Berlanty Azzam , 22, has been in the West Bank since 2005 and has only two months of studies left in order to complete her Bachelor’s degree in business administration. In late October, however, the Israeli authorities expelled her back to Gaza claiming that that she was illegally staying in the West Bank. Read more »
Israeli security agents held a Palestinian patient for three weeks without charge, interrogated him repeatedly and offered access to hospital care if he agreed to become an informant, the Guardian has learned. Read more »
[A]n all-time record for the number of Arab residents of East Jerusalem who were stripped of residency rights by the [Israeli] Interior Ministry. Altogether, the ministry revoked the residency of 4,577 East Jerusalemites in 2008 – 21 times the average of the previous 40 years… The [effort] was the brainchild of former interior minister Meir Sheetrit (Kadima) and [the head of] the ministry’s Population Administration.
IOA Editor: Depopulating the Palestinians, or ethnic cleansing, is not new for Israel. In addition to the forcible removal of Palestinians during the Nakba, the Israeli government has used a variety of tricks to “redeem” the Land of Israel from its native Arab population. The removal of East Jerusalem Palestinian residents is somewhat similar to a government practice of the early 1950s, targeting the so-called “absent present” residents: those who temporarily left their homes or land during the war, but remained within what later become Israel. They were prevented from reclaiming their property and Israel was thus able to confiscate it for the exclusive use of its Jewish citizens. Read more »
“… [W]e know the incident I was involved in was not an unusual one, but one that happens a lot… The only difference is that in my case it was documented and that’s how the entire world saw and heard about it… The Israeli courts have proved and taught us that they are part of the occupation system. It’s like the judge, the defendant and the prosecutor are the same thing, as they are part of one system. How can the same system judge itself?” Read more »
“To the best of my knowledge, there’s probably no other country in the world… which is subject to such an intrusive regime of aerial surveillance,” UN special envoy for Lebanon Michael Williams said this month. Read more »
Noam Chomsky in BBC interview:The war in Afghanistan is “immoral.” He spoke to Stephen Sackur and answered viewer questions, among them several on the Middle East. Read more »
[Lacking] the most essential elements of statehood: independence and sovereignty, and effective control over its territory… A Palestinian state that is recognised under these circumstances, with its territory partitioned, and subdivided into cantons, surrounded by walls, fences, ditches, watchtowers, and barbed wire, would scarcely be a state worthy of the name. Read more »
[T]here is a gradual mobilizing, galvanizing of public opinion such that… you can see the writing on the wall, that Israel is getting closer and closer to being held accountable… And in that respect you can say the Goldstone report marked a qualitative change. They recognized now for the first time that the shadow of accountability is hanging over them. Read more »
The outrageous treatment of the 21-year-old Bethlehem University student, Berlanty Azzam by the Israeli military is the latest incident in a long list of brutalities carried out by one of the longest and most brutal military occupations in history. Returning to Bethlehem in the West Bank, after a job interview in Ramallah, Berlanty… was detained at a military checkpoint, blindfolded, handcuffed, loaded into a military jeep and deported to Gaza. Read more »
“I would suggest that time has come for Israel to look at the allegations not only of the killing and injuring of so many civilians but also the collective punishment meted out to the people of Gaza by the substantial destruction of the infrastructure, and particularly the food infrastructure of Gaza. The debate should continue, not attempt to be silenced.” Read more »
