Israel’s War Against Palestine: Documenting the Military Occupation of Palestinian and Arab Lands

IOA content is now updated mostly on Facebook.
More on the current status of the IOA HERE.

Gideon Levy: It’s all kosher for Kasher

4 October 2009

When the world said in near unison, “War crimes,” Kasher said, “We are the most moral army in the world, no one is better than us.” If this is how a philosopher of ethics speaks, who needs propagandists?

Mubarak urges Israel to reconsider its Mideast policies

3 October 2009

“This is the core of the Arab peace initiative, which proposes normalisation by Arab states of relations with Israel in exchange for a comprehensive peace which establishes an independent Palestinian state linked to the withdrawal by Israel from all Arab lands it has occupied since 1967.”

IOA Editor: Entirely reasonable. As is “No normalization under Occupation.”

US ‘pressured Abbas on UN report’

3 October 2009

Mustafa Barghouti, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, said that the move “was totally unacceptable, unjustified… There is no justification for postponing the approval of that report and all human rights organisation, most political organisations in Palestine are against that decision.

IOA Editor: It’s the American way – Occupation-as-usual…

See also Washington Post: UN Panel Defers Vote On Gaza Report

Amnesty, HRW demand US, Security Council ensure justice is done

3 October 2009

Amnesty, HRW: US intervention to quash a vote on the report “obliges the United States and other governments blocking action at the council to press Israel and Hamas to commence credible investigations.”

Human Rights Orgs: Justice Delayed is Justice Denied – Decision of Palestinian Leadership and International Pressure an Insult to the Victims

3 October 2009

The Palestinian leadership—under heavy international pressure lead by the United States—deferred the draft proposal at the Human Rights Council endorsing all the recommendations of the UN Fact Finding Mission (the Goldstone Report). This deferral denies the Palestinian peoples’ right to an effective judicial remedy and the equal protection of the law. It represents the triumph of politics over human rights. It is an insult to all victims and a rejection of their rights.

Obama agrees to keep Israel’s nukes secret

3 October 2009

Under the understanding, the U.S. has not pressured Israel to disclose its nuclear weapons or to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which could require Israel to give up its estimated several hundred nuclear bombs.

Daoud Kuttab: False symmetry

2 October 2009

Obama was right in speaking out against the delay in movement in the peace process. Instead of this false symmetry in which charges are fabricated to appear balanced, the US president should simply lay out who was responsible for the delay. Only by chiding the right party can there be hope of real progress in this decades-old conflict.

Haaretz: Only an external probe will do

2 October 2009

The establishment of a state commission of inquiry to investigate the Goldstone report’s allegations of Israeli war crimes during Operation Cast Lead in Gaza is the only appropriate response the Israeli government can make.

PalTrade: Gaza exports at near zero; imports on steady decline

2 October 2009

[O]nly 1.7% of the planned produce exports from Gaza have actually left the Strip. The report also notes that the “monthly average exports in the period before the crisis was 1,380 truckloads per month (70 truckloads per day), composed of furniture, garments, cash crops, vegetables, processed food, metal products, handicrafts, and other cargo types.”

Official, unofficial Greek support for Palestine picks up

2 October 2009

[T]he Greek Association for Solidarity with the Palestinian People [calling] to boycott the participation of an Israeli archaeologist from a UNESCO event next month.

Lieberman: Norway too ‘hostile’ to have monitors in Hebron

2 October 2009

Israel should consider ousting Norwegian monitors from Hebron due to Oslo’s “hostility” toward Israel, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman told the cabinet Thursday.

IOA Editor: Israel is preparing to remove the Norwegian threat to its colonial program. The Baruch Goldstein massacre is nearly forgotten, overshadowed by mass killings on a far grander scale. And, Norway has been showing too much independence from the US-Israeli Occupation-as-usual view.

51% of Israeli-Arabs don’t believe peace coming

1 October 2009

According to the Saban Center poll, 55% of Israeli-Arabs surf the Internet on a near daily basis, 14% go online a few times a week, and only 24% do not use the Internet at all.

US Jews back military strike on Iran

1 October 2009

On Iran: Asked if they would support American military action, 56% of American Jews said they would, while just 36% opposed it…
On the Occupation: While 51% oppose the American freeze demand (though a substantial 41% agree with it), fully 60% said Israel should dismantle all (8%) or some (52%) of the West Bank settlements in the context of a permanent settlement with the Palestinians.

Egypt’s Al-Ahram media group agrees on massive Israel boycott

1 October 2009

The board of directors of Al-Ahram, the most powerful media body in Egypt, has reportedly decided to boycott Israel and Israelis of all positions.

IOA Editor: It is encouraging that such an important Egyptian institution has taken a principled stand, refusing to reward Israel for its aggressive Gaza attack, and for continuing the Occupation, settlement program, and the subjugation of the Palestinian people. Al-Ahram is saying: No normalization under Occupation. Rightly so.

Gideon Levy: Everything is personal

1 October 2009

The wounds of Gaza have not yet healed, the debris has not yet been cleared and the housing there has not yet been rehabilitated. Israel has also not been rehabilitated. It still insists that everything went as it should have. But cracks are now appearing. There is something cynical and depressing about the fact that it is happening only after Israeli leaders started to fear for their personal fates. Now it may be hoped that Goldstone, the United Nations and the world will not give in.

PHR: Shin Bet foot-dragging keeping Gazans from doctors visits

1 October 2009

Physicians for Human Rights-Israel: The slow response of the Shin Bet security service… was the main reason that more than one third… missed their medical appointments.

Jamal Zahalka, MK: Solidarity with general strike of Palestinians in Israel, October 1

30 September 2009

To protest the killing of 13 Palestinian demonstrators in 2000, stop land confiscations and house demolitions, advance full civic and national rights for Arab Palestinian citizens.

Israel set to approve massive new settlement near Bethlehem

30 September 2009

[The plan] calls for the construction of 14,000 housing units for 40,000 Jewish Israelis on 3,000 dunums… The land in question is owned by Palestinians in the West Bank village of Al-Walaja, sandwiched between the settlement of Gilo and the Gush Etzion settlement bloc.

Navi Pillay: The vital importance of ending impunity in Israel and Palestine

30 September 2009

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights: “I lend my full support to Justice Goldstone’s report and its recommendations. I fully agree with him that the prevailing impunity for human rights violations in the Middle East conflict must end.”

ADL slams Spain for banning settlement university from contest

29 September 2009

“The decision by the Spanish government to disqualify the Israeli researchers is unwarranted, biased and clearly discriminatory,” said Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director. “This unacceptable action introduces politics into an important scientific competition where politics has no place.”

IOA Editor: Despite its lofty motto, the ADL is not fighting for “justice and fair treatment to all.” It never protested the closure of Birzeit University or other Palestinian academic institutions, or rejected Israel’s closure of Gaza which prevented even pencils and paper from arriving at Gaza’s shattered schools in time for the current school year. Now, by joining Israel’s propaganda war against international law, the ADL is endorsing Israel’s occupation and settlement program.

Israel gets two more German submarines

29 September 2009

According to Jane’s Defence Weekly, the U212s… have a range of 4,500 kilometres (2,810 miles) and can launch cruise missiles carrying nuclear warheads. Israeli media have written that the Dolphin submarine could be key in any attack on arch-foe Iran’s controversial nuclear sites.

IOA Editor: For technical specifications, see Israeli Dolphins Rule The Waves

India to get Israeli killer drones by 2011

29 September 2009

India will get its first set of lethal drones designed to take down high-value targets like missile sites, radars and even senior enemy personnel by 2011, adding a new dimension to its combative capabilities.

IOA Editor: According to The Marker (Hebrew), the sale will consist of 10 “suicide” drones for over US$100M. The drones are classified as “violent” or “self-destruct,” designed to aim at high value targets and explode onto them. Not a bad deal for the killing-machine maker, Israel Aerospace Industries, at more than US$10M a pop, hit or miss – a far higher return than, say, Jaffa oranges.

DCI-Palestine submits 11 cases to the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture

29 September 2009

The cases arise out of three incidents where the Israeli army entered Palestinian villages in the middle of the night and rounded up children en masse, accusing them of throwing stones at the Wall and settler by-pass roads in the West Bank.

Lawyers seek arrest of Israeli defence minister in UK for alleged war crimes

29 September 2009

British lawyers for several Palestinian families are seeking to obtain an international arrest warrant for the Israeli defence minister, Ehud Barak, in a London court over alleged war crimes in the Gaza Strip… Barak is due to meet Gordon Brown today and David Miliband, the foreign secretary, tomorrow.

UPDATE:
U.K. court defers Palestinian bid to arrest Ehud Barak

Foreign diplomats to rally with Israeli Arabs marking October 2000 riots

29 September 2009

Participation of foreign diplomats represented a turning point in the way that the world treated relations between Israel’s Arab population and the state… About a month ago, The Higher Arab Monitoring Committee decided to declare a general strike in all Israeli Arab communities on Thursday, October 1st.

IOA Editor: The participation of foreign diplomats in events related to the General Strike would be a remarkable change, and would add to Israel’s feeling of growing global pressure. Let us hope that this will actually happen.

‘Hizbullah had better intel than Israel in 2006′

29 September 2009

[The military researcher] also warned of the possibility that in a future conflict, the United States might not help Israel as it had in the past… Sandman recommended that the IDF ask the US to establish additional warehouses with emergency stockpiles of weaponry in Israel, even “if Israel has to pay for their maintenance.” The US already has several warehouses with weaponry in Israel.

Gaza peace protester is imprisoned in own home

28 September 2009

Jonathan Cook writes about Samih Jabareen’s Gaza protest and extended house arrest. He also reports that Israel’s “Arab minority” is staging a general strike on Thursday, 1 Oct 2009 to protest the increasingly harsh climate.

PA condemns ‘state terror’ at Al-Aqsa

28 September 2009

The top PLO negotiator, Dr Saeb Erakat, condemned what he termed Israeli violence against worshippers. “This attack on ordinary civilians and worshippers at Al-Aqsa is unacceptable…” Israeli settlers were “determined to destroy Jerusalem as it once was, an open and multicultural city, and home to the world’s three great monotheistic faiths… Israel’s actions are both illegal and are designed to make Jerusalem a ‘united city’ for Israeli settlers only, while Israel continues to target the city’s Christian and Muslim population.”

Israelis, Palestinians work together in bid to solve local water shortage

27 September 2009

Israelis, Palestinians work together: The Occupier and the Occupied.

Israel demands PA drop war crimes suit at The Hague

27 September 2009

Meanwhile, Israel has warned the Palestinian Authority that it would condition permission for a second cellular telephone provider to operate in the West Bank – an economic issue of critical importance to the PA leadership – on the Palestinians withdrawing their request at the International Court.

Nuclear threat to the Golan

27 September 2009

[T]he Syrian Foreign Ministry has accused Israel of “the crime of burying nuclear, radioactive and poisonous waste in the Golan, exposing the population to the danger of grave illnesses.” The report also notes that the “living conditions of the Syrian inhabitants of the occupied Golan are deteriorating every day.”

Settlers marketing East Jerusalem homes for 22 Jewish families

27 September 2009

An organization committed to populating East Jerusalem with Jewish residents has said that it has six properties in the Old City to sell to 22 Jewish families, which would bring the number of Jews living in the Arab quarters of the walled city to 1,000.

Uri Avnery: The Drama and the Farce

26 September 2009

For Netanyahu, the threat of peace has passed. At least for the time being. It is difficult to understand how Obama allowed himself to get into this embarrassing situation.

IPI Poll: Palestinians Support 2-State Peace Plan, Fatah, Abbas

26 September 2009

A clear majority of Palestinians – 55% – favor a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza, separate from Israel, according to the survey. Just 11% favored either of the other alternatives under discussion, a bi-national state of Palestinians and Israelis or a confederation with neighboring Jordan and Egypt.

Jamil Dakwar: Goldstone Report is Not to Be Ignored

25 September 2009

The report’s findings demand action by the international community, including the United States. The importance of U.S. action is elevated because the U.S. currently holds the Presidency of the U.N. Security Council, the U.N. body charged with enforcing the report’s conclusions.

Ramzy Baroud: Justice This Time Around – Will Goldstone’s Report Deliver?

25 September 2009

‘We may be witnessing the beginning of the end of the era of impunity,’ Nadia Hijab, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Institute for Palestine Studies, was quoted by IPS in response to the findings of a 574-page report by a four-member United Nations Fact finding mission.