, Nixon, who knew that Felt had informed to some degree but did not suspect that he was "Deep Throat," testified on behalf of the man who had betrayed him. 

Felt then spent the next twenty-five years denying that he was "Deep Throat." Observe the Talmudic device by which the New York Times exculpates' Felt's decades of lies:

"Mr. Felt then disappeared from public view for a quarter of a century, denying unequivocally, time and again, that he had been Deep Throat. It was a lie he told to serve what he believed to be a higher truth."

Like Mr. Felt, the Zionist-Talmudic New York Times lies by omission or commission when the lie will "serve a higher truth."

***

W. Mark Felt, Watergate Deep Throat, Dies at 95

By Tim Weiner, NY Times, December 19, 2008

W. Mark Felt, who was the No. 2 official at the F.B.I. when he helped bring down President Richard M. Nixon by resisting the Watergate cover-up and becoming Deep Throat, the most famous anonymous source in American history, died Thursday Dec. 18. He was 95 and lived in Santa Rosa, Calif....In 2005, Mr. Felt revealed that he was the one who had secretly supplied Bob Woodward of The Washington Post with crucial leads in the Watergate affair in the early 1970s. His decision to unmask himself, in an article in Vanity Fair, ended a guessing game that had gone on for more than 30 years....Without Mr. Felt, there might not have been a Watergate...

Like Nixon, Mr. Felt authorized illegal break-ins in the name of national security and then received the absolution of a presidential pardon. Their lives were intertwined in ways only they and a few others knew. Nixon cursed his name when he learned early on that Mr. Felt was providing aid to the enemy in the wars of Watergate. The conversation was recorded in the Oval Office and later made public. “We know what’s leaked, and we know who leaked it,” Nixon’s chief of staff, H. R. Haldeman, told the president on Oct. 19, 1972, four months after a team of washed-up Central Intelligence Agency personnel hired by the White House was caught trying to wiretap the Democratic Party’s national offices at the Watergate complex.

“Somebody in the F.B.I.?” Nixon asked.

“Yes, sir,” Mr. Haldeman replied. Who? the president asked. “Mark Felt,” Mr. Haldeman said.

“Now why the hell would he do that?” the president asked in a wounded tone.

No one, including Mr. Felt, ever answered that question in full...Mr. Felt had expected to be named to succeed J. Edgar Hoover, who had run the bureau for 48 years and died in May 1972. The president instead chose a politically loyal Justice Department official, L. Patrick Gray III...The choice infuriated Mr. Felt...On July 1, 1971, Hoover promoted Mr. Felt to deputy associate director, the third in command at the headquarters, beneath Hoover’s right-hand man and longtime companion, Clyde A. Tolson. With both of his superiors in poor health, Mr. Felt increasingly took effective command of the daily work of the F.B.I. When Mr. Hoover died and Mr. Tolson retired, he saw his path to power cleared....But Nixon denied him, and he seethed with frustrated ambition in the summer of 1972. One evening that summer, a few weeks after the Watergate break-in, Mr. Woodward, then a neophyte newspaperman, knocked on Mr. Felt’s door in pursuit of the story. Mr. Felt decided to co-operate with him and set up an elaborate system of espionage techniques for clandestine meetings with Mr. Woodward....

Within weeks, Mr. Felt steered The (Washington) Post to a story establishing that the Watergate break-in was part of “a massive campaign of political spying and sabotage” directed by the White House. For the next eight months, he did his best to keep the newspaper on the trail, largely by providing, on “deep background,” anonymous confirmation of facts reporters had gathered from others. The Post’s managing editor, Howard Simons, gave him his famous pseudonym, taken from the pornographic movie then in vogue...

While Watergate was seething, Mr. Felt authorized nine illegal break-ins at the homes of friends and relatives of members of the Weather Underground, a violent left-wing splinter group. The people he chose as targets had committed no crimes. The F.B.I. had no search warrants. He later said he ordered the break-ins because national security required it.

In a criminal trial, Mr. Felt was convicted in November 1980 of conspiring to violate the constitutional rights of Americans. Nixon, who had denounced him in private for leaking Watergate secrets, testified on his behalf. Called by the prosecution, he told the jury that presidents and by extension their officers had an inherent right to conduct illegal searches in the name of national security.

“As Deep Throat, Felt helped establish the principle that our highest government officials are subject to the Constitution and the laws of the land,” the prosecutor, John W. Nields, wrote in The Washington Post in 2005. “Yet when it came to the Weather Underground bag jobs, he seems not to have been aware that this same principle applied to him.”

Seven months after the conviction, President Ronald Reagan pardoned Mr. Felt. Then 67, Mr. Felt celebrated the decision as one of great symbolic value. “This is going to be the biggest shot in the arm for the intelligence community for a long time,” he said. After the pardon, Nixon sent him a congratulatory bottle of Champagne.

...By June 1973, Mr. Felt was forced out of the F.B.I. Soon he came under investigation by some of the same agents he had supervised...

Mr. Felt then disappeared from public view for a quarter of a century, denying unequivocally, time and again, that he had been Deep Throat. It was a lie he told to serve what he believed to be a higher truth...

***

Hoffman is the author of the underground bestseller, Judaism Discovered: A Study of the Anti-Biblical Religion of Racism, Self-Worship, Superstition and Deceit, now in its second printing, in spite having been banned by Amazon.com (the only book about Judaism which has that distinction). 

Ordering information is here: http://www.revisionisthistory.org/page1/news.html

***

Wednesday, December 17, 2008

Judaic Columnist Urges: "Kill the Muslims"

Excerpt: "Any and all collateral damage in the form of casualties to friends, relatives, or anyone connected to the lives of these terrorists should be swiftly ignored...In terms of Jewish law, I think that the issue is probably clear. While no army should go out of its way to harm a civilian population in times of war, during the legitimate pursuit of an enemy that has instigated an attack against its people, a nation may defend itself with whatever means necessary, even if it includes causing death to civilians.."

The Appropriate Response To Islamic Terror
By Lawrence Kulak
Published December 11, 2008
The Five Towns Jewish Times, pp. 59-61

http://209.85.173.132/search?q=cache:-Jz30rqwkNUJ:www.5tjt.com/news/read.asp%3FId%3D3539+5+towns+jewish+times&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=2&gl=us

Some of the greatest discoveries of medical science, most notably penicillin, have been made by sheer accident. It is a signal tragedy of our times that, in the all too conspicuous absence of competent statesmanship among the leadership of democracies around the world... the solutions to certain international security issues must also be discovered by accident.

About six months ago, there was an article published in the New York Times about an incident in Afghanistan where the U.S. military, while attempting to take out a certain Taliban terrorist, dropped a bomb on a tent that was occupied by members of his extended family, killing several women and children. The particular terrorist that was being hunted was not home at the time, although there were several others that were part of the same terrorist network who were also killed.

This story ostensibly was published for the purpose of demonstrating the “horrors” of warfare, focusing primarily on the women and children in the tent who were killed, by all accounts of the U.S. military spokespeople, unintentionally. In our dangerous age of political tentativeness and compromised militaries, however, there is an overwhelming probability that even top-ranking U.S. military commanders were unaware that they may have accidentally stumbled upon the solution to international terror.

I’ll never forget how, during the last Lebanon war with Hezbollah, an Orthodox Jewish Russian immigrant who had survived Stalin approached me, gesturing with his hand while repeating the word “tzetlach” (“notes” or “letters” in Yiddish). He was referring to the pieces of paper which were dropped by the Israeli Air Force over Lebanon warning civilians of the bombs that were about to be dropped. In the process, the Hezbollah terrorists were also warned, which may have allowed them to escape to the north in large numbers and ultimately force Israel to belatedly engage its ground troops, leading to numerous casualties and the loss of the war.

“Did Stalin drop tzetlach when he bombed Berlin during the Second World War?” my Russian immigrant friend asked, obviously comparing the militant, pro-Hezbollah Lebanese civilians to the citizens of Germany during the Holocaust. The United States, it seems, did in fact originally institute the practice of dropping leaflets over an enemy population, as it did before it bombed Dresden and Berlin, but apparently Stalin had his own ideas. Israel was apparently afraid to stray from the U.S. precedent even if it meant risking the loss of a war.

In terms of Jewish law, I think that the issue is probably clear. While no army should go out of its way to harm a civilian population in times of war, during the legitimate pursuit of an enemy that has instigated an attack against its people, a nation may defend itself with whatever means necessary, even if it includes causing death to civilians. Those who are inclined to issue knee-jerk gasps to this common sense state of affairs that is etched in the Mosaic law are probably easily forgetful of the fact that Muslim countries are routinely targeting innocent civilians via their terrorist proxies and leaving the standing armies of nations alone. This is more or less what recently occurred in Mumbai, India.

Although the attack had all the hallmarks of Al Qaeda penetration into local Pakistani Muslim terror groups, there is ample evidence of complicity by the Pakistani Intelligence Service (known as the ISI.) which has a long and well-known history of facilitating acts of terror in Indian-held Kashmir. Reports indicate that a rogue element of the ISI recently forged a link with a local terrorist commander linked to Al Qaeda, which then embarked upon a plan to target Westerners in Mumbai.

The Mumbai attack signifies a change of course for Al Qaeda, which until this point had refrained from attacking India because of India’s prior course of neutrality vis-à-vis Islam’s conflicts with the West, and because of the need for its use of India as a transfer point to fly undetected in and out of Pakistan and the Afghan regions. This perhaps explains in part why India’s naval security was in such a state of low awareness and why there was not a perceived need to update their police department’s anti-terrorist training. (The Jewish Center was allegedly targeted specifically for attack for reasons stemming from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.)

Whatever the level or degree of the Pakistani government’s complicity in the attack that is ultimately proven to have taken place, the fact is that this operation could not have been accomplished without assistance from Pakistani Intelligence. This factor makes the Mumbai attack as much of an attack on India’s sovereignty as it was an attack on its civilians and foreign visitors. As such, it cries out for some type of retaliatory attack by the Indian government.

Aside from India, however, the attack on the foreign nationals of Israel, the United States, and Great Britain by proxy also constitutes an act of war against these countries and therefore legitimizes the infiltration of Pakistani territory for the purpose of pursuing the aggressors. While a generalized war with Pakistan should not be contemplated or pursued, it may be unavoidable, depending upon the vigilance with which Pakistan seeks to defend the terrorists within its borders.

The retaliation that is undertaken should strike hard at the training bases, madrassa schools, and homes of all the properly identified terrorist commanders and fellow terrorists of those identified in the attack, in a series of sustained surprise attacks over a period of time that is aimed at total eradication of the entire network that coordinated this attack. Any and all collateral damage in the form of casualties to friends, relatives, or anyone connected to the lives of these terrorists should be swiftly ignored. Public opinion and what is written in the newspapers should also be ignored by nations seeking to avenge the death of its innocent civilians.

When terrorists undertake to hide behind a sovereign government and to attempt to hide within its borders, it becomes the responsibility of that government to take swift action to flush them out and to neutralize them. Pakistan has obviously not done this, and is itself responsible for failing to purge itself of rogue commanders who facilitated the carnage in Mumbai. It must now step aside and let the foreign governments whose citizens have been mercilessly attacked take the proper course of action. George W. Bush certainly knows how to do it, and if his heart will be in the right place, so does Barack Obama.

As for the Islamic terrorists themselves, there has been a universal ineptitude in understanding their mentalities and how they work. Primarily because of leftist leaders and public sympathy with revolutionary mindsets, which have in cancerous fashion infiltrated the efficient workings of Western governments and Israel, the tactics that are necessary to defeat Islamic terror have been suppressed and discarded as politically incorrect. Many will remember how before Shimon Peres encouraged Prime Minister Rabin to embark on his infamous peace process with Arafat, the latter advocated “breaking the bones” of Arab rioters in the West Bank and Gaza as a means of putting down the intifada. Those means were apparently used for a period of time by Rabin, with much success, until his government decided to embark on a seriously unwise course of conciliation with premeditated and avowed murderers.

President Bush also delivered a setback to his own war on terror when, in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, he labeled Islam a peaceful religion that had been hijacked by radical elements. By making that statement, the president all but rejected the possibility of taking drastic action to eliminate entire terrorist networks that would of necessity cause the mass deaths of other potential operatives, and those others clandestinely associated with the actual terrorists, who provide means of support.

Contrary to all attention that has been given to the Muslim shaheed’s pursuit of the 72 virgins, the idea of martyrdom in Islam is really more of an exaggerated spin-off of good old fashioned American machismo and hero worship. A Muslim will seek martyrdom in order to bring honor to himself and to his family, just as a Muslim will kill others even within his own family to prevent or offset a similar association with dishonor or shame. If he knows that his family will all be killed, and there will be nobody left after him to claim that honor, he will be left with little reason to pursue his murderous mission.

One of the main daggers which Israel has thrust into its own heart was the government’s decision to abort the practice of demolishing the homes of terrorists. The prospect of rendering his own family homeless and desperate served to deter a potential terrorist from killing himself and anybody else by reducing the honor and machismo associated with the act. The notion of the 72 virgins is only a reward for the achievement of an act that brings honor to himself and his family, but there is nothing honorable in Islam about bringing harm to one’s family.

Perhaps this is the underlying reason why, since the war of terror has begun, we have been unsuccessful in tracking down Bin Laden. And if, as many feared before the presidential election, Barack Obama is really sympathetic to the Muslims radicals, it might also explain why his main promise in continuing Bush’s war on terror was to pursue this archterrorist through the hills of Pakistan. If Bin Laden is killed and hence martyred, it will only bring honor to himself and his family, who will be very much intact and alive. That will only give rise to more militant imams and more terrorist leaders.

Moreover, the only way to deal with Islamic terrorists is the same way in which they deal with their victims. Muslims believe in the literal interpretation of the Biblical doctrine of an eye for an eye, and they do not have respect for anything perceived as a lesser standard of justice. They killed our innocents, and unless we kill theirs, they will go on killing ours. The Torah, however, preaches a doctrine which, if implemented by the West, could finally put an end to all Islamic terror: If somebody is coming to kill you, rise up and kill him first.  [End quote]

Lawrence Kulak can be reached at Craniumcrust@yahoo.com

 CAIR Asks NY Jewish Leaders to Repudiate Call to Kill Muslims
12/12/2008 2:39:00 PM

(NEW YORK, NY, 12/12/08) - The New York chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-NY) today called on leaders of the Jewish community in that state to repudiate a columnist for a Jewish newspaper who called for the killing of “innocent” Muslims.

In a commentary in the December 12 issue of the 5 Towns Jewish Times, titled, “The Appropriate Response to Islamic Terror,” Lawrence Kulak wrote:

“Moreover, the only way to deal with Islamic terrorists is the same way in which they deal with their victims. Muslims believe in the literal interpretation of the Biblical doctrine of an eye for an eye, and they do not have respect for anything perceived as a lesser standard of justice. They killed our innocents, and unless we kill theirs, they will go on killing ours.”

SEE: The Appropriate Response to Islamic Terror (Pages 59-61)

“Such inflammatory comments have no place in reasoned public discourse,” said CAIR-NY Community Affairs Director Faiza N. Ali. “Calls for violence against innocent civilians of any faith should face universal rejection and repudiation by religious leaders.”

CAIR-NY and the Muslim Public Affairs Council, New York City office (MPAC-NYC) recently recommended that interfaith exchanges take place between Indian Hindus and Muslims in the wake of the Mumbai attacks.

CONTACT: CAIR-NY Community Affairs Director Faiza N. Ali, 212-870-2002, 718-724-3041, fali@cair.com; CAIR-NY Civil Rights Director Aliya Latif, 212-870-2002, 732-429-4268, alatif@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202 488-8787 or 202-744-7726, E-Mail: ihooper@cair.com

***

Monday, December 15, 2008

Revisionist Christmas Carols (as Israeli tanks go by)

O LITTLE TOWN OF BETHLEHEM

O little town of Bethlehem ,
How still we see thee lie!
A wall is laid where tourists stayed,
And tanks go rolling by.
And in thy dark streets shineth
No cheerful Christmas light;
The grief and fears of four sad years
Are met in thee tonight.

How silently, how silently
The world regards it all,
As now thy heart is torn apart
By Israel's ghetto wall.
They terrorize a people -
A war crime and a sin;
Their winding "fence" can make no sense;
Revenge can still get in.

O promised child of Bethlehem,
Cast down the iron cage,
The walls of hate that separate
And harden and enrage;
Bring justice and make equal;
Come down from far above;
And come to birth upon this earth,
As hope and peace and love.

ONCE IN ROYAL DAVID'S CITY

Once in royal David's city
Stood some big Israeli tanks;
Mothers giving birth to babies
Met with checkpoints and roadbanks.
Holy land was all defiled
As a bullet killed a child.

Round the ancient tomb of Rachel
They have built a ghetto wall;
Rachel's weeping for her children,
And "her children" means us all.
But this city's strangulated,
Rachel's children segregated.

David's people once instructed
All the world in righteousness;
Once they spoke of truth and justice,
Now they ravage and oppress.
Nations, look at Bethlehem ,
And speak out the truth to them.

THE TWELVE DAYS OF CHRISTMAS

On the first day of Christmas, Arik Sharon sent me
An uprooted olive tree.

On the second day of Christmas, Arik Sharon sent me
Two trampled doves
And an uprooted olive tree.

On the third day of Christmas, Arik Sharon sent me
Three trench guns,
Two trampled doves,
And an uprooted olive tree.

On the fourth day of Christmas, Arik Sharon sent me
Four falling bombs,
Three trench guns,
Two trampled doves,
And an uprooted olive tree.

On the fifth day of Christmas, Arik Sharon sent me
Five settlement rings.
Four falling bombs,
Three trench guns,
Two trampled doves,
And an uprooted olive tree.

On the sixth day of Christmas, Arik Sharon sent me
Six tanks a-rolling,
Five settlement rings.
Four falling bombs,
Three trench guns,
Two trampled doves,
And an uprooted olive tree.

On the seventh day of Christmas, Arik Sharon sent me
Seven checkpoints blocking,
Six tanks a-rolling,
Five settlement rings.
Four falling bombs,
Three trench guns,
Two trampled doves,
And an uprooted olive tree.

On the eighth day of Christmas, Arik Sharon sent me
Eight gunships firing,
Seven checkpoints blocking,
Six tanks a-rolling,
Five settlement rings.
Four falling bombs,
Three trench guns,
Two trampled doves,
And an uprooted olive tree.

On the ninth day of Christmas, Arik Sharon sent me
Nine smashed computers,
Eight gunships firing,
Seven checkpoints blocking,
Six tanks a-rolling,
Five settlement rings.
Four falling bombs,
Three trench guns,
Two trampled doves,
And an uprooted olive tree.

On the tenth day of Christmas, Arik Sharon sent me
Ten wells obstructed,
Nine smashed computers,
Eight gunships firing,
Seven checkpoints blocking,
Six tanks a-rolling,
Five settlement rings.
Four falling bombs,
Three trench guns,
Two trampled doves,
And an uprooted olive tree.

On the eleventh day of Christmas, Arik Sharon sent me
Eleven homes demolished,
Ten wells obstructed,
Nine smashed computers,
Eight gunships firing,
Seven checkpoints blocking,
Six tanks a-rolling,
Five settlement rings,
Four falling bombs,
Three trench guns,
Two trampled doves,
And an uprooted olive tree.

On the twelfth day of Christmas, Arik Sharon sent me
Twelve assassinations,
Eleven homes demolished,
Ten wells obstructed,
Nine smashed computers,
Eight gunships firing,
Seven checkpoints blocking,
Six tanks a-rolling,
Five settlement rings.
Four falling bombs,
Three trench guns,
Two trampled doves,

And an uprooted olive tree.

O COME ALL YE FAITHFUL

O come all ye faithful,
All who care for justice,
O look ye, O look ye at Bethlehem ;
Come and behold it
Under occupation.
O come, let's not ignore it,
O come, let's not ignore it,
O come, let's not ignore it,
Tell the world.

Sing, all ye people,
Sing in indignation,
Be with the citizens of Bethlehem ;
Sing out for justice,
Freedom from oppression.
O come, let's not ignore it,
O come, let's not ignore it,
O come, let's not ignore it,
Tell the world.

IN THE BLEAK MIDWINTER

In the bleak midwinter,
Refugees made moan;
Sharon stood like iron,
Bush was like a stone.
Tanks were rolling, tank on tank,
Tank on tank,
Through the camps of Gaza
And the West Bank .

How can we stop him,
Ariel Sharon?
Silence of the nations
Lets him carry on.
Where is there a wise man
Who could do his part?
Tell the world to stop him
With its heart.

THE OLIVE AND THE IDF (Israeli Army)

The olive and the IDF
When they are both full-grown,
Every olive tree on the West Bank
The IDF cuts down.

O the rampaging of settlers
And the rolling of the tanks;
The grinding of the bulldozers
As the olives fall in ranks.

The olive bears a berry
As green as any grass;
When the owners go to pick the fruit
They're not allowed to pass.

O the rampaging of settlers
And the rolling of the tanks;
The grinding of the bulldozers
As the olives fall in ranks.

This oppression bears a berry
As red as any blood,
As the owners see their livelihoods
All trampled into mud.

O the rampaging of settlers,
And the rolling of the tanks;
The grinding of the bulldozers
As the olives fall in ranks.

If you want to buy the olives,
You'll find it very hard;
To those that make it to checkpoints
The way outside is barred.

O the rampaging of settlers,
And the rolling of the tanks;
The grinding of the bulldozers
As the olives fall in ranks.

The olive and the IDF,
When they are both full-grown,
Every olive tree on the West Bank
The IDF cuts down.

WE FOUR KINGS

FOUR KINGS TOGETHER

We four kings, we're called the Quartet;
With a roadmap off we all set,
No-one knowing where we're going,
Or how far we can get.

CHORUS

O, map of wonder, map of light,
Map of promises so bright,
In three phases, through the mazes
Guide us with no end in sight.

1ST KING

I'm King George, the USA man;
And it goes according to plan;
Fighting terror, righting error;
After Iraq, Iran .

CHORUS

O, map of wonder, etc.

2ND KING

I this year am King of EU;
My name's known to more than a few -
Sarkozy; I and Tony
Take from King George our cue.

CHORUS

O map of wonder, etc.

3RD KING

I'm King Putin, Muscovite Tzar,
With this map I travel afar;
I'm partaking in peace-making,
Just like in Chechnya .

CHORUS

O map of wonder, etc.

4TH KING

I'm Ban Ki-Moon, head of UN;
It makes laws again and again,
But ignored is, for the sword is
Mightier than the pen.

CHORUS

O map of wonder, etc..

FOUR KINGS TOGETHER

We four kings, we're all in a flap,
For we've got ourselves in a trap -
Stopped by trenches, walls and fences,
Not marked upon the map.

CHORUS

O map of wonder, etc.

FOUR KINGS TOGETHER

We four kings, bewildered we are,
For this map's not getting us far,
Nowhere leading - for we're needing
Not a map but a star.

CHORUS

O star of freedom, star of light,
Star of peace with justice bright,
Shining ever, they can never
Target-bomb thy perfect light.

Israeli ambassador blasts London church
December 11, 2008 LONDON (JTA) -- Israel's ambassador to London added a diplomatic dimension to a row over anti-Israel carol singers at a central London church.

Two weeks ago, a group called “Jews for boycotting Israeli goods” performed at St. James's Church in Piccadilly with its own version of Christmas carols, in which it changed the words of the familiar carols to lyrics referring to Israel’s actions in Gaza and the West Bank.

The performance drew huge criticism, and on Wednesday, the Ambassador Ron Prosor told the Times: “It was appalling to see a church allow one of its most endearing seasonal traditions to be hijacked by hatred.”

He also attacked the lack of strong condemnation by the Church of England leadership. "Only the 'merry gentlemen' of Hamas and its fellow extremists will take any 'tidings of comfort and joy' from this event," he said. "In Bethlehem, even if Santa Claus is coming to town, when he gets there, he’ll be met with a frosty reception by Islamic extremists."

He added: “Unfortunately, the criticism from within the Church of England, that should have echoed with bold moral clarity, has instead sounded like a silent night, but far from holy.”

Prosor went on to attack the head of St. James's Church, saying, “It is saddening that Rev. Charles Hedley should have allowed the beautiful acoustics of his church to be abused to create such discord. If Hedley’s aim was to create harmony, he might have expressed a modicum of concern for the Israeli victims of terrorist violence.”

He also discussed the wider implications of the event. "Hedley's decision undermines the hard work that has taken place to improve relations between Christians, Muslims and Jews. He should understand that interfaith dialogue, tolerance and open-mindedness are the way forward to brotherly love, and not the interfaith ranting and raving of the 'carol service' at St. James's Piccadilly."

***

Friday, February 29, 2008

Israelis Threaten to Holocaust Gaza

Israel Warns Gaza Of "Shoah"

By REUTERS | Filed at 5:33 p.m. ET | February 29, 2008

GAZA (Reuters) - A year-old Palestinian girl and a senior Hamas bombmaker were killed in the Gaza Strip on Friday as Israel pressed home air strikes after a senior official warned Gazans they risked a "shoah" if rocket fire did not stop.

With the Palestinian death toll at 35 in three days, aides insisted the deputy defense minister used the Hebrew word not in its common meaning of holocaust but only as a term for disaster.

But the strength of his language reflected mounting anger after an Israeli was killed by a rocket on Wednesday and the government debated whether to mount a major ground offensive.

Hamas, which organized rallies in Gaza, held the comment up as proof their enemies were the "new Nazis."

Friday saw fewer air strikes. One, which the army said had targeted a rocket squad, killed Eyad al-Ashram. Hamas said he was one of the Islamist group's senior munitions experts.

Doctors said one-year-old Malak al-Kafarna died in hospital from a shrapnel wound to the head after a missile exploded near her home, wounding four other civilians. Hamas officials said it was an Israeli surface-to-surface missile. Residents said some rockets fired by militants also fell short, landing inside Gaza.

Political sources said Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was wary of launching a major ground offensive and Israeli public radio stations quoted security sources saying that, while plans for an assault were being prepared, such an invasion was not imminent.

The United States, whose Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is due next week to visit Olmert and Palestinian leaders in the occupied West Bank, urged Israel to "consider the consequences" of its action. Bloodshed could derail Washington's hopes of a peace deal this year before President George W. Bush steps down.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who has shared Israel's hostility to Hamas since they routed his forces in Gaza in June, called Israeli threats "dangerous." Even Palestinians who want to see Hamas defeated are outraged that at least 16 civilians, including children as young as 6 months, were among the 35 dead.

"A BIGGER "SHOAH

Israel's deputy defense minister Matan Vilnai told Army Radio: "The more Qassam fire intensifies and the rockets reach a longer range, they will bring upon themselves a bigger 'shoah' because we will use all our might to defend ourselves."

The word "shoah" is rarely used in Israel beyond discussions of the Nazi Holocaust of the Jews but government spokesmen said Vilnai had employed the word only to mean "disaster."

Israeli leaders said rockets from the blockaded territory may leave them no choice but to launch a broader offensive into the crowded coastal strip, which is home to 1.5 million people and which Israel occupied for 38 years until 2005.

Though rocket fire has long disrupted life in small Israeli border towns since then, the killing of an Israeli on Wednesday, the first such death since May, has increased public pressure on Olmert's already unpopular coalition government to act.

Hamas has also raised the stakes by firing Soviet-designed Katyusha missiles, more powerful and accurate than improvised Gazan Qassams, to strike the much larger city of Ashkelon.

Visiting there, Defense Minister Ehud Barak said an Israeli response was "required" and that "Hamas bears responsibility for this deterioration and it will also bear the results."

Ismail Haniyeh, the Hamas leader who was Abbas's prime minister until June, told supporters: "This is a proof of Israel's pre-planned aggressive intentions against our people. "They want the world to condemn what they call the Holocaust and now they are threatening our people with a holocaust."

According to Israel's Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper, Barak has sought to prepare the way for an offensive by sending confidential messages to world leaders, including Rice. "Israel is not keen on and rushing for an offensive, but Hamas is leaving us no choice," Barak told them, Yedioth said.

However, chastened by his 2006 war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, Olmert is wary of an operation that would incur more casualties when Israel is reluctant to re-occupy Gaza long-term.

Rice has voiced concern for Palestinian civilian deaths but stopped short of calling for Israeli restraint. Officials say she will make clear support for Israel's right to defend itself.

***

Tuesday, February 26, 2008

U.N: Terrorism is inevitable consequence of Israeli occupation

Findings of the UN Commission on Human Rights:

Palestinian terrorism is the "inevitable consequence of (Israeli) colonialism, apartheid or occupation"

CONTENTS

1. Michael Hoffman's condensed digest of highlights from this eye-opening UN Human Rights Report on Palestine, by Justice John Dugard, Jan. 21, 2008.

2. The FULL-LENGTH Report (highly recommended reading) of the UN Human Rights Jan. 21, 2008. Report on Palestine by Justice John Dugard.

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1. Michael Hoffman's condensed digest of the Report
www.RevisionistHistory.org

...the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) are guilty of terrorizing innocent Palestinian civilians by military incursions, targeted killings and sonic booms that fail to distinguish between military targets and civilians. All these acts must be condemned and have been condemned.

Common sense...dictates that a distinction must be drawn between acts of mindless terror, such as acts committed by Al Qaeda, and acts committed in the course of a war of national liberation against colonialism, apartheid or military occupation. While such acts cannot be justified, they must be understood as being a painful but inevitable consequence of colonialism, apartheid or occupation.

History is replete with examples of military occupation that have been resisted by violence - acts of terror. The German occupation was resisted by many European countries in the Second World War; the South West Africa People's Organization (SWAPO) resisted South Africa's occupation of Namibia; and Jewish groups resisted British occupation of Palestine - inter alia, by the blowing up of the King David Hotel in 1946 with heavy loss of life, by a group masterminded by Menachem Begin, who later became Prime Minister of Israel.

Acts of terror against military occupation must be seen in historical context. This is why every effort should be made to bring the (Israeli) occupation to a speedy end. Until this is done, peace cannot be expected, and violence will continue. In other situations, for example Namibia, peace has been achieved by the ending of occupation, without setting the end of resistance as a precondition. Israel cannot expect perfect peace and the end of violence as a precondition for the ending of the occupation.

A further comment on terrorism is called for. In the present international climate it is easy for a State to justify its repressive measures as a response to terrorism - and to expect a sympathetic hearing. Israel exploits the present international fear of terrorism to the full. But this will not solve the Palestinian problem. Israel must address the occupation and the violation of human rights and international humanitarian law it engenders, and not invoke the justification of terrorism as a distraction, as a pretext for failure to confront the root cause of Palestinian violence - the occupation.

...In the past two years 668 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli security forces in Gaza. Over half - 359 people - were not involved in hostilities at the time they were killed. Of those killed 126 were minors; 361 were killed by missiles fired from helicopters; and 29 of those killed were targeted for assassination. During the same period, Palestinians fired some 2,800 Qassam rockets and mortar shells into Israel from the Gaza Strip. Four Israeli civilians were killed by Qassam rockets...Four members of the Israeli security forces were killed in attacks originating from Gaza.

Serious questions arise over the proportionality of Israel's military response and its failure to distinguish between military and civilian targets. It is highly arguable that Israel has violated the most fundamental rules of international humanitarian law, which constitute war crimes in terms of article 147 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and article 85 of the Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts (Additional Protocol I). These crimes include direct attacks against civilians and civilian objects, and attacks which fail to distinguish between military targets and civilians and civilian objects (articles 48, 51 (4) and 52 (1) of Protocol I); the excessive use of force arising from disproportionate attacks on civilians and civilian objects (articles 51 (4) and 51 (5) of Protocol I); and the spreading of terror among the civilian population (article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and article 51 (2) of Protocol I).

The indiscriminate and excessive use of force against civilians and civilian objects, the destruction of electricity and water supplies, the bombardment of public buildings, the restrictions on freedom of movement, the closure of crossings and the consequences that these actions have upon public health, food, family life and the psychological well-being of the Palestinian people constitute a gross form of collective punishment.

Since 1967 over 700,000 Palestinians have been imprisoned. At present, there are some 11,000 (Palestinian) prisoners in Israeli jails, a number which includes 376 children, 118 women, 44 members of the Palestinian Legislative Council and some 800 "administrative detainees" (that is, persons not convicted for any offense...).

On 20 July 2004 the General Assembly adopted resolution ES-10/15 which called for Israel to comply with the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice. This resolution was adopted by 150 nations. Six nations (Australia, Micronesia, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau, United States) voted against it. There were 10 abstentions....

Since 2004, the Advisory Opinion has been ignored by the Security Council. While the General Assembly and Human Rights Council have passed several resolutions reaffirming the Opinion, no attempt has been made by the Security Council to compel Israel to comply with the Opinion or to remind States of their obligation to ensure compliance by Israel with the Fourth Geneva Convention.

The reason for this is not hard to find. The Security Council is prevented from giving its backing to the Opinion by the United States, which has refused to accept it.

For 40 years the political organs of the United Nations, States and individuals have accused Israel of consistent, systematic and gross violations of human rights and humanitarian law...

In 2004 the judicial organ of the United Nations, in its Advisory Opinion, affirmed that Israel's actions in the occupied territories do indeed violate fundamental norms of human rights and humanitarian law and cannot be justified on grounds of self-defence or necessity.

If the United Nations is serious about human rights it cannot afford to ignore this Opinion in the deliberations of the Quartet, as it is an authoritative affirmation that Israel is in serious breach of its international commitments.

Failure to attempt to implement, or even to acknowledge, an advisory opinion dealing with international humanitarian law and human rights law, brings the very commitment of the United Nations to human rights into question.

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Investigator Dugard's education, experience and credentials:
LL.D. degree from Cambridge University (1980)
Former Director of the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law at the University of Cambridge (1995-1997)
Former Chairman of the Dept. of Public International Law at Leiden University in the Netherlands (1998)
Judge ad hoc on the International Court of Justice at The Hague (2000)
United Nations "Special Rapporteur" (investigator) for Human Rights (current position)

[The FULL-LENGTH Report:]

GE.08-40229 (E) 290108 UNITED NATIONS General Assembly Distr. GENERAL A/HRC/7/17 21 January 2008
Original: ENGLISH
HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL Seventh session Item 7 of the provisional agenda. Reference: A/HRC/7/17

HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION IN PALESTINE AND OTHER OCCUPIED ARAB TERRITORIES
Report of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967

By JOHN DUGARD
http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G08/402/29/PDF/G0840229.pdf?OpenElement

Summary
This year marks the fortieth anniversary of the occupation of the Palestinian territory. Israel's obligations as an occupying Power have not diminished as a result of the prolonged nature of the occupation.

Israel remains the occupying Power in Gaza despite its claim that Gaza is a "hostile territory". This means that its actions must be measured against the standards of international humanitarian law and human rights law. Judged by these standards Israel is in serious violation of its legal obligations. The collective punishment of Gaza by Israel is expressly prohibited by international humanitarian law and has resulted in a serious humanitarian crisis.

The human rights situation in the West Bank has worsened, despite expectations that it would improve following the removal of Hamas from the Government of the West Bank. Settlements expand, the construction of the wall continues, and checkpoints increase in number. Military incursions and arrests have intensified, 779 Palestinian prisoners have been released but some 11,000 remain in Israeli jails.

The right of self-determination of the Palestinian people is seriously threatened by the separation of Gaza and the West Bank resulting from the seizure of power by Hamas in Gaza in June 2007. Every effort must be made by the international community to restore Palestinian unity.

On 27 November a new peace process was initiated at a meeting in Annapolis. This process must take place within a normative framework that respects international law, international humanitarian law and human rights. The Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice on the Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory1 is an essential feature of this framework and cannot be overlooked by the Annapolis peace process, the Israeli and Palestinian authorities, the Quartet and the United Nations. The Secretary-General as the representative of the United Nations must ensure that the Advisory Opinion, which represents the law of the United Nations, is respected by all parties engaged in the Annapolis process.

Introduction 1. The Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967 visited the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) from 25 September to 1 October 2007. During this time he visited Gaza, Jerusalem, Ramallah, Bethlehem, Jericho and Nablus, where he met with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) - both Palestinian and Israeli - United Nations agencies, Palestinian officials, academics, businessmen and independent interlocutors. The Special Rapporteur spent a considerable amount of time in the field, visiting factories in Gaza, checkpoints, settlements, Palestinian villages affected by the wall near Bethlehem, Nablus and Qalqiliya, and villages and communities in the Jordan valley. On 30 September he delivered a lecture at Al-Najah University in Nablus. The visit of the Special Rapporteur to the OPT was preceded and followed by visits to Jordan where he met with Jordanian officials. The purpose of these meetings was to obtain a Jordanian perspective on the human rights situation in the OPT.

I. CRITICISM OF SPECIAL RAPPORTEUR AND MANDATE
The Special Rapporteur has been criticized for a number of reasons by concerned States. First, reports are repetitious. Second, they fail to address terrorism. Third, they fail to consider human rights violations committed by Palestinians. These criticisms will be briefly considered at the outset of the present report. A. Repetition 3. It is true that reports on the OPT follow a familiar pattern and deal with substantially similar factual situations. They record violations of human rights and international humanitarian law that have occurred in a systematic and consistent manner over many years, some going back to the start of the occupation 40 years ago. Settlements, checkpoints, demolition of houses, torture, closure of crossings and military incursions have characterized the occupation for many decades and have featured regularly in reports. Reports inevitably, and correctly, continue to report on such matters and to record their consequences and frequency in a changing environment.

New violations of human rights and humanitarian law are added as they occur, such as the construction of the wall (since 2003), sonic booms, targeted killings, the use of Palestinians as human shields, and the humanitarian crisis produced by the non-payment of tax money due to the Palestinians. In short, reports are repetitious because the same violations of human rights and humanitarian law continue to occur in the OPT. B. Terrorism Terrorism is a scourge, a serious violation of human rights and international humanitarian law. No attempt is made in the reports to minimize the pain and suffering it causes to victims, their families and the broader community. Palestinians are guilty of terrorizing innocent Israeli civilians by means of suicide bombs and Qassam rockets.

Likewise the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) are guilty of terrorizing innocent Palestinian civilians by military incursions, targeted killings and sonic booms that fail to distinguish between military targets and civilians. All these acts must be condemned and have been condemned.

Common sense, however, dictates that a distinction must be drawn between acts of mindless terror, such as acts committed by Al Qaeda, and acts committed in the course of a war of national liberation against colonialism, apartheid or military occupation. While such acts cannot be justified, they must be understood as being a painful but inevitable consequence of colonialism, apartheid or occupation.

History is replete with examples of military occupation that have been resisted by violence - acts of terror. The German occupation was resisted by many European countries in the Second World War; the South West Africa People's Organization (SWAPO) resisted South Africa's occupation of Namibia; and Jewish groups resisted British occupation of Palestine - inter alia, by the blowing up of the King David Hotel in 1946 with heavy loss of life, by a group masterminded by Menachem Begin, who later became Prime Minister of Israel.

Acts of terror against military occupation must be seen in historical context. This is why every effort should be made to bring the occupation to a speedy end. Until this is done peace cannot be expected, and violence will continue. In other situations, for example Namibia, peace has been achieved by the ending of occupation, without setting the end of resistance as a precondition. Israel cannot expect perfect peace and the end of violence as a precondition for the ending of the occupation.

A further comment on terrorism is called for. In the present international climate it is easy for a State to justify its repressive measures as a response to terrorism - and to expect a sympathetic hearing. Israel exploits the present international fear of terrorism to the full. But this will not solve the Palestinian problem. Israel must address the occupation and the violation of human rights and international humanitarian law it engenders, and not invoke the justification of terrorism as a distraction, as a pretext for failure to confront the root cause of Palestinian violence - the occupation.

Palestinian human rights violations
The mandate of the Special Rapporteur is concerned with violations of human rights and international humanitarian law that are a consequence of military occupation. Although military occupation is tolerated by international law it is not approved and must be brought to a speedy end. The mandate of the Special Rapporteur therefore requires him to report on human rights violations committed by the occupying Power and not by the occupied people. For this reason this report, like previous reports, will not address the violation of the human rights of Israelis by Palestinians. Nor will it address the conflict between Fatah and Hamas, and the human rights violations that this conflict has engendered. Similarly it will not consider the human rights record of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank or of Hamas in Gaza.

The Special Rapporteur is aware of the ongoing violations of human rights committed by Palestinians upon Palestinians and by Palestinians upon Israelis. He is deeply concerned and condemns such violations. However, they find no place in this report because the mandate requires that the report be limited to the consequences of the military occupation of the OPT by Israel.

II. THE OCCUPATION OF THE OCCUPIED PALESTINIAN TERRITORY What distinguishes the case of Palestine from other situations in which violations of human rights occur is the occupation, an occupation which began in 1967, 40 years ago, and which shows no sign of ending. In Israel, complaints are frequently made that criticism of its policies and practices are too much centred on the occupation. But the occupation is a reality, one which is to blame for the present conflict, and the source of the violation of human rights and of international humanitarian law. Consequently, it is necessary to commence this report - again - with comments on the occupation.

Israel has been for 40 years and remains in military occupation of the OPT. This was reaffirmed by the International Court of Justice in its 2004 Advisory Opinion on the Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, when it held that the Palestinian territories (including East Jerusalem) "remain occupied territories and Israel has continued to have the status of occupying Power". The consequence of this, in the opinion of the International Court, is that the Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War (Fourth Geneva Convention) applies to the Occupied Palestinian Territory, as do the International Covenants on Civil and Political Rights and on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.4 Furthermore, Israel's obligations have not diminished as a result of the prolonged nature of the occupation.5 On the contrary, they have increased as a result of it. It is now argued that Israel's occupation has become unlawful as a result of the numerous violations of international law that have occurred during the occupation.

III. THE OCCUPATION OF GAZA

In its Advisory Opinion on the construction of a wall in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, the International Court of Justice was not asked to pronounce on the legal status of Gaza. It, possibly therefore, confined its reaffirmation of the occupied status of the Occupied Palestinian Territory to the West Bank and East Jerusalem.7 The evacuation of Israeli settlements and the withdrawal of the permanent IDF presence from Gaza in 2005, has now given rise to the argument that Gaza is no longer occupied territory. On 15 September 2005 Prime Minister Sharon told the General Assembly that Israel's withdrawal from Gaza meant the end of its responsibility for Gaza.

See Adam Roberts, "Prolonged military occupation: the Israeli occupied territories since 1967", American Journal of International Law, vol. 84 (1990), pp. 55-57 and 95.

O. Ben-Naftali, A.M. Gross and K. Michaeli, "Illegal occupation: framing the Occupied Palestinian Territory", Berkeley Journal of International Law, vol. 23, No. 3 (2005), pp. 551-614.

On 19 September 2007 Israel seemed to give a new status to Gaza when its Security Cabinet declared Gaza to be "hostile territory" - a characterization that was shortly afterwards approved by the United States Secretary of State. Although the legal implications that Israel intends to attach to this "status" remain unclear, the political purpose of this declaration was immediately made known - namely the reduction of the supply of fuel and electricity to Gaza.

The test for determining whether a territory is occupied under international law is effective control,8 and not the permanent physical presence of the occupying Power's military forces in the territory in question. Judged by this test it is clear that Israel remains the occupying Power as technological developments have made it possible for Israel to assert control over the people of Gaza without a permanent military presence.9 Israel's effective control is demonstrated by the following factors:

(a) Substantial control of Gaza's six land crossings: the Erez crossing is effectively closed to Palestinians wishing to cross to Israel or the West Bank. The Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza, which is regulated by the Agreement on Movement and Access entered into between Israel and the Palestinian Authority on 15 November 2005 (brokered by the United States, the European Union and the international community's envoy for the Israeli disengagement from Gaza), has been closed by Israel for lengthy periods since June 2006. The main crossing for goods at Karni is strictly controlled by Israel and since June 2006 this crossing too has been largely closed, with disastrous consequences for the Palestinian economy;

(b) Control through military incursions, rocket attacks and sonic booms: sections of Gaza have been declared "no-go" zones in which residents will be shot if they enter; ( c) Complete control of Gaza's airspace and territorial waters;

(d) Control of the Palestinian Population Registry: the definition of who is "Palestinian" and who is a resident of Gaza and the West Bank is controlled by the Israeli military. Even when the Rafah crossing is open, only holders of Palestinian identity cards can enter Gaza through the crossing; therefore control over the Palestinian Population Registry is also control over who may enter and leave Gaza. Since 2000, with few exceptions, Israel has not permitted additions to the Palestinian Population Registry.

The fact that Gaza remains occupied territory means that Israel's actions towards Gaza must be measured against the standards of international humanitarian law.

See United States of America v. Wilhelm List et al. (The Hostages case) United Nations War Crimes Commission, Law Reports of Trials of War Criminals, vol. III, 1949, p. 56; Democratic Republic of Congo v. Uganda, International Court of Justice, 2005, paras. 173 and 174.

See further on this subject, Sari Bashi and Kenneth Mann, "Disengaged Occupiers: the Legal Status of Gaza", Gisha: Legal Center for Freedom of Movement, January 2007.

IV. ISRAEL'S ACTIONS AGAINST GAZA AND THEIR CONSEQUENCES Israel has taken a number of actions against Gaza since the withdrawal of Israeli settlers and the IDF in 2005.

Military action IDF military incursions into Gaza have continued regularly over the past year; 290 Palestinians were killed in Gaza in 2007. Of this number at least a third were civilians. On 26 September, the day the Special Rapporteur visited Gaza, 12 Palestinian militants were killed by IDF missiles. Since the Annapolis meeting on 27 November 2007, over 70 Palestinians have been killed of whom 8 were killed in a major military operation in southern Gaza on the day before the first round of talks between Israelis and Palestinians following the Annapolis meeting. A further 13 Palestinians were killed in three separate airstrikes on 18 December. The frequency of targeted killings raises a question as to whether the IDF acts within the permissible parameters for such action laid down by the Israeli Supreme Court in its 2006 judgement on targeted killings. Or does the IDF act without regard to its own law as well as international law in carrying out targeted killings?

In the past two years 668 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli security forces in Gaza. Over half - 359 people - were not involved in hostilities at the time they were killed. Of those killed 126 were minors; 361 were killed by missiles fired from helicopters; and 29 of those killed were targeted for assassination. (HOW MANY PALESTINIANS IN GAZA WERE >WOUNDED< BY ISRAELI ATTACKS? --Hoffman)

During the same period, Palestinians fired some 2,800 Qassam rockets and mortar shells into Israel from the Gaza Strip. Four Israeli civilians were killed by Qassam rockets and hundreds were injured. Four members of the Israeli security forces were killed in attacks originating from Gaza.

B. Closure of crossings 15. All the crossings into and out of Gaza are controlled by Israel. Rafah, the crossing point for Gazans to Egypt, and Karni, the commercial crossing for the import and export of goods, are the principal crossing points. They are the subject of the Agreement on Movement and Access, which provides for Gazans to travel freely to Egypt through Rafah and for a substantial increase in the number of export trucks through Karni. Since 25 June 2006, following the capture of Corporal Shalit, and more particularly since mid-June 2007, following the Hamas seizure of power in Gaza, the Rafah crossing has been closed. From mid-June to early August 2007 some 6,000 Palestinians were stranded on the Egyptian side of the border, without adequate accommodation or facilities and denied the right to return home. Over 30 people died while waiting. The Karni crossing has likewise been closed for long periods of time during the past 18 months, and more particularly since mid-June 2007. Karem Shalom and Sufa are now used for the import of goods but the number of trucks bringing goods into Gaza has droppedalarmingly - from 253 a day in April 2007 to 74 a day in November. To make matters worse Sufa is possibly scheduled to close - though on 20 November the Israeli Government decided to permit the export of flowers and strawberries from Gaza to Europe via the Sufa crossing. Erez, previously used as a crossing for persons in need of medical attention in Israel, has also been largely closed for this purpose. On the other hand, in December 2007, Israel allowed several hundred Palestinians who reside abroad to leave Gaza via Israel.

These statistics, provided by B'Tselem, the Israeli Information Centre for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, cover the period 1 September 2005 to 25 July 2007.

C. The reduction of fuel and electricity supplies 16. On 19 September Israel declared Gaza to be a hostile territory and announced that, as a consequence, it would reduce the supply of fuel and electricity to Gaza. Ten Israeli and Palestinian NGOs brought an application before the Israeli High Court of Justice to halt the reduction of fuel and electricity on the ground that this constitutes collective punishment and would cause widespread humanitarian damage but the Israeli High Court has upheld the State's plan to reduce fuel transfers to Gaza. According to the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights fuel supplies have been reduced by more than 50 per cent since the decision to cease fuel supplies on 25 October 2007.

D. Termination of banking facilities 17. Following the designation of Gaza as a hostile territory the only two Israeli commercial banks dealing with financial institutions in Gaza, Bank Hapoalim and Discount Bank, announced that they would cut ties with Gaza. This involves, inter alia, the refusal to clear cheques from Gaza banks and the halting of cash transfers between Israeli banks and Gaza banks. At this stage, the full implications of this decision are not yet clear, but as the Israeli shekel is the official currency in the OPT, in accordance with the Oslo Accords, and must be supplied from Israel, it is likely that this could produce chaos in the Gazan monetary system.

E. The humanitarian crisis in Gaza 18. Regular military incursions, the closure of crossings, the reduction of fuel and the threat to the banking system have produced a humanitarian crisis, which has the following impact on life in Gaza.

1. Food 19. Over 80 per cent of the population of Gaza is dependent on food aid from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) and the World Food Programme (WFP). This takes the form of flour, rice, sugar, sunflower oil, powdered milk and lentils. Fruit and vegetables are no longer available to supplement these basic rations as farmers do not have the money to get their crops picked and marketed. Few can afford meat, and fish is virtually unobtainable as a result of the Israeli prohibition of fishing. Although critical humanitarian food supplies are being allowed in, only 41 per cent of Gaza's food import needs are currently being met.

2. Unemployment and poverty The closure of crossings prevents Gazan farmers and manufacturers from exporting their goods to markets outside Gaza. It also prevents materials from entering Gaza and this has resulted in the end of most construction works and the closure of factories. On 26 September the Special Rapporteur visited the Karni industrial zone and saw factories that had been closed as a result of the failure to import materials and the prohibition on the export of goods. Factory owners are being held responsible by Israeli buyers for non-delivery of goods caused by the closure. Farmers are without income and some 65,000 factory employees are unemployed.

According to the Palestinian Federation of Industries, 95 per cent of Gaza's industrial operations have been suspended as a result of restrictions.11 Fishermen are likewise unemployed as a result of the Israeli ban on fishing along the Gaza coast. On 9 July 2007, UNRWA announced that it had halted all its building projects in Gaza because it had run out of building materials, such as cement. This has affected 121,000 jobs of people building new schools, houses, waterworks, and health centres. In many instances those working in the public sector remain unpaid. Municipal employees in Gaza City have not been paid since March 2007. As a result garbage collection services went on strike in November causing a serious threat to health.

Poverty in Gaza is rife. Over 80 per cent of the population live below the official poverty line.

Health care. Health-care clinics are in short supply of paediatric antibiotics, and 91 key drugs are no longer available. Previously, seriously ill patients were allowed to leave Gaza to receive treatment in Israel, the West Bank, Egypt, Jordan and other countries through the Rafah and Erez crossings. Rafah is now completely closed and the Israeli authorities deny passage through Erez to all but the most "severe and urgent cases". The situation has worsened since the declaration of Gaza as a hostile territory. The World Health Organization reports that while 89.4 per cent of patients who applied for permits during the period January-May 2007 were granted permits, only 77.1 per cent of those who applied were granted permits during October 2007. This has resulted in a drastic increase in the number of patients who have died as a result of restrictions: according to the Israeli NGO Physicians for Human Rights, since June 2007, 44 people have died as a result of denial or delay of access to medical care by the Israeli authorities and 13 died in November alone. Mahmoud Abu Taha, a 21-year-old patient with stomach cancer, arrived at Erez at 16.00 hours on 18 October with a Palestinian intensive care unit ambulance, escorted by his father. The patient's entry was delayed for two and a half hours, after which the IDF asked the father to cross to the Israeli side of Erez. His son, the patient, was to enter on a walker and not with the ambulance.

The patient was denied access after reaching the end of the 500 metre long tunnel, while the father was arrested by the IDF and held for nine days. On 28 October, a second arrangement for the patient was approved and he was admitted to an Israeli hospital, where he died the same night. In November, hospitals were prevented from carrying out operations as a result of the restrictions placed by Israel on nitrous oxide gas that is used for anaesthetics.

"Investing in Palestinian Economic Reform and Development", Report for the Pledging Conference, World Bank, December 2007, para. 13.

4. Education Gaza's children in UNRWA schools lag behind refugee children elsewhere, according to UNRWA, as a result of the Israeli blockade and military violence. Students are prevented from studying abroad. In November 670 students were denied permission to study abroad, including six Fulbright scholars.

5. Fuel, energy and water Gaza is largely dependent on Israel for its supply of fuel and electricity. Already there are frequent power outages as a result of Israel's destruction of the main Gaza power plant in 2006 and subsequent damage to electricity transformers.

(For instance on 14 November the IDF struck an electricity transformer in Beit Hanoun which knocked out power for 5,000 people in the area.) The supply of water is also affected and there is insufficient power for water pumps. As a result, 210,000 people are able to access drinking water supplies for only 1-2 hours a day. Sewage is also a problem: sewage plants require repairs but materials, such as metal pipes and welding machines, have been prohibited by Israel on the grounds that they may be used for making rockets.

At present there is a real danger that sewage plants could overflow. Cutting off fuel and electricity will exacerbate an already dangerous situation. It will endanger the functioning of hospitals, water services and sewage, as well as depriving residents of electricity for refrigerators and household appliances. A humanitarian catastrophe is contemplated if Israel continues to reduce fuel and carries out its threat to reduce electricity supplies.

F. Legal consequences of Israel's actions. Israel has largely justified its attacks and incursions as defensive operations aimed at preventing the launching of Qassam rockets into Israel, the arrest or killing of suspected militants or the destruction of tunnels. Clearly the firing of rockets into Israel by Palestinian militants without any military target, which has resulted in the killing and injury of Israelis, cannot be condoned and constitutes a war crime.

Nevertheless, serious questions arise over the proportionality of Israel's military response and its failure to distinguish between military and civilian targets. It is highly arguable that Israel has violated the most fundamental rules of international humanitarian law, which constitute war crimes in terms of article 147 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and article 85 of the Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts (Additional Protocol I).

These crimes include direct attacks against civilians and civilian objects, and attacks which fail to distinguish between military targets and civilians and civilian objects (articles 48, 51 (4) and 52 (1) of Protocol I); the excessive use of force arising from disproportionate attacks on civilians and civilian objects (articles 51 (4) and 51 (5) of Protocol I); and the spreading of terror among the civilian population (article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and article 51 (2) of Protocol I).

26. Israel's siege of Gaza violates a whole range of obligations under both human rights law and humanitarian law. The provisions of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights that state that everyone has the right to "an adequate standard of living for himself and his family, including adequate food, clothing and housing", freedom from hunger and the right to food (art. 11) and that everyone has the right to health, have been seriously infringed.

Above all, the Government of Israel has violated the prohibition on collective punishment of an occupied people contained in article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention. The indiscriminate and excessive use of force against civilians and civilian objects, the destruction of electricity and water supplies, the bombardment of public buildings, the restrictions on freedom of movement, the closure of crossings and the consequences that these actions have upon public health, food, family life and the psychological well-being of the Palestinian people constitute a gross form of collective punishment.

Gaza is no ordinary State upon which other States may freely impose economic sanctions in order to create a humanitarian crisis or take disproportionate military action that endangers the civilian population in the name of self-defence. It is an occupied territory in whose well-being all States have an interest and whose welfare all States are required to promote. According to the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice, all States parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention have the obligation "to ensure compliance by Israel with international humanitarian law as embodied in that Convention". Israel has violated obligations of an erga omnes character that are the concern of all States and that all States are required to bring to an end. In the first instance, Israel, the occupying Power, is obliged to cease its violations of international humanitarian law. But other States that are a party to the siege of Gaza are likewise in violation of international humanitarian law and obliged to cease their unlawful actions.

V. HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE WEST BANK AND JERUSALEM It was widely expected that the human rights situation would improve in the West Bank following the exclusion of Hamas from the Government of the West Bank. This initially signalled a new rapprochement between Israel and the emergency Government of President Abbas, under the Prime Ministership of Salam Fayyad. Israel has made some gestures of rapprochement, such as the release of 779 prisoners (mainly belonging to Fatah), the payment of some of the tax money due to the Palestinian Authority, the relaxation of travel restrictions in the Jordan Valley, the granting of amnesty to 178 Fatah militants wanted by Israel and the promised granting of residence permits in the West Bank to 3,500 Palestinians. Unfortunately, Israel has not taken steps to dismantle the infrastructure of occupation. On the contrary, it has maintained and expanded the instruments that most seriously violate human rights - military incursions, settlements, the separation wall, restrictions on freedom of movement, the Judaization of Jerusalem and the demolition of houses.

A. Military incursions Military incursions in the West Bank have intensified since June 2007. For instance, in November the IDF carried out 786 raids in the West Bank in the course of which one person was killed, 67 injured and 398 arrested;12 public and private properties were damaged; curfews were imposed; and countless innocent civilians were terrorized by armed soldiers and dogs. Nablus has been particularly affected: on 17 October, the Israeli army raided the city of Nablus and fired tank shells, killing an elderly civilian and one armed individual, and injuring 14 civilians, including 2 children and a journalist. The IDF has frequently failed to distinguish clearly between military targets and civilians. As in the case of Gaza (see paragraph 25) these actions appear to violate rules of international humanitarian law (articles 48, 51 (4) and 52 (1) of Additional Protocol I).

B. Settlements and settlers13 30. There are 149 settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Despite promises by Israel to freeze settlement growth, the number of settlers has increased by 63 per cent since 1993 to its present population of 460,000. At present new construction is under way in 88 settlements and the average growth rate in the settlements is 4.5 per cent compared with the average growth rate of 1.5 per cent in Israel itself. In addition there are 105 "outposts" - that is, informal structures, which serve as a prelude to a new settlement, and are unauthorized but still funded by Government ministries. Despite Israel's undertaking in the road map to dismantle all outposts built after 2001, no such action has been taken in respect of the 51 such outposts. More than 38 per cent of the West Bank consists of settlements, outposts, military areas and Israeli nature reserves that are off limits to Palestinians. Settler roads link settlements to each other and to Israel. These roads are largely closed to Palestinian vehicles. (Israel has therefore introduced a system of "road apartheid", which was unknown in apartheid South Africa.)

In a statement to the Third Committee in October 2007 the Israeli delegate, Ms. Ady Schonmann, stated that the Special Rapporteur had failed to indicate that the Israeli NGO, Peace Now, had retracted a report of October 200614 which showed that nearly 40 per cent of the land held by Israeli settlements in the West Bank is privately owned by Palestinians. The Special Rapporteur has had contact with Peace Now which has indicated that while it made some corrections to its report in response to representations from the Israeli Government, it has not retracted its finding that 40 per cent of land occupied by settlements in the West Bank is privately owned by Palestinians.

Settlements are illegal under international law as they violate article 49, paragraph 6, of the Fourth Geneva Convention. This illegality has been confirmed by the International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion on the construction of the wall, by the High Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention in a declaration published in 2001, and by both the Security Council and the General Assembly. Furthermore settlements constitute a form of colonialism which is contrary to international law.15

See generally, "The Humanitarian Impact on Palestinians of Israeli Settlements and Other Infrastructure in the West Bank", the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), July 2007, available at http://www.ochaopt.org/?module=displaysection& section_id=103&format=html.

Breaking the Law in the West Bank - One Violation Leads to Another: Israeli Settlement Building on Private Palestinian Property, Peace Now, October 2006.

Israel's contempt for international law and opinion is illustrated by recent Government decisions. First, in December shortly after the Annapolis meeting, the Israeli Government announced plans to build 307 new apartments in the settlement of Har Homa. Secondly, in October it announced that it would proceed with plans for the development of E1, a planned new settlement which will have 3,500 apartments, 10 hotels and an industrial park, to accommodate 14,500 settlers, situated adjacent to Maale Adumim.

At present Israel has built a police station on E1 (visited by the Special Rapporteur on 25 September) but is prevented from proceeding with its plans to start construction on E1 by the presence of the main road from East Jerusalem to Jericho, which is used by Palestinians. Israel has now confiscated Palestinian land in Abu Dis, Sawareh, Nabi Moussa and al-Khan al-Ahmar to enable it to build an alternate road for Palestinians to Jericho which will free the area for E1. The road is part of Israel's broader plan to replace territorial contiguity with "transportational contiguity" by artificially connecting Palestinian population centres through an elaborate network of alternate roads and tunnels and creating segregated road networks, one for Palestinians and another for Israeli settlers, in the West Bank.

C. Checkpoints, roadblocks and permits as obstacles to freedom of movement. Checkpoints and roadblocks seriously obstruct the freedom of movement of Palestinians in the West Bank, with disastrous consequences for both personal life and the economy. There are 561 such obstacles to freedom of movement, comprising over 80 manned checkpoints and some 476 unmanned locked gates, earth mounds, concrete blocks and ditches. In addition, thousands of temporary checkpoints, known as flying checkpoints, are set up every year by Israeli army patrols on roads throughout the West Bank for limited periods, ranging from half an hour to several hours. In November 2007 there were 429 flying checkpoints.

35. Palestinians are subjected to numerous prohibitions on travel and to requirements for permits for travel within the West Bank and to East Jerusalem. Checkpoints ensure compliance with the permit regime.

These restrictions violate article 12 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights which has been held to be binding on Israel in the OPT by the International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion on the construction of the wall. Israel's argument that these restrictions are justified as security measures is difficult to accept. Many of the checkpoints and roadblocks are distant from the border of Israel, which is in any event protected by the wall. More likely explanations are to be found in the need to serve the convenience of settlers, to facilitate the travel of settlers through the West Bank and to impress upon the Palestinian people the power and presence of the occupier. According to a report in Yedioth Ahronoth, one quarter of all IDF soldiers who have served at roadblocks in the West Bank reported having witnessed or taken part in an act of abuse against a Palestinian civilian.

Checkpoints serve to humiliate Palestinians and to create feelings of deep hostility towards Israel. In this respect they resemble the "pass laws" of apartheid South Africa, which required black South Africans to demonstrate permission to travel or reside anywhere in South Africa.16 These laws generated widespread humiliation and anger, and were the cause of regular protest action. Israel would do well to consider the South African experience. Restrictions on freedom of movement of the kind applied by Israel do more to create insecurity than to achieve security.

See General Assembly resolution 1514 (XV): Declaration on the granting of independence to colonial countries and peoples.

D. The wall The wall that Israel is at present building, largely in Palestinian territory, is clearly illegal. The International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion on the construction of the wall found that it is contrary to international law and that Israel is under an obligation to discontinue construction of the wall and to dismantle forthwith those sections that have already been built. Israel has abandoned its claim that the wall is a security measure only and now concedes that one of the purposes of the wall is to include settlements within Israel. The fact that 83 per cent of the West Bank settler population and 69 settlements are enclosed within the wall bears this out. The wall is planned to extend for 721 kilometres.

At present 59 per cent of the wall has been completed and 200 kilometres have been constructed since the International Court of Justice handed down its Advisory Opinion declaring the wall to be illegal. When the wall is finished, an estimated 60,000 West Bank Palestinians living in 42 villages and towns will reside in the closed zone between the wall and the Green Line. This area will constitute 10.2 per cent of Palestinian land in the West Bank. There are, however, suggestions that the route of the wall will be revised to include additional Palestinian lands in the south-eastern West Bank near to the Dead Sea. If this plan is implemented some 13 per cent of Palestinian land will be seized by the wall. The closed zone includes many of the West Bank's valuable water resources and its richest agricultural lands.

The wall has serious humanitarian consequences for Palestinians living within the closed zone. They are cut off from places of employment, schools, universities and specialized medical care, and community life is seriously fragmented. Moreover, they do not have 24-hour access to emergency health services. Over 100 persons residing in the closed zone have not received permits to leave the area. Palestinians who live on the eastern side of the wall but whose land lies in the closed zone face serious economic hardship, as they are not able to reach their land to harvest crops or to graze their animals without permits. Permits are not easily granted and the bureaucratic procedures for obtaining them are humiliating and obstructive. The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has estimated that only about 18 per cent of those who used to work land in the closed zone before the construction of the wall receive permits to visit the closed zone today. The opening and closing of the gates leading to the closed zone are regulated in a highly restrictive manner: in 2007 OCHA carried out a survey in 67 communities located close to the wall which showed that only 19 of the 67 gates in the wall were open to Palestinians for use all the year round on a daily basis. To aggravate matters Palestinians coming into and out of the closed zone are frequently subjected to abuse and humiliation at the gates by the IDF. Hardships experienced by Palestinians living within the closed zone and in the precincts of the wall have already resulted in the displacement of some 15,000 persons.

On these laws, see J. Dugard, Human Rights and the South African Legal Order (Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1978).

The plight of the village of Jayyus, visited by the Special Rapporteur on 30 September 2007, illustrates the hardships faced by communities living near to the wall, but in the West Bank. The 3,200 residents of Jayyus are separated by the wall from their farmland; 68 per cent of the village's agricultural land and its six agricultural wells lie in the closed zone between the wall and the Green Line and are off limits to those without a visitor's permit. Scores of greenhouses are situated in the closed zone, producing tomatoes, cucumbers and sweet peppers, which require daily irrigation. Only about 40 per cent of the residents of Jayyus are granted permits to access farms, and gate opening times are both limited and arbitrary. By August 2004, one year after the construction of the wall, local production had fallen from 7 to 4 million kilograms of fruit and vegetables. The situation has further deteriorated over the past three years.

The section of the wall within the Jerusalem Governorate measures 168 kilometres in length. Only 5 kilometres of its completed length runs along the Green Line. The route of the wall runs deep into the West Bank to encircle the settlements of Maale Adumim. In contrast, many Palestinian villages which are currently in the Jerusalem municipality are placed outside the wall and thus separated from Jerusalem. In some places, such as Abu Dis, the wall runs through Palestinian communities, separating neighbours and families. About 25 per cent of the 253,000 Palestinians living in East Jerusalem have been cut off from the city by the wall. This means they can only enter Jerusalem through checkpoints, which makes it difficult to access hospitals, schools, universities, work and holy sites - particularly the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

E. Demolition of houses. The demolition of houses has been a regular feature of Israel's occupation of the OPT. Different reasons or justifications are advanced for such demolitions: military necessity, punishment and failure to obtain a building permit. Although the IDF claims to have discontinued punitive home demolitions, instances of such demolitions still occur. On 29 August 2007, the IDF demolished seven housing units in the Naqar neighbourhood of Qalqiliya, which were home to 48 persons (including 17 children) on the ground that they housed members of the military wing of Hamas. Houses are frequently demolished for "administrative" reasons, on the grounds that no permit has been obtained to build - which Israel defends as a normal feature of town planning. Both law and fact show, however, that houses are not demolished in the course of "normal" town planning operations, but are instead demolished in a discriminatory manner to demonstrate the power of the occupier over the occupied.

See B'Tselem, "Demolition for Alleged Military Purposes".

In both East Jerusalem and that part of the West Bank categorized as Area C (60 per cent of the West Bank, comprising villages and rural districts), houses and structures may not be built without permits. The bureaucratic procedures for obtaining permits are cumbersome and in practice permits are rarely granted. As a result, Palestinians are frequently compelled to build homes without permits. In East Jerusalem house demolitions are implemented in a discriminatory manner:18 Arab homes are destroyed but not Jewish houses. In Area C the IDF has demolished or designated for demolition homes, schools, clinics and mosques on the ground that permits have not been obtained. Between May 2005 and May 2007, 354 Palestinian structures were destroyed by the IDF in Area C.

Many Bedouin communities have had their structures demolished. In September 2007 the Special Rapporteur visited Al Hadidiya in the Jordan Valley where the structures of a Bedouin community of some 200 families, comprising 6,000 people, living near to the Jewish settlement of Roi, were demolished by the IDF. This brought back memories of the practice in apartheid South Africa of destroying black villages (termed "black spots") that were too close to white residents. Article 53 of the Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits the destruction of personal property "except where such destruction is rendered absolutely necessary by military operations". According to B'Tselem, the Israeli Information Centre for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, the destruction of homes in the Naqar neighbourhood of Qalqiliya failed to meet this test. The demolition of homes for administrative reasons can likewise not be justified. Both East Jerusalem and Area C are occupied territory, in respect of which the prohibition contained in article 53 applies.

F. Humanitarian situation The construction of the wall, the expansion of settlements, the restrictions on freedom of movement, house demolitions and military incursions have had a disastrous impact on the economy, health, education, family life and standard of living of Palestinians in the West Bank. Since 2006 the situation has deteriorated further. Israel withholds taxes which it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority on all goods imported into the Occupied Palestinian Territory, amounting to $50-60 million per month (about half of the budget of the Palestinian Authority).

Recently, Israel has transferred $119 million of the tax money it has unlawfully seized to the Palestinian Authority and western States and the Quartet have promised to recommence funding to the Palestinian Authority (insofar as it does not further the interests of Hamas in Gaza). At the time of writing no material change is discernible in the humanitarian situation in the West Bank as a result of the continuing occupation, the human rights violations described in this section of the report and Israel's refusal to transfer all the tax money due in law to the Palestinian Authority. Poverty and unemployment are at their highest levels ever; health and education are undermined by military incursions, the wall and checkpoints; and the social fabric of society is threatened.

Meir Margalit, Discrimination in the Heart of the Holy City (Jerusalem, Al Manar Modern Press, 2006).

G. Conclusion The situation in the West Bank may not be as serious as that of Gaza, however it is all a question of degree. Moreover, as in Gaza, the serious humanitarian situation in the West Bank is largely the result of Israel's violations of international law. The wall violates norms of international humanitarian law and human rights law, according to the International Court of Justice; settlements violate the Fourth Geneva Convention; checkpoints violate the freedom of movement proclaimed in human rights conventions; house demolitions violate the Fourth Geneva Convention; the humanitarian crisis in the West Bank, brought about by Israel's withholding of Palestinian tax money and other violations of international law, violates many of the rights contained in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. As in Gaza, Israel's actions constitute an unlawful collective punishment of the Palestinian people.

VI. THE TREATMENT OF ARRESTED PERSONS AND CONVICTED PRISONERS

It is estimated that since 1967 over 700,000 Palestinians have been imprisoned. At present, there are some 11,000 prisoners in Israeli jails, a number which includes 376 children, 118 women, 44 members of the Palestinian Legislative Council and some 800 "administrative detainees" (that is, persons not convicted for any offence, held for renewable periods of up to six months). Israel sees such prisoners as terrorists or ordinary criminals who have violated the criminal law. Palestinians see them as political prisoners who have committed crimes against the occupier.

History is replete with examples of such competing perspectives - to cite but South Africa and Namibia as examples. Prisoners are a key issue in any peace settlement. That Israel is aware of this is demonstrated by its release of 779 prisoners (although in November 411 persons were arrested). The release of such a small number of prisoners, however, provides little evidence of a bona fide attempt to reach a peaceful settlement on the part of Israel. To make matters worse prisoners are subjected to humiliating and degrading treatment.

A. Arrested and detained persons Following arrest, persons are frequently beaten and stripped in a humiliating manner. The interrogation of subjects is then carried out in a degrading and inhuman manner, sometimes amounting to torture. During 2007, two reports published by Israeli NGOs - Hamoked (Center for the Defence of the Individual) and B'Tselem19 and the Public Committee against Torture in Israel (PCATI)20 - have shown that arrested persons are subjected to beatings, humiliated and deprived of basic needs and that persons suspected of having information that could prevent attacks (so-called "ticking bomb suspects") are deprived of sleep for more than 24 hours, beaten and subjected to physical ill-treatment. The treatment of children is equally disturbing.

According to Defence for Children International (Palestine Section), children are on average detained for between 8 to 21 days before being brought to court; denied the presence of a parent or lawyer during interrogation; cursed, threatened, beaten and kept in solitary confinement during interrogation.

Absolute Prohibition: The Torture and Ill-Treatment of Palestinian Detainees, Hamoked and B'Tselem, May 2007.

"Ticking Bombs" Testimonies of Torture Victims in Israel, Public Committee against Torture in Israel, May 2007.

B. Convicted prisoners and administrative detainees Prison conditions are harsh. Many prisoners are accommodated in tents, which are extremely hot in summer and cold in winter. Food is poor, resulting in anaemia among prisoners, and there is serious overcrowding. Most Palestinian prisoners are held in jails in Israel. This violates article 76 of the Fourth Geneva Convention which requires persons from an occupied territory to be detained in the occupied country, and if convicted, to serve their sentences therein. Family visits are difficult and frequently impossible: all visits for families from Gaza to their relatives detained in Israeli prisons have been suspended since 6 June 2007, affecting some 900 prisoners. On 22 October there was a riot in Ketziot prison in the Negev (in Israel), accommodating some 2,300 prisoners, which resulted in 1 death and some 250 injuries among prisoners.

The role of medical doctors in detention centres and prisons requires attention. These doctors witness the result of inhuman treatment - wounds, swollen hands, signs of violence - but remain silent, acting as if they do not know that torture is taking place. This raises ethical questions that in similar circumstances in South Africa were, after years of silence, addressed by the South African Medical Association and international medical bodies. Why, one must ask, has the responsibility of Israeli medical doctors who examine detainees and prisoners not been questioned by the relevant Israeli and international medical professional bodies?

VII. SELF-DETERMINATION The right of self-determination of the Palestinian people has been recognized by the Security Council, the General Assembly, the International Court of Justice and Israel itself. The territory of the self-determination unit within which this right is to be exercised clearly includes the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza. The right of the Palestinian people to self-determination has been denied and obstructed for nearly 60 years by Israel.

Now it is threatened by the political separation of the West Bank and Gaza, resulting from the seizure of power in Gaza by Hamas in June 2007, followed by the seizure of power in the West Bank by Fatah. The carefully brokered Government of Palestinian national unity has been destroyed by the internecine conflict resulting in the death of several hundred Palestinians, mostly belonging to Fatah.

At the time of writing, there is no immediate prospect of reconciliation between Hamas and Fatah. This is a matter of deep concern to the Special Rapporteur as the right to self-determination is a central and core human right. It must also be a matter of concern to the Quartet and other international institutions committed to the realization of the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination. Such a concern should not take the form of support - political, economic or military - for one faction at the expense of the other, but rather for reconciliation between the two factions so that the right to self-determination may be realized within the 1967 borders of the Palestinian self-determination unit, that is including the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza. Unhappily, the Quartet (which embraces the United Nations) is, at the time of writing, making little attempt to promote Palestinian national unity. On the contrary, it pursues a divisive policy of preferring one faction over the other; of speaking to one faction but not the other; of dealing with one faction while isolating the other.

Semi-Annual Report 2007, Defence for Children International (Palestine Section).

VIII. INTERNATIONAL LAW, THE INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE, THE QUARTET AND THE UNITED NATIONS On 8 December 2003 the General Assembly requested an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice on the legal consequences arising from the construction of the wall being built by Israel in the OPT. Fifty States and international organizations gave written statements to the Court and 15 States and international organizations made oral statements before the Court. The Court provided an advisory opinion23 by 14 votes to 1, which answered many of the legal questions that have been raised over the past 40 years. The principal findings of the Court were as follows: (a) The Palestinian people have the right to self-determination24 and the exercise of this right is violated by the construction of the wall;25 (b) Israel is under a legal obligation to comply with the Fourth Geneva Convention in the OPT26 - a unanimous finding;27 (c) Settlements are illegal as they violate article 49 (6) of the Fourth Geneva Convention28 - a unanimous finding;

Resolution ES-10/14. Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, ICJ, 2004.

(d) Israel is bound by international human rights conventions in the OPT30 - a unanimous finding31 - and consequently its conduct is to be measured against both international human rights conventions and the Fourth Geneva Convention;

(e) The regime in force in the closed zone between the wall and Green Line violates the right to freedom of movement contained in article 12 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights32 and the right to work, health, education and an adequate standard of living contained in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights;

(f) The destruction of property for the construction of the wall violates article 53 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and cannot be justified on grounds of military necessity or national security;

g) The wall cannot be justified as an exercise in self-defence;

(h) The annexation of East Jerusalem is illegal;

(i) The construction of the wall by Israel in the OPT, including in and around East Jerusalem, and its associated regime are contrary to international law; and Israel is obliged in law to cease the construction of the wall, to dismantle it and to make reparation for the construction of the wall;

j) All States are under a legal obligation not to recognize the illegal situation resulting from the wall and to ensure compliance by Israel with the Fourth Geneva Convention;

(k) The United Nations, especially the General Assembly and Security Council, should consider what further action is required to bring an end to the illegal situation resulting from the construction of the wall and associated regime, "taking due account of the present Advisory Opinion".

On 20 July 2004 the General Assembly adopted resolution ES-10/15 which called for Israel to comply with the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice. This resolution was adopted by 150 votes to 6 (Australia, Micronesia, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau, United States) with 10 abstentions. The Russian Federation and member States of the European Union voted in favour of the resolution.

Since 2004, the Advisory Opinion has been ignored by the Security Council. While the General Assembly and Human Rights Council have passed several resolutions reaffirming the Opinion, no attempt has been made by the Security Council to compel Israel to comply with the Opinion or to remind States of their obligation to ensure compliance by Israel with the Fourth Geneva Convention. The reason for this is not hard to find. The Security Council is prevented from giving its backing to the Opinion by the United States which has refused to accept it.

Similarly the United States prevents the Quartet from taking steps to implement the Opinion. No statement issued by the Quartet has ever acknowledged the Opinion.

Although the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice is an authoritative statement of the applicable law and is designed to contribute to the framework for peace in the Middle East, it is not legally binding on States. In law, the United States is well within its right to refuse to accept the Opinion in the Quartet. The same applies to the Russian Federation and the European Union - although both have compromised themselves by giving approval to the Opinion by supporting General Assembly resolution ES-10/15 and subsequent resolutions. The position of the United Nations is, however, very different.

The International Court of Justice is the judicial organ of the United Nations. Moreover the General Assembly has by an overwhelming majority repeatedly given its approval to the Opinion. This means that it is now part of the law of the United Nations. As such the representative of the United Nations in the Quartet - the Secretary-General or his representative - is in law obliged to be guided by the Opinion and to endeavour in good faith to do his or her best to ensure compliance with the Opinion.

If the Secretary-General (or his representative) is politically unable to do so he has two choices: either to withdraw from the Quartet or to explain to his constituency - "we the peoples of the United Nations" in the language of the Charter - why he is unable to do so and how he justifies remaining in the Quartet in the light of its refusal to be guided by the law of the United Nations. The first course is possibly unwise at this time as this would deprive the United Nations of a role in the peace process. This makes the second course essential.

For 40 years the political organs of the United Nations, States and individuals have accused Israel of consistent, systematic and gross violations of human rights and humanitarian law in the OPT. In 2004 the judicial organ of the United Nations, in its Advisory Opinion, affirmed that Israel's actions in the OPT do indeed violate fundamental norms of human rights and humanitarian law and cannot be justified on grounds of self-defence or necessity. If the United Nations is serious about human rights it cannot afford to ignore this Opinion in the deliberations of the Quartet, as it is an authoritative affirmation that Israel is in serious breach of its international commitments. Failure to attempt to implement, or even to acknowledge, an advisory opinion dealing with international humanitarian law and human rights law, brings the very commitment of the United Nations to human rights into question.

See, for example, the draft text in A/62/L.21/Rev.1 adopted on 10 December 2007 which calls on Israel to comply with the Advisory Opinion and on all States to comply with the legal obligations mentioned in the Opinion.

HRC resolution 2/4 of 27 November 2006.

See, for example, the statement of the Quartet of 23 September 2007.

IX. PEACE TALKS At the time of writing negotiations leading to a peace settlement between Israelis and Palestinians have commenced following an initial meeting in Annapolis on 27 November 2007. It is not within the mandate of the Special Rapporteur to comment on what is essentially a political process, except insofar as it has implications for human rights. In this context the

Special Rapporteur wishes to make the following remarks. The Oslo Accords have been criticized for failing to consider normative aspects of the Palestinian issue. In particular they failed to pay adequate attention to international law and to the human rights dimension. It is important that the Annapolis process does not make the same mistake.

Unfortunately the first indications suggest that this is a serious possibility as the joint statement of 27 November agreed to by the parties as a starting point for the negotiations is premised on the proposals contained in the Quartet road map of 2003 rather than on the legal norms proclaimed by the International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion on the construction of the wall.

Indeed the joint statement makes no mention of the Advisory Opinion at all. The Secretary-General in his statement at Annapolis also invoked the road map but made no mention of the Advisory Opinion. In the opinion of the Special Rapporteur, the road map is an inappropriate and unhelpful framework for negotiations for the following reasons.

First, it is outdated as it takes no account of the Advisory Opinion, Palestinian democratic elections, Israel's withdrawal from Gaza and the June 2007 separation of Gaza from the West Bank. Second, Israel attached 14 reservations to the road map in May 2003, which makes Israel's commitment to it unclear. Third, it is, in its own language, "a performance-based and goal driven roadmap" which takes little account of the normative aspect.

It must be recalled that article 47 of the Fourth Geneva Convention provides that persons in an occupied territory shall not be deprived of the benefits of the Convention by any agreement concluded between the authorities of the occupied territory and the occupying Power, or by the annexation by the occupying Power of part of the occupied territory.

This means that any agreement between the Palestinian authorities and the Israeli Government that recognizes settlements within the occupied Palestinian territory, or accepts the annexation by Israel of Palestinian land within the wall, will violate the Fourth Geneva Convention.

This is but one example of the dangers of a peace process between unequals which has no regard to the normative framework of international law. In its approach to previous peace negotiations, the Israeli Government has insisted on negotiations being restricted to the agreed framework. The Annapolis joint statement which refers only to the road map suggests that Israel does not see itself as being bound by the normative framework accepted by the United Nations.

In the opinion of the Special Rapporteur negotiations should take place within a normative framework, with the guiding norms to be found in international law, particularly international humanitarian law and human rights law, the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice, and Security Council resolutions.

Negotiations on issues such as boundaries, settlements, East Jerusalem, the return of refugees and the isolation of Gaza should be informed by such norms and not by political horse-trading. In this respect parties might learn from the experience of the negotiations that led to a democratic South Africa in the mid-1990s, which took place within the framework of accepted democratic principles, the rule of law and international law (with special reference to human rights law).

The creation of a Palestinian State will not heal the wounds of 60 years of conflict. If real peace and security is to be achieved every effort should be made to achieve reconciliation between Palestinians and Israelis. To do this it will be necessary for both people to address the events, actions and sufferings of the past. Consideration should therefore be given to the establishment of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to hear the stories of the sufferings of both peoples. Without truth-telling of this kind tensions between Palestinians and Israelis will remain to threaten peace between the two nations.

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