Friday, December 28, 2018
As the year draws to a close, we’d like to share with you 89 seconds
that convey several images, several moments, of the reality of Israel’s
“democratic” control over Palestinian subjects, whose lives - and homes -
are entirely exposed to Israel’s power. The occupation will sadly still
be here in 2019. And so will we. Until the occupation ends
The employment rate of Bedouin women is increasing, and there is a
five-year government plan on the subject. However, testimonies at a
recent conference which took place in Rahat indicate that the Israeli
labor market is not adapted to the needs of the Bedouin women and their
culture, nor to the lack of infrastructure in the unrecognized villages.
Friday, December 21, 2018
On 14 July 2018, the Israeli military carried out an airstrike on a
building in Gaza which it claimed the Hamas used for training purposes. A
joint investigation by B’Tselem and Forensic Architecture found that
the strike began with the launching of four missiles the military termed
“warning missiles.” The first killed two 14-year-olds who were sitting
on the rooftop at the time. The investigation also found that the video
clip the military released of the attack omits footage of the strike in
which the two boys were killed while the impact of the third missile is
shown twice. The firing of lethal missiles as a means of warning is
unlawful and, for all intents and purposes, constitutes an attack. As
such, the action must abide by the applicable rules set out in
international law, including adhering to the principle of
proportionality and the duty to provide effective warning. None of this
was done in the case at hand
On the morning of Thursday, 13 December 2018, at around 11 A.M., Civil
Administration personnel came with a military jeep escort to the
Palestinian community of Khirbet Ibziq in the northern Jordan Valley.
They served temporary displacement orders to 13 families – a total of 70
people, including 38 children – citing military training in the area as
the pretext. The orders require the families to vacate their homes from
12:00 noon until 6:00
the next morning on 16 December, 23 December, 26 December, and 31
December 2018. In other words, the families must spend the night away
from home.
Two of the 13 families were served additional orders, requiring them to
vacate their homes also on 17 December 2018 from 12 noon until 4:00
P.M., and on 18 December 2018 from 10:00 A.M. to 3:00 P.M. Twelve of
the 13 families had already been temporarily displaced from their homes
in March 2018.
On Sunday, 16 December 2018, at around 12:00
noon, military jeeps and tanks arrived in the area, as did Civil
Administration personnel who instructed the families to vacate their
homes. The families complied. Taking along a portion of their flocks but
leaving behind young lambs and kids, the families walked a distance of
over 5 kilometers. Some were able to stay with relatives, while others
remained outside, exposed to the elements
This is the story of ‘Alaa a-Dali. He was injured on 30 March 2018, at
the first of the Return Protests east of the city of Rafah. He lost a
leg.
Since the protests near the Gaza perimeter fence began, over 180
protesters – including at least 31 minors – have been killed by Israeli
gunfire, and over 5,800 wounded.
Most were unarmed and were shot despite posing no mortal danger to
anyone
Israeli-American actress Natalie Portman called Israel's "Nation State"
law "racist".
Israel passed "Nation State" law in July 2018 giving Jews supremacy over
all non-Jewish Israeli citizens, which critics and members of the
state's Palestinian minority called racist, likening the legislation to
apartheid.
15-year-old ‘Abd a-Rahman Abu Daoud was arrested, then sentenced by the
military justice system – which does not provide safeguards to minors –
to three months in prison.
6-year-old Zeid Taha is under the age of criminal responsibility. He was
taken unlawfully to the checkpoint and kept there for about an hour
without his parents being informed. This conduct demonstrates the moral
blindness afflicting the powers of the occupation
An 18-year-old Palestinian was killed by Israeli forces during protests
in Ramallah after Israel intensified its military presence in the West
Bank. Israeli forces sealed off Ramallah, the seat of the Palestinian
Authority, from its surroundings. At least 57 were injured throughout
the occupied West Bank, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent.
Israeli forces also injured 75 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, including
two photojournalists, during the 38th week of protests against the
Israeli blockade.
In total more than 100 Palestinians have been arrested by Israeli forces
in raids of West Bank cities since Thursday.
Together we resist home demolitions! we say no the settlements in East Jerusalem!
We shall stand in silence protest in solidarity with the 700 residents
of Baten el-Hawa, Silwan, and the 40 members of the Sabag family from
Sheikh Jarrah.
We shall meet on December 9th at 19:00 next to Teva Castel, in the First Station, West Jerusalem.
Friday, December 14, 2018
A Canadian Court ruled that Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions activists
were denied free speech and campaigning rights when the city of Montreal
tore down their posters highlighting an Israeli atrocity during an
election campaign in Canada. We discuss the case with Bruce Katz, one of
the main plaintiffs in the case
Ramzi Ajamiah, 17, and Issa al-Muti, 16, have been best friends since
the first grade.
The pair can often be found with their arms wrapped around one another,
wandering through the narrow, graffiti-filled alleyways between their
homes in the Dheisheh refugee camp near the occupied West Bank city of
Bethlehem.
The teenagers’ friendship grew deeper after Israeli occupation forces
shot both of them in the legs, causing each severe injuries.
“Our relationship is tied with a solidarity of pain. He is injured and I
am injured. We have the same suffering,” Ramzi told The Electronic
Intifada.
“[Our friendship is] like a stone. We have unity in pain.”
Friday, December 7, 2018
What has been done so far in the context of the Hot Meal law, in the 15
years since its enactment? Should it be differential or universal? And
how many children and local authorities can it reach? On the
achievements and ongoing work, as well as the challenges, barriers and
possible solutions. The conference was initiated by the following
organizations: Yedid, Leket Israel, Mazon - Jewish Response to Hunger
and was held in Tel Aviv on 28/10/2018.
November 30th marked the eight-month anniversary of the Great March of
Return. Every Friday since March 30th, thousands of Palestinians in Gaza
have taken to the borders with Israel to demand the right of return of
refugees to their ancestral homelands in present-day Israel, and an end
to the siege on Gaza. Israel has imposed an 11-year land, air, and sea
blockade on Gaza, crippling the coastal enclave's economy. Gazans suffer
from lack of access to clean water, high unemployment rates, and
electricity for only a few hours a day -- contributing to growing
frustrations in the coastal enclave. Despite reported efforts from
political officials to bring the Great March of Return to a close,
protesters maintain that they will continue demonstrating until the
siege is lifted once and for all.
Friday, November 30, 2018
The Israeli military, in a statement released on Monday, alleged that
the attacker was "neutralized" near the Gush Etzion junction south of
the city of Bethlehem, located about 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) south of
Jerusalem al-Quds.
The statement asserted that three Israeli soldiers were injured in the
purported assault. One of the soldiers sustained moderate injuries,
while the other two were slightly hurt.
The Israeli military added that the Palestinian man rammed his vehicle
into soldiers as the latter were carrying out engineering work along a
road. An Israeli soldier, on patrol, then fired shots at the alleged
assailant.
The Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) confirmed that Israeli
forces had shot and killed Ramzi Abu Yabes, a resident from the Dheisheh
refugee camp, while he was on his way to the southern West Bank city of
al-Khalil (Hebron) for work.
Every year at Easter, a ceremony takes place in Ma'alul that connects
the community of displaced persons and their descendants to the village
from which they were expelled. This is not just a romantic-symbolic
act, the community also has a practical plan for realizing the return. A
conversation with Rowan Bisharat, the daughter of an uprooted family
from the village of Ma'lul.
Interview with Frank Romano (11/9/2018), Doctor of Philosophy at the
University of Paris and a faculty member at San Francisco's Golden
Bridge University, three days before his arrest in Khan el Ahmar. Dr.
Romano says that what happens in Khan al-Ahmar falls under the
definition of ethnic cleansing and is a serious violation of
international law, and hopes that the world will open its heart and
understand that it is a mistake!
Saturday, November 24, 2018
Friday, November 16, 2018
0
“The settlers came in the middle of the night, no one knew. By morning
they had paved a road up to the mountain, set up their tents, and had
soldiers protecting them,” Zafer Attayah, a resident of Kfar Ni’ma told
Mondoweiss. Ever since the settlers showed up two months ago, the
Palestinians from Risan’s three surrounding villages have been staging
weekly Friday protests on the mountain in attempts to stop the
confiscation. “We have to maintain our presence in the area,” Attayah
said. “They think they can just come and take the land, but we will not
make it easy for them.”
On the morning of Thursday, 8 November 2018, at around 5:00
A.M., Civil Administration personnel came with two bulldozers and a
Border Police escort to the village of a-Za’ayem in al-Quds District.
The forces first came to the al-Barakah neighborhood, where they
demolished a fence that was built a year ago around an agricultural
plot. At about 7:00 A.M. the forces arrived in a-Sheikh ’Anbar
neighborhood in the village and demolished a home under construction,
where a family of ten, including seven children, were set to live. The
forces later demolished the foundations for another residential
structure
Eden Tesfamarim, a single mother of three children, has been in Israel
for nine years without any status: "I have no hope in Israel." The
deposit law that has been operating in Israel for a year has caused
thousands of asylum seekers to find themselves in a very difficult
economic and psychological situation. According to the aid
organizations, the number of women who have been reduced to prostitution
by the law reaches hundreds, and despite this the state refuses to
recognize the injustices caused by the law and does not offer an
efficient and fair solution.
Eden Tesfamarim, a single mother of three children, has been in Israel
for nine years without any status: "I have no hope in Israel." The
deposit law that has been operating in Israel for a year has caused
thousands of asylum seekers to find themselves in a very difficult
economic and psychological situation. According to the aid
organizations, the number of women who have been reduced to prostitution
by the law reaches hundreds, and despite this the state refuses to
recognize the injustices caused by the law and does not offer an
efficient and fair solution.
Israelis supporting the right of return of the Palestinians demonstrated
on the Gaza border at the same time as the Palestinian return
demonstration held on the 21st of September 2018. During the
demonstration the Israelis spoke on the phone with the Palestinians on
the other side of the fence and expressed support and solidarity with
them.
A quarter of the deaths on construction sites in recent years have been
caused by improper scaffolding or installation failures. The Israeli
standard for scaffolding is very old, and the European standard has long
been adopted by the Israeli Standards Institute, but most contractors
prefer to use those old scaffolding and safety scaffolds to save costs.
The workers are not the only ones who pay the price, but also
pedestrians who are in vicinity of the construction sites. In this
article, you will also be able to identify the common scaffolds and
their failures in order to beware of them.
Saturday, November 10, 2018
The group of human rights defenders organized a solidarity stand with
the Palestinian prisoners in the Israeli occupation prisons of 350
children in the Tel Rumeida area of Hebron, which is suffering from
settlement and whose inhabitants have been turned into prisoners in
their homes due to the policy of ethnic cleansing. 12 efficiency in
different cities of the world, including Belfast, Waterford in Ireland,
Amsterdam in the Netherlands, South Johannesburg in South Africa,
Marseilles in France, London in Britain and other cities in the world.
Activist Badee Dwaik Coordinator of the campaign Shadi Farah from the
Human Rights Defenders group, thanked all the international partners and
friends in organizing and attending the events organized to support the
issue of children in the prisons of the occupation. He called on human
rights institutions and governments of the world to take practical
measures to punish the State of Israel For its crimes against the
Palestinian people and land and the immediate release of children.
On the morning of Tuesday, 6 November 2018, at about 6:00
A.M., Jerusalem Municipality personnel came with two bulldozers and a
Border Police and special Israel Police forces escort to the East
Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina. They demolished two tin-roofed
cement structures which had been the homes of two families, numbering 11
persons, including 5 minors. Later that morning, at around 10:00
A.M., Jerusalem Municipality personnel came with a bulldozer and a
Border Police escort to the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan and
demolished a snack shop.
The Jerusalem Municipality deliberately avoids preparing detailed urban
building plans (UBPs), which are the only avenue for obtaining building
permits, for the Palestinian neighborhoods in East Jerusalem. The result
is a severe shortage of homes, public buildings, infrastructure and
leisure and commercial facilities. This has left the residents no choice
but to build without permits and risk demolition.
Palestinians who live in the Gheith and a-Salameih neighborhoods, as
well as in other neighborhoods in Hebron, are subjected to extreme
restrictions on their freedom of movement, as B’Tselem has documented
many times. The military built a fence along the main street of these
neighborhoods to keep residents out and leave the street open to
settlers only.
Although the military promised it would keep the gate in the fence open
from 6:00 A.M. to 22:00
P.M., it has failed to do so and the gate often remains locked
throughout the day.
To get out of the area when the gate is closed, residents have to take a
roundabout route that is 500 meters long and includes many flights of
steps. When neighborhood children find the gate locked on their way to
school or back home, they often scale the fence rather than take the
long route.
Israel has been implementing a segregation policy in Hebron for more
than twenty years, largely by installing permanent checkpoints
throughout the center of the Old City and around al-Haram al-Ibrahimi
(the Tomb of the Patriarchs) – an area less than 80 hectares wide. These
checkpoints make daily life a nightmare for Palestinian residents there
and in other parts of Hebron.
This unceasing harassment and restriction of movement prevents
Palestinian residents of Area H2 from leading a reasonable routine and
makes daily reality intolerable. By implementing this policy, the
Israeli authorities are promoting the ongoing transfer of Palestinians
from the center of
Sunday, October 21, 2018
Friday, October 19, 2018
Two Palestinian workers were injured after an Israeli settler ran them
over yesterday near the Kafr Laqif village, east of the northern
occupied West Bank district of Qalqiliya.
According to local sources, an Israeli settler ran over two Palestinian
workers, who were identified as Oqab Raji Mahmoud Abed Al-Hafith and
Ameer Hayel Raji.
The time had finally come: the residents of Turmusayya, a lush
Palestinian village nestled in a valley between Ramallah and Nablus in
the central occupied West Bank, had gotten permission from Israeli
authorities to go harvest their olive trees.
This chance only came twice a year: two days in the spring to cultivate
their land, and two days in the fall to harvest the olives.
Filled with excitement and a sense of urgency, the villagers made their
way to their farmlands, which are surrounded by an Israeli settlement
and outpost. When they arrived, they were devastated to find dozens of
trees chopped down, uprooted, and rotting.
The 40 olive trees belonged to 78-year-old Palestinian Mahmoud al-Araj,
who had been tending to the trees since he was a boy.
“Some of these trees are 40, 50, 60, and 70 years old,” al-Araj told
Mondoweiss, as he sat under the shade of a large olive tree that had
been slashed at its trunk.
“I have been cultivating these trees, this land, since I was a boy. We
helped our families and tired ourselves on this land so we could provide
for our children and the future generations,” he said.
On Tuesday, 9 October 2018, at around 10:00
A.M., Civil Administration personnel, soldiers, Border Police and two
bulldozers arrived at Khirbet al-Halawah in the Masafer Yatta area in
the South Hebron Hills. The forces demolished three dwellings, donated
to local residents by a humanitarian aid organization with European
Union funding. The demolition left 21 people, including 13 children,
homeless. The forces also confiscated four solar panel batteries and an
electrical box donated to the residents by COMET ME, with funding from
the Dutch government. Earlier this month, the Civil Administration and
military confiscated a tent in the community, leaving homeless a family
of six, including four minors. Ever since the 1990s, Israel has been
endeavoring to drive out the residents of Masafer Yatta.
One of the ways the state has set itself up as coping with the
phenomenon of food insecurity among schoolchildren is to provide a hot
meal for every child within the school. This ensures that about two
million children will receive a hot and nutritious meal, once a day,
equally. It turns out, however, that 15 years after the law was passed,
it is implemented only partially and not universally for all children.
In addition, an important component of the law, designed to create jobs
in the community by establishing community kitchens that will provide
the meals, was not implemented at all 15 years after the legislation -
what are the challenges still facing the implementation of the law?
On October 10, Israeli anti-Zionist and international activists were
invited to the Gaza fence across from an encampment of the Great March
of Return. The Palestinians held a cultural event of traditional music
and dancing in support of the Right of Return. The Israeli activists
created a memorial by hanging pictures on the fence of Palestinian
protestors executed by the Israeli army during the Great March of Return
in previous months.
The two groups met and were able to see and speak to each other with
only a few dozen meters and the siege fence between them. Armed soldiers
arrived and attempted to disperse the meeting. Activists from both
sides chanted together to the rhythm of a drum, “free free Palestine”.
The demonstrators left from both sides without incident, promising to
meet each other again.
Friday, October 12, 2018
Israel/Palestine News
Israel border authorities have detained US-Palestinian student for her
alleged Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) activism, denying her
entry into Israel, despite having a visa. Tallie Ben-Daniel of Jewish
voice for Peace discusses the case and what it means for the BDS
movement
On 13 September 2018, at around 7:30 Border Police officers detained two Palestinian boys who live in the Old
City of Hebron: Q.R. (13) and ‘A.H. (8). The boys were on their way to
school on a-Sahla Street. According to the officers, they had thrown
stones at the nearby Checkpoint 160.
The officers took the two to the Pharmacy Checkpoint, some 50 meters
from the school. There, they were made to sit and forbidden to talk to
relatives who came to the checkpoint. After about an hour and a half,
they were taken to the police station by the Tomb of the
Patriarchs/al-Haram a-Sharif. About two hours later, ‘A.H. was allowed
to go home with his mother. Q.R. was taken to the police station in
Kiryat Arba, where he was questioned for about half an hour and then
sent home with his father.
Friday, October 5, 2018
Friday, September 28, 2018
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