While the Occupation is business as usual for Israel, there should be no business with Israel

In Occupied Palestine

Zionism in practice

Israel’s Daily Toll on Palestinian Life, Limb, Liberty and Property

(Compiled by Leslie Bravery, Palestine Human Rights Campaign POB 56150, Dominion Rd, Auckland, New Zealand www.palestine.org.nz)

21 and 22 November 2013 [Main source of statistics: Palestinian Monitoring Group (PMG). http://www.nad-plo.org/dailyreports.php] NB: We shall always do our utmost to verify the accuracy of all items in these IOP newsletters/reports wherever possible – but please forgive us for any errors or omissions (not of our own making) that may occur! L & M.

1:45am, five-hour night home invasion ordeal – 14-year-old boy seized and terrorised

Israeli Army orders destruction of Palestinian home

Night peace disruption and/or home invasions in refugee camp and 9 towns and villages

1 attack – 21 raids including home invasions – 1 beaten – 10 injured

3 acts of economic/pastoral sabotage

17 taken prisoner – 20 detained – 114 restrictions of movement

November 21 & 22

Home invasions & occupations: 18:00-21:10, Deir Abu Mash’al - 10:25-16:00, al-Zabadiya - 01:45-07:00, Azzun. 01:00-02:30, Qarwat Bani Zaid - 01:15-02:40, the Balata refugee camp - 11:00, Halhul.

Peace disruption raids: 09:30, the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound - 09:25, Tulkarem - 03:10, Fara'un - 02:15, Deir Ballout - 10:35, al-Ubeidiya - 11:20, Harmalah - 20:50-04:00, Sa’ir. 13:00, Abu Dis - 19:40, Zeita - 11:10, Kafr Qaddum - 00:30-04:25, Salfit - 00:30, Deir Istiya - 00:30, Hares - 10:20, Ithna - 14:20, Bani Na’im - 23:00, Khirbeit Salameh.

November 21

Palestinian attacks: none

Economic sabotage: Gaza – the Israeli Navy continues to enforce a three-nautical-mile fishing limit.

Home invasions – 5-hour ordeal – child terrorised: Qalqilya – 01:45-07:00, Israeli forces raided Azzun, seizing and terrorising a 14-year-old boy, Mohammad Rayan, and searching several homes.

House destruction order: Jerusalem – 08:00, the Israeli Army issued destruction orders on a home in al-Issawiya village.

Israeli Army rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades: Jerusalem – 19:10, the Israeli Army fired rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades at people in the Beir Ayoub area of Silwan.

Israeli Army rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades: Ramallah – 12:40, Israeli troops fired rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades at Deir Abu Mash’al residents.

Israeli Army tear gas grenades – injury: Ramallah – 15:55, refugee Hammad Hammad was injured as the Israeli Army fired tear gas grenades at al-Jalazoun refugee camp residents.

Israeli Army rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades: Bethlehem – 12:30, Israeli forces fired rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades at people in the al-Aida refugee camp.

Occupation settlement development – Israeli Army complicity: Bethlehem – evening, Israeli settlers, accompanied by Israeli forces, set up camp near the western entrance to Taqou.

Raid – mosque violation: Jerusalem – 09:30, Israeli settler militants, escorted by Israeli soldiers, invaded the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound and molested worshippers.

Raid – theft: Tulkarem – 03:10, Israeli troops raided Fara'un village, invaded a vehicle spare parts shop, took one person prisoner and made off with several vehicle parts.

November 22

Palestinian attacks: none

Israeli attack – woundings: Northern Gaza – evening, an Israeli Army position behind the Green Line opened fire on people in Jabalya, wounding two residents.

Beating – injury: Jerusalem – 16:40, Israeli soldiers near the Old City Hata Gate beat up and injured a Palestinian man, Omar Salameh.

Economic sabotage: Gaza – the Israeli Navy continues to enforce a three-nautical-mile fishing limit.

Home invasions – injury: Ramallah – 01:00-02:30, the Israeli Army raided Qarwat Bani Zaid village and invaded two homes, injuring one resident, Mustafa Maloukh, and ordering two others to report for interrogation at Israeli Military Intelligence.

Home invasion and theft: Nablus – 01:15-02:40, Israeli troops raided the Balata refugee camp, invaded a home and stole a computer.

Raid – abductions – pastoral sabotage: Hebron – 14:20, Occupation forces raided the Yaqin area of Bani Na’im and abducted two young goatherds: Mohammad Sa’eid Al-Faqir (14) and Mohammad Zuheir Al-Faqir (15).

Israeli Army rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades: Jerusalem – 16:00, Qalandya checkpoint troops fired rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades at pedestrians.

Israeli Army rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades: Jerusalem – 16:20, the Israeli Army fired rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades at people in al-Issawiya.

Israeli Army rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades: Jerusalem – 17:00, Israeli troops fired rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades at people near the Al-Ram road junction.

Israeli Army rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades: Jerusalem – 21:35, the Israeli Army fired rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades at people in Abu Dis.

Israeli Army rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades: Ramallah – 15:45, Occupation troops fired rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades at people in Silad.

Israeli Army rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades: Ramallah – 15:50, the Israeli Army fired rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades at people in front of the Ofer Prison.

Israeli Army rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades: Ramallah – 15:55, Israeli forces fired rubber-coated bullets and tear gas grenades at al-Jalazun refugee camp residents.

Israeli Army tear gas grenades – injuries – hospitalisation: Hebron – 17:40, two people, Samer Salhab (16) and Ahmad Qazaz, were injured and hospitalised by flying tear gas grenades during an Israeli Army assault on people near the Old City al-Shalalat Road.

Non-violent resistance – tear gas grenades – injury: Ramallah – 12:20, one person, Majd Burnat, was injured and several people were overcome by Israeli tear gas during an assault by Occupation forces on an anti-annexation Wall protest in Bil’in.

Non-violent resistance – tear gas casualties: Ramallah – 12:20, several people were overcome by Israeli tear gas during an assault on anti-annexation Wall protesters in Ni'lin.

Non-violent resistance – tear gas casualties: Ramallah – 13:00, several people were overcome by Israeli tear gas during an assault on a protest demonstration in al-Nabi Saleh village.

Non-violent resistance – tear gas grenades – injuries – hospitalisation: Qalqilya – 12:20, flying tear gas grenades injured and hospitalised two protesters, Waqas Wa’el and Tariq Amar, in Kafr Qaddum during an Israeli Army assault. Several people were overcome by Israeli tear gas.

Occupation settler violence: Jenin – 08:00, Occupation settlers and troops invaded the al-Manshiya area in Kafriyat village.

Occupation settler arson: Jenin – 10:00, arsonists from the Movo Dotan Occupation settlement set fire to tyres near Ya’bad and invaded the Jabal Hafriya area in Arraba.

Children seized and held captive: Jerusalem – Israeli soldiers patrolling the Old City al-Sa’aydeh neighbourhood seized and held captive for a time four Palestinian children: Abdel Rahman Hijazi (8), Fadi Al-Ghafri (10), Ahmad Jabour (10) and Mohammad Naji (14).

Youngsters seized and held captive: Tulkarem – 16:35, Israeli troops in the city seized and held captive for a time three Palestinian youngsters: Mustafa Tem (13), Islam Hamada (16) and Ayham Hamada (16).

SEE ALSO: Restrictions of Movement notes after Behind the Wall (below)

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Who is Pulling the Strings?

The Battle of the Titans

By URI AVNERY

November 22-24, 2013. http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/11/22/the-battle-of-the-titans/

This is not merely a fight between Israel and the US. Nor is it only a fight between the White House and Congress. It is also a battle between intellectual titans. On the one side there are the two renowned professors, Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer. On the other, the towering international intellectual Noam Chomsky.

It’s all about whether the dog wags the tail or the tail wags the dog.

Six years ago the two professors shocked the US (and Israel) when they published a book, “The Israel lobby and US Foreign Policy”, in which they asserted that the foreign policy of the United States of America, at least in the Middle East, is practically controlled by the State of Israel. To paraphrase their analysis, Washington DC is in effect an Israeli colony. Both the Senate and the House of Representatives are Israeli occupied territories, much like Ramallah and Nablus. This is diametrically opposed to the assertion of Noam Chomsky that Israel is a US pawn, used by American imperialism as an instrument to promote its interests. (I commented at the time that both sides were right, and that this is a unique dog-tail relationship. I even quoted the old Jewish joke about the rabbi who tells a plaintiff that he is right, and then says the same to the defendant. “But they can’t both be right!” remonstrates his wife. “You are right, too!” he answers.)

Intellectual theories can seldom be put to a laboratory test. But this one can. It is happening now. Between Israel and the US a crisis has developed, and it has come into the open. It’s about the putative Iranian nuclear bomb. President Barack Obama is determined to avert a military showdown. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is determined to prevent a compromise. For Netanyahu, the Iranian nuclear effort has become a defining issue, even an obsession. He talks about it incessantly. He has declared that it is an “existential” threat to Israel, that it poses the possibility of a second Holocaust. Last year he made an exhibition of himself at the UN General Assembly meeting with his childish drawing of the bomb. Cynics say that this is only a trick, a successful gimmick to divert the world’s attention away from the Palestinian issue. And indeed, for years now the Israeli policy of occupation and settlements has been advancing quietly, away from the limelight. But in politics, one gimmick can serve several purposes at once. Netanyahu is serious about the Iranian bomb. The proof: on this issue he is ready to do something that no Israeli prime minister has ever dared to do before: endanger Israeli-American relations.

This is a momentous decision. Israel is dependent on the US in almost every respect. The US pays Israel a yearly tribute of at least three billion dollars, and in fact much more. It gives us state of the art military equipment. Its veto protects us from UN Security Council censure, whatever we do. We have no other unconditional friend in the world, except, perhaps, the Fiji Islands. If there is one thing on which practically all Israelis agree, it is this subject. A break with the US is unthinkable. The US-Israeli relationship is, to use a Hebrew expression much loved by Netanyahu, “the rock of our existence”. So what does he think he is doing?

NETANYAHU WAS brought up in the US. There he attended high school and university. There he started his career. He does not need advisers on US affairs. He considers himself the smartest expert of all. He is no fool. Neither is he an adventurer. He bases himself on solid assessments. He believes that he is able to win this fight. You could say that he is an adherent of the Walt-Mearsheimer doctrine. His present moves are based on the assessment that in a straight confrontation between Congress and the White House, Congress will win. Obama, already blooded by other issues, will be beaten, even destroyed. True, Netanyahu was proved wrong the last time he tried something like this. During the last presidential elections, he openly supported Mitt Romney. The idea was that the Republicans were bound to win. The Jewish casino baron, Sheldon Adelson, poured money into their campaign, while at the same time maintaining an Israeli mass-circulation daily for the sole purpose of supporting Netanyahu. Romney “couldn’t lose” – but he did. This should have been a lesson for Netanyahu, but he didn’t absorb it. He is now playing the same game, but for vastly higher stakes.

WE ARE now in the middle of the fight, and it is still too early to predict the outcome. The Jewish pro-Israel lobby, AIPAC, supported by other Jewish and Evangelical organisations, is marshalling its forces on Capitol Hill. It’s an impressive show. Senator after Senator, Congressman after Congressman comes forward to support the Israeli government against their own president. The same people who jumped up and down like string puppets when Netanyahu made his last speech before both houses of Congress, try to outdo each other in assertions of their undying loyalty to Israel. This is now done in the open, in an exhibition of shamelessness. Several Senators and Congressmen declare publicly that they have been briefed by the Israeli Intelligence services, and they trust them more than the Intelligence agencies of the USA. Not one of them said the opposite. This would have been unthinkable if any other country was involved, say Ireland or Italy, from which many Americans are descended. The “Jewish State” stands unique, a kind of inverse anti-Semitism. Indeed, some Israeli commentators have joked that Netanyahu believes in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the famous – and infamous – tract fabricated by the secret police of the Czar. It purported to expose a sinister conspiracy of the Jews to rule the world. A hundred years later, controlling the US comes near to that.

The senators and representatives are no fools (not all of them, in any case). They have a clear purpose: to be re-elected. They know on which side their bread is buttered. AIPAC has demonstrated, in several test cases, that it can unseat any senator or congressman who does not toe the straight Israeli line. One sentence of implied criticism of Israeli policies suffices to doom a candidate. Politicians prefer open shame and ridicule to political suicide. No kamikaze pilots in Congress. This is not a new situation. It is at least several decades old. What is new is that it is now out in the open, without embellishment.

IT IS difficult to know, as of now, how much the White House is cowed by this development. Obama and his Secretary of State John Kerry know that American public opinion is dead set against any new war in the Middle East. Compromise with Iran is in the air. This is supported by almost all the world’s powers. Even the French tantrums, which have no clear purpose but to throw their supposed weight around, are not serious. President Francois Hollande was received in Israel this week like the harbinger of the Messiah. If one closed one’s eyes, one could imagine that the happy old pre-de Gaulle days were back again, when France armed Israel, supplied it with its military atomic reactor and the two countries went on escapades together (the ill-fated 1956 Suez adventure.) But if Obama & Kerry hold fast and stay their course on Iran, can Congress impose the opposite course? Could this turn into the most serious constitutional crisis in US history?

As a sideshow, Kerry is going on with his effort to impose on Netanyahu a peace he does not want. The Secretary of State did succeed in pushing Netanyahu into “final status negotiations” (nobody dared to utter the word peace, God forbid), but nobody in Israel or Palestine believes that anything will come out of this. Unless, of course, the White House puts the whole might of the US behind the effort – and that seems more than unlikely. Kerry has allotted nine months to the endeavour, as if it were a normal pregnancy. But the chances of a baby emerging at the end of it are practically nil. During the first three months, the sides have not progressed a single step. So who will win? Obama or Netanyahu? Chomsky or Walt/Mearsheimer? As commentators love to say: Time Will Tell. In the meantime, place your bets.

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Uri Avnery is an Israeli writer and peace activist with Gush Shalom. He is a contributor to CounterPunch’s book The Politics of Anti-Semitism.  http://www.easycartsecure.com/CounterPunch/CounterPunch_Books.html

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On the 50th anniversary of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy

From Ali Kazak:

President Kennedy supported the inalienable rights of the Palestinian refugees for “repatriation or compensation” to their homeland which Israel and the Zionists regarded as anathema. The following are excerpts from a letter he sent to Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser dated 11 May 1961:

“Underlying tensions, do, however, remain, not the least of which is the unresolved Arab-Israel controversy. I know deep emotions are involved. No easy solution presents itself. The American government and people believe that an honourable and humane settlement can be found and are willing to share in the labours and burdens which are so difficult an achievement must entail, if the parties concerned genuinely desire such participation. We are willing to help resolve the tragic Palestine refugee problem on the basis of the principle of repatriation or compensation for properties, to assist in finding an equitable answer to the question of Jordan River water resources development and to be helpful in making progress on other aspects of this complex problem. I am pleased that the United Nations General Assembly recently underscored the necessity to implement more rapidly its previous recommendations on the refugee problem. In this connection, I wish to state unequivocally that this Government’s position is anchored and will continue to be anchored in the firm bedrock of support for General Assembly recommendations concerning the refugees, and of active, impartial concern that those recommendations be implements in a way most beneficial to the refugees.

The United States, as a member of the Palestine Conciliation Commission and a nation keenly interested in the long range advancement of the peoples of the Middle East, takes seriously the task entrusted to the Commission by the United Nations. We are determined to use our influence to assure that the Commission intensify its efforts to promote progress toward a just and peaceful solution. What precise steps the Commission may be able to take are, of course, not yet clear, but I can assure you that there will be no lack of United States interest in seeing that effective action is taken. It is my sincere hope that all parties directly concerned will cooperate fully with whatever program is undertaken by the Commission so that the best interest and welfare of all the Arab refugees of Palestine may be protected and advanced.”

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Excerpts from a letter from US President J.F. Kennedy to Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, dated 11 May 1961, reprinted in William Yates’s PhD thesis ‘The Post War Middle East and the Kennedy-Nasser letters 1961/63’, May 2003, University of Melbourne, Appendix 1, p.15.

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Released Palestinian woman tells of torture in Israeli prisons

http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=650019

A Palestinian prisoner recently released by Israel told of extensive beatings, strip-searches and other forms of humiliation during her time in Israeli prisons, Ahrar Centre for Prisoners Studies said Thursday. Palestinian prisoner Muntaha al-Heeh, 21, detailed the forms of beatings she was subjected to by Israeli prison guards during her three weeks in Israeli prisons, in a report released by Ahrar.

Al-Heeh also spoke extensively about the violence suffered by Rana Abu Kweek, another Palestinian female prisoner who she came into contact with while in Israeli prison. Muntaha al-Heeh, from Hebron, said she was tortured, beaten, and once was beaten so badly that she had bleeding in her kidney, according to a doctor. Al-Heeh, who was detained from October 22 until Tuesday, told Ahrar, "I was severely beaten. I was not allowed to sleep and I was kept tied up for long hours. I was beaten so violently and severely that I fainted, and I still have pain from the beatings." Al-Heeh said that following her arrest, she was brutally beaten, put in solitary confinement, verbally abused, and threatened to be held in handcuffs for days.

'The most difficult times of my life'

She recollected a time when she was beaten by an officer and was told by the prison doctor that she had bleeding in her kidney. The doctor only gave her painkillers and told her to drink water. Another incident was when she was hit so hard on the head by an officer that she lost consciousness. She later woke up to find herself lying in a prison hallway with soldiers and officers surrounding her holding batons. She started crying and screaming until an officer tied her and put her in the solitary confinement unit, she added. Al-Heeh said that she was isolated from other Palestinian prisoners, and wasn't put in HaSharon Prison with them. She was detained with criminal prisoners, and for that she refused food for days. "I was held alone in a room at al-Muscoviyah for most of the time," she continued. "The soldiers treated me extremely harshly. And not being able to see my family who were denied from visitation caused me to suffer psychologically, especially with the ongoing interrogation in horrible ways." Al-Heeh added that she was not allowed to leave for the prison yard, and she was held alone in a room until she was released on a bail of 5000 shekels on Tuesday. She added that these were the most difficult times in her life.

Al-Heeh expressed her hope that her voice, and her suffering reach all international human rights organisations to hold Israel accountable for its crimes against prisoners.

The Torture of Rana Abu Kweek

Al-Heeh also spoke about the beatings fellow Palestinian prisoner Rana Abu Kweek was subjected to. Abu Kweek is originally from Ramallah and she was detained by Israeli forces on October 27. She is currently being held at Ashkelon detention centre. Al-Heeh saw Abu Kweek as she was being brought for a court hearing, which coincided with al-Heeh's release from prison. Rana Abu Kweek was subject to extensive beatings and strip-searches, which she recounted to al-Heeh in detail. A source in the Prisoners' Movement in Occupation Prisons previously told Ahrar that one of their members had come in contact with Rana after he heard her sobbing in an adjacent cell. According to the source, Rana told the member that she had been subject to severe beatings that left her in great pain. Montaha al-Heeh explained that when they met, Abu Kweek recounted to her how she was beaten by Israeli prison guards and hit in the stomach with the metal detectors they used to search her. "When Rana entered the room, the soldiers forced all other prisoners to exit. Four female soldiers entered the room and they began stripping her underneath the shower and searching her," al-Heeh explained. "When they finished the strip-search, they took her clothes and threw them in the corner of the room, forcing her to leave the cell naked. The door of the cell was open and a number of soldiers stood at the door's entrance." "Rana, however, refused to leave the cell naked and instead began to scream in protest," al-Heeh continued. "Rana told me that they began to beat her in the stomach with the metal detector. She was then subjected to another strip-search, during which yet again she was tied against a post while dogs were brought close to her."

Al-Heeh also explained how the prison guards acquired false confessions from Abu Kweek through a spy who was sent to speak to her in her cell, “lying to her and telling her that he knew her and knew all of the people that she knew.” “He would literally tell her that a certain somebody she knows sends their regards, and that she can write whatever she wants to them on paper (that he would take to them).” “Her morale was very low during the first days of her arrest, and later an officer came to her telling her that they have a written confession from her.”

5200 Palestinians were being held in Israeli gaols as of October 2013, according to the Palestinian Authority's Ministry of Prisoners' Affairs. Another 1280 are in Israeli prisons for being inside Israel without permits. Since 1967, more than 650,000 Palestinians have been detained by Israel, representing 20% of the total population and 40% of all males in the occupied territories. Under international law, it is illegal to transfer prisoners outside of the occupied territory in which they are detained, and the families of Palestinian prisoners face many obstacles in obtaining permits to see their imprisoned relatives.

http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=650019

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Further news sources

Today in Palestine! www.groups.yahoo.com/group/f_shadi

PNEWS Vacy Vlazna This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

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Behind the Wall

Rich Wiles is a photographic artist who has been living and working in Palestine for some years. His photographic work has been shown around Europe, the US, Australia and in Palestine itself. Since 2006 he has been writing from Occupied Palestine under the title Behind the Wall. Much of this work is based in and around the refugee camps in Palestine, highlighting daily life and memories of refugees who still live in forced exile for over 60 years since Al Nakba (The Catastrophe). www.richwiles.com

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Life under Israeli military occupation

Every area of Israeli-Occupied Palestinian territory experiences arbitrary restrictions of movement imposed by the Israeli Army. The lack of freedom of movement is the frustrating and humiliating background to daily life for the Palestinian people, whose suffering includes a variety of human rights abuses from night home invasions to wanton acts of agricultural and economic sabotage. The Israeli Occupation Army enforces a permit system for the benefit of settlers that determines where Palestinians may live in their own land.

Water

Across the Occupied West Bank, Israel's illegal settlements have completely free access to water. Settler homes enjoy full swimming pools and well-watered gardens, while Palestinian access to their own water is severely restricted. Israel compounds this crime in two ways: The Zionist state forces Palestinians to pay the Israeli government public water supply company Mekorot[1] for what little water they are allowed and, at the same time, Israel forbids Palestinians to sink wells or even build water storage facilities. Palestinians living under Israeli occupation are restricted to about 70 litres a day per person – well below the 100 litres per capita daily recommended by the World Health Organisation (WHO) – whereas Israeli daily per capita consumption, at about 300 litres, is about four times as much. In some rural communities Palestinians survive on far less than even the average 70 litres, in some cases barely 20 litres per day, the minimum amount recommended by the World Health Organisation (WHO) for emergency situations response.

In addition, reports by both the World Bank[2] and the United Nations Environment Programme show that the water crisis in Gaza[3] is likely to be critical and irreversible by 2020. The reports show that Gaza is almost completely dependent on a coastal aquifer that has now become filled with undrinkable sea water. Both international bodies express concern that Israeli military occupation in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip means severe limitations on people's access to essential water supplies.

Checkpoints

Israel places checkpoints at the entrances to towns and villages to prevent people entering or leaving. Interference with people attempting to move around towns and villages consists of blocking roads with concrete blocks, barbed-wire and/or earth mounds. People attempting to transport farm produce and other goods find obstacles placed on the roads by the Israeli Army. Trucks have to be unloaded by hand and similarly re-loaded onto vehicles brought from beyond the obstructions. Road closures are used to isolate areas wherever the Israeli Army considers the presence of Palestinians to be ‘illegal’. When the Israeli Army declares a curfew, anyone appearing in the street or at a window is liable to be shot dead. There are instances of Palestinian mothers giving birth at checkpoints, having been denied ready access to hospital.

Agricultural and economic sabotage

Both the Israeli Army and illegal (according to international law) settlers terrorise Palestinian farmers, often preventing them from working their land as well as frequently uprooting or setting fire to Palestinian olive trees and bulldozing their crops. The United Nations[4] (UN Security Council Resolution 465)[5] has repeatedly upheld the view that Israel's construction of settlements constitutes violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention[6]. The International Court of Justice[7] see also summary[8] says these settlements are illegal and no foreign governments support Israel's settlements. The Gaza fishing industry is being crippled by the enforcement of a draconian fishing limit. The Israel Navy forces Palestinian fishing boats to remain within a three-nautical-mile, over-fished zone, sometimes at the cost to crews of life, limb and property. Gaza City's ruined international airport is permanently closed. Palestinians needing to enter or leave Palestine can do so only with Israeli permission. In addition to Israel's occasional massive bombing raids, Gaza residents are forced to live with the constant fear of overflying drones and the traumatising effects of sonic booms created by Israeli war-planes. The effects on the children of Gaza are particularly distressing.

House demolitions and evictions

The Israeli Army routinely destroys Palestinian houses built without Israel's permission. Israeli troops frequently invade Palestinian homes (often at dead of night) and abductions of Palestinian minors are commonplace. Israeli soldiers often vandalise the interiors of Palestinian homes being raided and frequently terrorise children and other minors with threats. Youngsters abducted by Israeli soldiers are often blindfolded and their wrists tied behind their backs. Many children are illegally taken to prison in Israel, where more terror is practised against them, such as solitary confinement and shackling in painful positions for long periods. The majority of these children are detained inside Israel in violation of Article 76 of the Fourth Geneva Convention.

Israel’s toxic hazard weapon

Israel has devised yet another technique designed to to drive Palestinians from their land and weaken their resolve to resist. It is a direct assault on their health that carries the menace of further agricultural and economic sabotage. For instance, activity at Israel's Barkan industrial complex generates growing quantities of polluting waste-water from the production of plastics, lead and other commodities that endanger human health. Pollution from Barkan flows into the streams that run through valleys where there are Palestinian farms as well as towns. Israeli Occupation settlements discharge their untreated waste to add to the pollution. This practice poisons Palestinian land, crops, farm animals and essential, if meagre, water supplies. Settlers – with Israeli Army assistance – release wild pigs, that reproduce rapidly, into Palestinian areas, spoiling agriculture and damaging olive trees, fencing and small buildings. The pigs cannot be controlled because Israel will not allow the people to own or use firearms, or even knives, to kill the pigs. Poison cannot be used because of the danger to Palestinian farm animals.

Tear gas – Israel's daily violations of the CWC

Israel has signed but refuses to ratify the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention[9] (CWC). Tear gas riot control agents, including tear gas and pepper-spray, are banned in international warfare under both the 1925 Geneva Protocol and Article 1 of the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention. The CWC defines chemical weapons as “munitions and devices that are designed to cause death or other harm through toxic chemicals” that lead to “death, temporary incapacitation or permanent harm to humans or animals.” According to the CWC, “riot control agents” are any chemicals, not specifically named in their list of prohibited chemicals, that can cause humans to suffer rapid “sensory irritation or disabling physical effects which disappear within a short time following termination of exposure.” Belligerent military occupation by a foreign power is an act of war and when the Israeli Army fires tear gas grenades at Palestinian villagers in their homes or at protesters it is violating the CWC; the more so when standard weapons of war such as live fire accompany the use of tear gas. Persons blinded by tear gas cannot avoid live fire, rubber-coated bullets, stun grenades or military vehicles and bulldozers. But that is the reality for Palestinians living under Israeli military Occupation.

Israeli Army military exercises force Palestinians out of their homes[12]

An example of this practice is contained in an International Women's Peace Service (IWPS) report[10] on the Israeli Army's terrorising of a Bedouin community in the Jordan Valley. The report tells of a continual programme of Israeli military training in the village of ‘Atuf that traumatises the population. Every week 22 families, amounting to 172 individuals, are displaced from their homes from 4am to 5pm by Israeli military live-fire exercises. Since 1967 Israeli troops have been forcing the Bedouin people to leave their houses each week. Whole families and their livestock are displaced to outlying fields to the sound of gunfire and explosions. The entire area is designated “Area C” and there is a 'closed military zone' where nothing is allowed to be built or improved. A whole valley of fertile farmland lies uncultivated while the nearby Occupation settlement of Beqa constantly expands. In both ‘Atuf and Tamun countless houses have been demolished by the Israeli Army and many more are under demolition orders. Since 1970, 14 people have been killed and 30 have lost limbs due to exploding abandoned Israeli Army ordnance. The explosives can be as small as a pen, easily mistaken by children as harmless. The continual sound of explosions and gunfire results in many cases of psychological trauma, especially to children, and the only school in the district is within earshot of the weekly Israeli military exercises.

Ethnic discrimination

In addition to all of the above, Palestinians citizens of Israel as well as those living under occupation have to contend with more than 50 discriminatory Israeli laws[11]. These affect all areas of life, including rights to political participation, access to land, education, state budget resources and criminal procedures. Some of the laws also violate the rights of refugees.

Israeli Army violence

The Israeli Occupation Army enforces many of the above restrictions with the threat, or actual use, of military action as well as personal physical assault. Thus, daily life for Palestinians is conducted in an all-pervasive atmosphere of violence and fear.

The Prawer Plan[13]

The Israeli Knesset has approved a plan for the mass expulsion of the Arab Bedouin community in the Naqab (Negev) Desert in the south of Israel. When fully implemented, the Prawer plan will result in the destruction of 35 'unrecognised' Arab Bedouin villages with the forced displacement and dispossession of up to 70,000 Arab Bedouin citizens of Israel.

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[1] http://members.stopthewall.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=1338&qid=381088

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Bank

http://wedc.lboro.ac.uk/resources/who_notes/WHO_TN_09_How_much_water_is_needed.pdf

[3] www.unep.org/PDF/dmb/UNEP_Gaza_EA.pdf

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations

[5]http://domino.un.org/unispal.nsf/3822b5e39951876a85256b6e0058a478/5aa254a1c8f8b1cb852560e50075d7d5

[6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_Geneva_Convention

[7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Court_of_Justice

[8] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_settlement#cite_note-13

[9] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geneva_Protocol

[10] http://iwps.info

[11] http://adalah.org/eng/Israeli-Discriminatory-Law-Database

[12] http://www.deliberation.info/what-sort-of-state-drives-people-out-of-their-homes-in-order-to-conduct-live-fire-military-exercises/

[13] http://www.truah.org/issuescampaigns/bedouin/government-response/prawer-plan.html#sthash.XiKpBPqZ.dpuf

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Leslie Bravery www.palestine.org.nz

PHRC | Palestine Human Rights Campaign Aotearoa/New Zealand

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