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

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Netanyahu’s paranoia extends to ‘self-hating Jews’ Emmanuel and Axelrod

9 July 2009

Netanyahu appears to be suffering from confusion and paranoia. He is convinced that the media are after him, that his aides are leaking information against him and that the American administration wants him out of office. Two months after his visit to Washington, he is still finding it difficult to communication normally with the White House. To appreciate the depth of his paranoia, it is enough to hear how he refers to Rahm Emanuel and David Axelrod, Obama’s senior aides: as “self-hating Jews.”

IOA Editor: This is an alarming report, given the potential destruction Netanyahu can inflict upon the region.

Amos Harel: Why Israel won’t evacuate West Bank outposts

7 July 2009

Not just in the courts, but also on the ground, it is hard to see any real indication that the settlement enterprise is headed toward a freeze. Dror Etkes, the man behind the petitions, photographed construction in the outpost of Ali this week.

Former US Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney’s telephone call from Israeli Jail

6 July 2009

This is Cynthia McKinney and I’m speaking from an Israeli prison cellblock in Ramle. [I am one of] the Free Gaza 21, human rights activists currently imprisoned for trying to take medical supplies to Gaza, building supplies – and even crayons for children, I had a suitcase full of crayons for children. While we were on our way to Gaza the Israelis threatened to fire on our boat, but we did not turn around. The Israelis high-jacked and arrested us because we wanted to give crayons to the children in Gaza. We have been detained, and we want the people of the world to see how we have been treated just because we wanted to deliver humanitarian assistance to the people of Gaza.

Gideon Levy: Our IDF

6 July 2009

Gideon Levy on the latest IDF hijacking of a Gaza relief boat, and on the IDF as an occupation force and a killing machine.

Israel braces for influx of new immigrants this summer

6 July 2009

After years of decline in immigration, Israel is expected this year to absorb 15 percent more new arrivals than last year, thanks in part to 20 flights arriving this summer carrying 5,000 immigrants from North America, France, Great Britain, South Africa and beyond.

Saudis give nod to Israeli raid on Iran

5 July 2009

The head of Mossad, Israel’s overseas intelligence service, has assured Benjamin Netanyahu, its prime minister, that Saudi Arabia would turn a blind eye to Israeli jets flying over the kingdom during any future raid on Iran’s nuclear sites.

The Israeli army’s religious transformation

2 July 2009

A significant change is occurring within the IDF, and it has not yet been sufficiently analyzed. The face of the army, especially the middle ranks, has become more religious over the last decade. It’s not just a matter of counting skullcaps at graduation ceremonies at Training Base 1, where religious soldiers account for 30 percent of infantry officer course graduates. The same process is playing itself out in most of the fighting units. As a result the IDF, and not just its chief rabbi, is speaking with a different, more religious voice.

Israeli Housing Minister: Spread of Arab population must be stopped

2 July 2009

Housing Minister Ariel Atias… warned against the spread of Arab population into various parts of Israel, saying that preventing this phenomenon was no less than a national responsibility. “I see [it] as a national duty to prevent the spread of a population that, to say the least, does not love the state of Israel,” Atias told a conference of the Israel Bar Association, which focused on a reforming Israel’s Land Administration.

Peace Now Activists Assaulted by Settlers for Documenting Illegal West Bank Settlement Construction

2 July 2009

Peace Now plays a very important role in documenting Israel’s on-going international law violations as applied to the misappropriation of lands owned by an occupaied population and land development which causes a change of population in territories under occupation.

Naomi Klein: Oppose the state, not the people

1 July 2009

Ramallah’s intellectual elite, foreigners and curious spectators gathered last Saturday at the Friends School in Ramallah to hear writer and political activist Naomi Klein lecture to a packed auditorium… She chose to speak in Ramallah about her Jewish roots. “There is a debate among Jews – I’m a Jew by the way,” she said. The debate boils down to the question: “Never again to everyone, or never again to us?… [Some Jews] even think we get one get-away-with-genocide-free card… There is another strain in the Jewish tradition that say,’Never again to anyone.’”

Israeli Court: IDF must toughen charges for shooting of bound Palestinian

1 July 2009

The High Court of Justice on Wednesday ordered the Israel Defense Forces to press stronger charges against a commanding officer over the shooting of a bound and blindfolded Palestinian detainee in the West Bank.

Daniel Lang-Levitsky: Jews Confront Zionism

30 June 2009

One of the main accomplishments of the Israeli government’s bombing and invasion of the Gaza Strip last winter was to inspire new vitality within leftist and peace groups in solidarity with the Palestinian struggle for justice and liberation. This wave of activity has continued after the supposed ceasefire, with demonstrations and direct actions from New York to Los Angeles, Paris, Jaffa, and Tel Aviv. Most noteworthy has been a coming out of sorts of an increasingly large and vocal segment of the Jewish world that is not only opposed to the Israeli government’s wars and military occupations, but critical of Zionism itself.

Amira Hass: Privately run checkpoint stops Palestinians with ’too much food’

29 June 2009

A West Bank checkpoint managed by a private security company is not allowing Palestinians to pass through with large water bottles and some food items – such as 6 pieces of bread.

Red Cross: Israel trapping 1.5m Gazans in despair

29 June 2009

The Red Cross released a damning report Monday on the effects of the Israel-led blockade on the Gaza Strip, describing the 2-year-old measure as having trapped the coastal territory’s 1.5 million residentsin despair.

“Gaza neighborhoods particularly hard hit by the Israeli strikes will continue to look like the epicenter of a massive earthquake unless vast quantities of cement, steel and other building materials are allowed into the territory for reconstruction,” the report said.

Unlikely Ally for Residents of West Bank

27 June 2009

Ezra Nawi was in his element. Behind the wheel of his well-worn jeep one recent Saturday morning, working two cellphones in Arabic as he bounded through the terraced hills and hardscrabble villages near Hebron, he was greeted warmly by Palestinians near and far.

Gideon Levy: Lawbreakers in the Supreme Court

25 June 2009

The Supreme Court now appears to be the settlers’ next illegal outpost. They will get their wish, nothing will stop them. This couldn’t happen in a state of law.

Rights group: IDF, Shin Bet restraint practices tantamount to torture

24 June 2009

The public committee against torture in Israel released a harsh report on Wednesday, revealing “pain and humiliation” inflicted by the Israel Defense Forces and the Shin Bet security service, against Palestinian detainees… often constituting torture. In defiance of Israeli law, High Court rulings and international laws and guidelines, detainees in Israel are usually bound in a way that is designed to cause them pain, and not only to prevent them from escaping, the report says.

Barak authorizes construction of 300 new homes in West Bank

23 June 2009

Activists for Bimkom association, which works for justice and human rights in planning and knows a thing or two about the situation in the territories, have discovered that Barak recently authorized the Civil Administration to submit a plan for the construction of 300 housing units in the unauthorized outpost of Givat Habrecha, near the community of Talmon… The new construction is located around 13 kilometers east of the Green Line, on the “Palestinian” side of the separation barrier.

Jewish groups blast ’anti-Zionist’ conference at Toronto university

22 June 2009

Entitled “Israel/Palestine: Mapping Models of Statehood and Paths to Peace,” the three-day meet features presentations by dozens of speakers, including Palestinian and Israeli scholars.

IOA Editor: So-called “Supporters of Israel” (a misnomer because, invariably, they object to an equitable solution to the Israeli-Palestinian confilct, thus excluding any viable solution) again show their true anti-democratic faces: trying to block an academic conference assessing potential future peace arrangements which they choose not to tolerate. Thus, not for the first time, charges of “anti-Semitism” are leveled. Anyone who experienced the anti-Occupation struggle in the past 42 years is familiar with this dynamic.

David Shulman: Where peaceful protest begets jail

19 June 2009

[I]nside the occupied Palestinian territories [there] is a shadow state where the only real law is the law of the gun, where land is being taken away from its rightful owners every day, and where the very few who stand up to protest, without violence, like Ezra Nawi, are sent to prison. Bad times generally bring out the worst in most of us.

Aluf Benn: West Bank road trip

19 June 2009

An important assessment of the realities of the West Bank settlement program, and why the Israeli Occupation is here to stay – unless Israel is forced otherwise.

Haaretz: Israeli troops humiliate Palestinians – and put it on YouTube

19 June 2009

Haaretz documents the latest abuses of Palestinians by Israeli Border Police at checkpoints. The Israeli military/police soldiers were so pround of their work that the decided to film it and put it on YouTube for the world to see. Haaretz (Hebrew edition) presents six such video clips, each reflecting the fundamental humanity of the victim, and the fundamental indecency and cruelty of the victimizer.

It is important to note that such ugly and unpleasant behavior is just that: ugly and unpleasant. While accurately reflecting the day-to-day abusive aspects of the Occupation, such behavioral aspects are probably among its least important aspects. For 42 years now, the Israeli occupation, in an orchestrated campaign to dispossess an entire people and to physically destroy Palestinian nationhood, has done far, far worse.

Gideon Levy: The unrest in Iran makes me green with envy

18 June 2009

It’s true, there is liberty in Israel, but only for us, the Jews. We have a regime that is no less tyrannical than the ayatollahs’ regime: the regime of the officers and the settlers in the territories… When you get a chance, go on Friday to Na’alin or Bil’in and see what happens there. Demonstrators are killed here with similar brutality, but in Iran the crowd is standing up to a tyrannical regime, while here only a handful of brave people stand up to the Border Police, who are firing weapons. Moreover, we hardly write anything about the protest being silenced with bullets. It interests no one, and this, too, is called democracy.

US ups pressure on Israel to end Gaza blockade

18 June 2009

The United States has stepped up pressure on Israel regarding the Gaza Strip: Three weeks ago it sent Jerusalem a diplomatic note officially protesting Gaza policy and demanding a more liberal opening of the border crossings to facilitate reconstruction.

IOA Editor: Clearly, the “stepped up pressure” is not too onerous on Israel: after three weeks, it has yet to result in any meaningful change in Gaza.

Assaf Kfoury: What the Lebanese Elections Are and What They Are Not

18 June 2009

American policies in the average Lebanese voter’s mind are not exemplified by Obama’s pious pronouncements in Cairo on June 4th, but by a long record of unrestricted support for Israel’s meddling in internal Lebanese affairs and oppression of Palestinians, as well as American alliance with despotic Arab regimes, the devastation of Iraq, and aggressive interventions further East.

Carter ’distressed’ by Gaza visit

17 June 2009

Visiting the American School in Gaza, damaged in Israel’s three-week operation, Mr Carter said “it’s very distressing to me”. He said the school had been “deliberately destroyed by bombs from F-16s made in my country and delivered to the Israelis”… Gazans “are treated more like animals than human beings,” Mr Carter said. “Never before in history has a large community like this been savaged by bombs and missiles and then been deprived of the means to repair itself…”

Antony Loewenstein: Why aren’t Jews outraged by Israeli occupation?

17 June 2009

A thinking, more enlightened Judaism is emerging, a necessity in the face of apartheid realities… Defining a humane Judaism in the 21st century means condemning the brutal military occupation in the West Bank and resisting the ongoing siege of Gaza.

Akiva Eldar: Netanyahu, Mideast peace and a return to the Axis of Evil

15 June 2009

The prime minister’s speech last night returned the Middle East to the days of George W. Bush’s “axis of evil.” Benjamin Netanyahu delivered a patriarchal, colonialist address in the best neoconservative tradition: The Arabs are the bad guys, or at best ungrateful terrorists; the Jews, of course, are the good guys, rational people who need to raise and care for their children.

Carter: Netanyahu faces clash with Obama over peace process

14 June 2009

A day before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivers what has been described as a key policy speech at Bar-Ilan University, former U.S. president Jimmy Carter told Haaretz in an exclusive interview on Saturday that President Barack Obama will not change his position on the two-state solution and Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Carter added that Israel and the United States are on a collision course if Israel refuses to comply on these two issues.

Akive Eldar: What about the Arabs’ natural growth?

12 June 2009

It seems that never before has so much been written and said about the “natural growth” of so few… Maybe it is no coincidence that the government spokespeople insist on describing the homes for “sons returning from the army” rather than homes for young couples, or students. Someone might dare to check the housing situation in Arab villages or East Jerusalem, whose residents actually on Israeli soil as opposed to the settlers.

Poll: 56% of Israelis back settlement construction

12 June 2009

Nearly six of every 10 Israelis think Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should resist U.S. demands to completely freeze construction in Jewish West Bank settlements, according to a new poll released Friday. The poll by the Maagar Mohot Polling Institute comes just ahead of Netanyahu’s major policy speech on Sunday that is expected to address a […]

Gaza bonanza

11 June 2009

While the Israel Defense Forces calculates how many calories Gaza residents need and strictly regulates the products allowed to enter the Strip, the blockade is giving some Israeli entrepreneurs an opportunity to turn big profits.

IOA Editor: An important investigative report uncovering the many ways in which the Israel economy, and Israeli companies, profit from the Gaza closure.

Aluf Benn: Netanyahu failed to build bond of trust with Obama

10 June 2009

A photo released by the White House, which shows Obama talking on the phone with Netanyahu on Monday, speaks volumes: The president is seen with his legs up on the table, his face stern and his fist clenched, as though he were dictating to Netanyahu: “Listen up and write ’Palestinian state’ a hundred times. That’s right, Palestine, with a P.” As an enthusiast of Muslim culture, Obama surely knows there is no greater insult in the Middle East than pointing the soles of one’s shoes at another person.

Supreme Court: Why won’t state demolish illegal outposts?

10 June 2009

Supreme Court President Dorit Beinisch on Wednesday lambasted the state for neglecting to enforce demolition orders of illegal West Bank outposts… The state prosecutor’s office responded by saying that the government was working according to the priorities set forth by Defense Minister Ehud Barak.

Noam Chomsky: Turning Point?

7 June 2009

Obama has praised the [Arab Peace] Initiative and called on the Arab states to proceed to normalize relations with Israel. But he has so far scrupulously evaded the core of the proposal, thus implicitly maintaining the US rejectionist stand that has blocked a diplomatic settlement since the 1970s along with its Israeli client, in virtual isolation. There are no signs that Obama is willing even to consider the Arab Initiative, let alone “promote” it. That was underscored in Obama’s much heralded address to the Muslim world in Cairo on June 4, [2009].

Yehuda Ben Meir: Don’t turn Obama into an enemy

7 June 2009

Apart from a few small nuances, George W. Bush could have delivered the same speech. On the Israeli-Palestinian-Arab issue, in particular, not only could Bush have delivered the same speech, he did – almost everything the current U.S. president said in Cairo was said many times over by his predecessor. It was not Obama, after all, who invented the maxim “two states for two peoples” – it was at the very core of his predecessor’s vision, our great friend in the White House, as early as 2002.