Articles on Collective Punishment and Terrorism

 Israeli Organ Trafficking and Theft: From Moldova to Palestine 
Alison Weir, Washington Report - In August Sweden’s largest daily newspaper published an article containing grisly evidence suggesting that Israel had been taking Palestinian internal organs. The article, by veteran photojournalist Donald Bostrom, called for an international investigation to discover the facts. more

 Videos: Alison Weir on Organ Harvesting and Israel 
Divining the News - Three videos from an interview with Alison Weir discussing allegations of Israeli organ harvesting, the Israel lobby in the U.S., and her response to accusations of anti-Semitism. WATCH

 Israeli Organ Harvesting: The New "Blood Libel"? 
Alison Weir, CounterPunch - Last week Sweden’s largest daily newspaper published an article containing shocking material: testimony and circumstantial evidence indicating that Israelis may have been harvesting internal organs from Palestinian prisoners without consent for many years. more

Related Videos:

• Donald Bostrom Swedish Journalist on Israeli organ harvesting

• Donald Bostrom: Israeli Govt needs to read about democracy

• Brooklyn Rabbi Trafficking in Human Organs

• Alison Weir on Organ Harvesting and Israel

 Palestinian US College Grad Loses 2 Brothers in Israeli Shooting; Father Watched Son Bleed to Death After Israeli Troops Bar Ambulances 
Democracy Now! - Amer Shurrab is a Palestinian from Khan Yunis and a recent graduate of Vermont’s Middlebury College. On Friday, his father and two brothers were fleeing their village when their vehicle came under Israeli fire. Twenty-eight-year-old Kassab died in a hail of bullets trying to flee the vehicle. Eighteen-year-old Ibrahim survived the initial attack, but Israeli troops refused to allow an ambulance to reach them until twenty hours later. By then, it was too late. Ibrahim had bled to death in front of his father. Amer joins us to tell his story. WATCH

 The Death of Bassem Abu Rahme 
Frank Barat, Palestine Chronicle - As it usually happens, as soon as the march reached the corner where the Israeli soldiers can be seen, the tear gas started. A few brave ones continued anyway and reached the beginning of the wall, after a few minutes. Bassem, as usual, was one of those. The Israelis, present at the front of the demonstration started talking with the nearby soldiers in Hebrew and Bassem too, screamed “We are in a non violent protest, there are kids and internationals...”. He was shot in the chest and never managed to finish his sentence. He fell on the floor, moved a little bit, fell again, and died. more

 VIDEO: Nonviolent Protest in Bil'in on April 17, 2009; Bassem Abu Rahme is Killed 
Demonstration by village of Bil'in Friday April 17th 2009, Bassem Ibrahim abu-Rakhma ('Phil") mortally wounded. more

 Israel on Trial 
George Bisharat, New York Times - Chilling testimony by Israeli soldiers substantiates charges that Israel’s Gaza Strip assault entailed grave violations of international law. The emergence of a predominantly right-wing, nationalist government in Israel suggests that there may be more violations to come. Hamas’s indiscriminate rocket attacks on Israeli civilians also constituted war crimes, but do not excuse Israel’s transgressions. While Israel disputes some of the soldiers’ accounts, the evidence suggests that Israel committed the following six offenses: more

 'Shooting and crying' 
Amos Harel, Haaretz - Less than a month after the end of Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip, dozens of graduates of the Yitzhak Rabin pre-military preparatory program convened at Oranim Academic College in Kiryat Tivon. Since 1998 the program has prepared participants for what is considered meaningful military service. Many assume command positions in combat and other elite units of the Israel Defense Forces. The program's founder, Danny Zamir, still heads it today and also serves as deputy battalion commander in a reserve unit. more

 Monthly Summary of Israeli Violations: 01 January 2009 - 31 January 2009 
Palestinian Monitoring Group - During the month of January 2009, the Israeli army killed 785 Palestinians, including 5 in the West Bank and 780 in the Gaza Strip. The majority of Palestinians killed were in the Gaza Strip. As a result of attacks and air attacks waged during the Israeli offensive on the Gaza Strip districts, scores of children, women, and elderly civilians were killed. Corpses were also extricated from under the rubble of destroyed houses and buildings. Of those killed were 283 children; 101 female civilians; 92 elderly civilians; 12 medics; 16 civilians from the same family; and 4 journalists. more

 Hammad’s death barely made the news 
Palestinian Centre for Human Rights - On the 14 of February 2009, almost a month after Israel declared a unilateral ceasefire in Gaza, thirteen year old Hammad Silmiya was grazing his sheep and goats in northeast Gaza, about 500 metres from the border with Israel. An Israeli military jeep patrolling the border opened fire on him and his teenage friends. Hammad was shot in the head and he died almost instantly. more

 Statement on Access 
Joe Donnelly, Permanent Delegate to the United Nations - ACCESS ACCESS ACCESS. One word which makes extraordinary difference for everyone's life in Gaza, as well as everyone outside Gaza seeking to provide normal, as well as heightened, emergency assistance to the 1.5 million Palestinian people surviving that extraordinarily densely populated sliver of land on the Mediterranean coast, adjacent to Israel at the Eretz border crossing. more

 Family members die in Israeli house demolition 
Sherine Tadros, Al Jazeera - Israeli forces demolished the house of the Sammouni family in Gaza City after ordering them to remain in it for safety. WATCH

 Israel 'using food and medicines as weapons' 
Ekklesia - Israel is collectively punishing innocent civilians by withholding and controlling food and medicine to Gaza, says Christian Aid. more

 Hope as Palestinians Use Nonviolence in their Struggle for Human Rights and Freedom 
Mairead Maguire (Nobel Peace Laureate), PeacePeople.com - On this the second boat journey into Gaza the siege-breakers brought with them 6 cubic meters of medicine, and their hope that by going to Gaza across the sea (only the second boat to do so in over 41 years) they would give hope to the people of Gaza and that the outside world would break its silence to the tragedy of Gaza's suffering and act to get the siege lifted. more

 British TV Documentary – Dispatches: The Killing Zone 
Sandra Jordan and Rodrigo Vasquez, Channel 4 - British report on Israeli violence in Gaza against not only Palestinian civilians, but international aid volunteers and foreign reporters as well. more

 Israeli Strip Searches: A Partial List 
Sarah Tiglao, If Americans Knew - The following is a partial list documenting the use of strip searches and forced stripping as a method for humiliating men, women, and children – fishermen, women in labor, journalists, human rights workers, medical workers, and others – routinely employed by Israeli forces. more

 VIDEO: Palestinians Document Settler Violence 
Al Jazeera English - The victim of a beating captured on videotape outside the West Bank city of Hebron has spoken about the day he was set upon by Jewish settlers. Midhat Abu Karsh, a 30-year-old Palestinian teacher was beaten for allegedly setting fire to fields in the area. Nour Odeh reports on how he and human rights groups are fighting back. more

 Stripping Palestinians has Become Common Practice: Eyewitness Accounts 
Suzanne Russ, Palestine Chronicle - On Monday, November 25, Israeli soldiers ordered a young resident of the town of Nablus to strip completely naked in the street, according to Palestinian witnesses. more

 WATCH VIDEO: West Bank attack filmed 
Tim Frank, BBC - The BBC has obtained footage of Palestinians being attacked close to a Jewish settlement in the West Bank by a group of masked men wielding baseball bats. WATCH VIDEO

 Our reign of terror, by the Israeli army 
Donald Macintyre, The Independent - In shocking testimonies that reveal abductions, beatings and torture, Israeli soldiers confess the horror they have visited on Hebron. more

 Sanctions causing Gaza to implode, say rights groups 
Ian Black, The Guardian - Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are living through their worst humanitarian crisis since the 1967 war because of the severe restrictions imposed by Israel since the Islamist movement Hamas seized power, a report says today. more

 VIDEO – Gaza: A humanitarian implosion 
The Real News Network - A coalition of eight UK-based human rights organizations released a scathing report on conditions in the Gaza Strip on Thursday. Watch Video

 Gaza: Humanitarian situation worst since 1967 
Amnesty International UK, CARE International UK, CAFOD, Christian Aid, Médecins du Monde UK, Oxfam, Save The Children UK and Trócaire - Poverty and unemployment up, hospitals suffering 12 hour a day power cuts, water and sewage system close to collapse. The humanitarian situation in Gaza is worse now than it's been at any time since the beginning of the Israeli occupation in 1967, according to a new report published today (6 March) by a coalition of leading humanitarian and human rights organisations. The weekend's upsurge in violence and human misery underlines the urgency of this report. more

 Video: Old Palestinian Man Describes Being Shot 

 Gaza: Israel Blocks 670 Students from Studies Abroad 
Human Rights Watch - The Israeli government is arbitrarily blocking some 670 students in Gaza from pursuing higher education abroad, Human Rights Watch said today. Israel is denying exit permits that the young men and women need to leave Gaza for university programs in countries such as Egypt, Jordan, Germany, Britain, and the United States. more

 Israel shaken by troops' tales of brutality against Palestinians 
Conal Urquhart, UK Guardian - A study by an Israeli psychologist into the violent behaviour of the country's soldiers is provoking bitter controversy and has awakened urgent questions about the way the army conducts itself in the Gaza Strip and West Bank. more

 Treachery for treatment 
Saleh Al-Naami, Al-Ahram Weekly - His calm demeanour belies the personal tragedy he is living. Journalist Bassam Al-Wahidi, 30, is on the verge of giving in to perpetual darkness. This will happen if he doesn't have an operation to reposition his retina, an operation that he was supposed to have had last month in a Palestinian hospital in Jerusalem. Although Al-Wahidi, a news presenter on the Voice of the Workers radio station in Gaza, had completed all the necessary administrative procedures required of him to travel to Jerusalem, officers in the Israeli domestic intelligence agency, Shin Bet, at the Erez Crossing on the northern border between the Gaza Strip and Israel, won't allow him to cross until he agrees to become an Israeli agent and provide information on the activities, leaders and members of Palestinian resistance movements active in Gaza. more

 Khouloud Daibes: Israeli soldiers forcing women to submit to strip searches at checkpoints 
Ma'an News Agency - Khouloud Daibes, the minister of Women's Affairs in the new emergency government, condemned the behaviour of Israeli soldiers in forcing Palestinians to submit to strip searches at a military check point near Beit Safafa, north of Bethlehem. more

 And we sleep. 
Laila El-Haddad in Raising Yousuf, Unplugged: diary of a Palestinian mother - We go to sleep now waiting for the next round of Israeli attacks against "Hamas targets". That is what they are calling them now. Last night, I couldn't sleep again. The drones were waxing and waning in intensity overhead. And then of course the Apaches. And the explosions. more

 And now, a fetus 
Gideon Levy in Haaretz - Memorial posters decorate the walls of the Rafidiya government hospital in Nablus, covering earlier posters of countless young people who have been killed. But this poster is like nothing we have seen before: a fetus covered in its own blood, its tiny head blown up by the bullet that struck its mother, and the caption - "Who gave you the right to steal his life?" more

 Utterly Forbidden: The Torture And Ill-Treatment Of Palestinian Detainees 
B'Tselem & HaMoked - In recent years, Israel has openly admitted that ISA (formerly the General Security Service) interrogators employ "exceptional" interrogation methods and "physical pressure" against Palestinian detainees in situations labeled "ticking bombs". B'Tselem and HaMoked - Center for the Defence of the Individual have examined these interrogation methods and the frequency with which they are used, as well as other harmful practices. The report's findings are based on the testimonies of 73 Palestinian residents of the West Bank who were arrested between July 2005 and January 2006 and interrogated by the ISA. Although it is not a representative sample, it does provide a valid indication of the frequency of the reported phenomena. more

 Israel's lab in Palestine 
Mel Frykberg in Al-Ahram Weekly - Doctors in Gaza have been reporting strange wounds on the bodies of innocent bystanders and those targeted by drones. These wounds consist of many small holes, often invisible to X-rays, and burns caused by heat so intense that many cases have required amputation because of the extensive burning. more

 Report: “68 women gave birth on checkpoints, 34 infants and 4 women died” 
IMEMC - The Palestinian Independent Commission for Citizens Rights (PICCR) reported that Israeli troops stationed at hundreds of roadblocks in the occupied territories barred dozens of pregnant women from crossing the checkpoints while in labor; 34 infants and four women died on their roadblocks. more

 Humiliation and Child Abuse at Israeli Borders & Airports: Strip-Searching Children 
Alison Weir in Counter Punch - Israeli officials have been regularly strip-searching children for decades, some of them American citizens. While organizations that focus on Israel-Palestine have long been aware that Israeli border officials regularly strip search men and women, If Americans Knew appears to be the first organization that has specifically investigated the policy of strip searching women. In the course of its investigation, If Americans Knew was astonished to learn that Israeli officials have also been strip searching young girls as young as seven and below. more

 The Prevalence of Torture 
Ralph Schoenman in The Hidden History of Zionism - The use of torture in Israeli prisons has been the subject of extensive inquiry. In 1977, the London Sunday Times conducted a five-month investigation. Corroboration was obtained for the evidence adduced. The torture documented occurred “through the ten years of Israeli occupation since 1967. The Sunday Times study presented the cases of forty-four Palestinians who were tortured. It documented practices in seven centers: prisons within the four principal cities of Nablus, Ramallah, Hebron and Gaza; the interrogation and detention center in Jerusalem known as the Russian Compound or Moscobiya; and special military centers located in Gaza and Sarafand. more

 Gaza and Darfur 
Alexander Cockburn in CounterPunch - As a zone of ongoing, large-scale bloodletting Darfur in the western Sudan has big appeal for US news editors. Americans are not doing the killing, or paying for others to do it. So there's no need to minimize the vast slaughter with the usual drizzle of "allegations." There's no political risk here in sounding off about genocide in Darfur. The crisis in Darfur is also very photogenic. more

 Does It Matter What You Call It? Genocide or Erasure of Palestinians 
Kathleen and Bill Christison - During an appearance in late October on Ireland's Pat Kenny radio show, a popular national program broadcast daily on Ireland's RTE Radio, we were asked as the opening question if Israel could be compared to Nazi Germany. Not across the board, we said, but there are certainly some aspects of Israel's policy toward the Palestinians that bear a clear resemblance to the Nazis' oppression. Do you mean the wall, Kenny prompted, and we agreed, describing the ghettoization and other effects of this monstrosity. Before we could elaborate on other Nazi-like features of Israel's policies, Kenny moved on to another question. Within minutes, while we were still on the air, a producer handed Kenny a note, which we later learned was a request from the newly arrived Israeli ambassador to Ireland to appear on the show, by himself. Several days later, on the air by himself, the ambassador pronounced us and our comparisons of Israeli and Nazi policies "outrageous." more

 Commentary: Israelis adopt what South Africa dropped 
John Dugard in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution - Former President Jimmy Carter's new book, "Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid," is igniting controversy for its allegation that Israel practices a form of apartheid. As a South African and former anti-apartheid advocate who visits the Palestinian territories regularly to assess the human rights situation for the U.N. Human Rights Council, the comparison to South African apartheid is of special interest to me. more

 Ethnic cleansing returns to Israel's agenda 
Johann Hari in The Independent of London - When Jorg Haider's far-right Freedom Party joined the governing coalition in Austria in 2000, the world offered a collective retch and moved to isolate the country. In the past fortnight, a startlingly similar far-right politician named Avigdor Lieberman has joined the governing coalition in Israel – in the lofty position of Deputy Prime Minister – but the world's gagging reflex has yet to respond. more

 Israel’s Attorney General receives 40 torture complaints in past year, investigates none 
Nir Hasson in Haaretz - Twenty-four hours before the abduction of Corporal Gilad Shalit, Israel Defense Forces soldiers broke into the home of Mustafa Abu Ma'amar in Rafah. Special forces soldiers arrested him and his brother in their respective homes. more

 Italian probe: Israel used new weapon prototype in Gaza Strip 
Meron Rapoport in Haaretz - An investigative report to be aired on Italian television Wednesday raises the possibility that Israel has used an experimental weapon in the Gaza Strip in recent months, causing especially serious physical injuries, such as amputated limbs and severe burns. more

 Detainee Paralyzed During Torture in Israeli Prison 
Mustafa Sabri in PNN, translated by Saed Bannoura in IMEMC - Every Palestinian detainee has his own story of the horrors of being held in Israeli detention facilities, but in the case of detainee Luay Al Ashqar, 28, from Saida village, near Tulkarem (in the northern part of the West Bank), the result and the outcome are clearly apparent on his body, which has been paralyzed due to Israeli torture. Al Ashqar is currently in Majeddo prison after the Israeli Salim military court sentenced him for 26 months. more

 Palestinian children pay price of Israel's Summer Rain offensive 
Rory McCarthy in the UK Guardian - Rights group says 197 civilians have been killed in Israeli military operation, including 48 minors . more

 Israel intensifies Gaza action 
Al Jazeera - Israel has begun fresh air strikes in the Gaza Strip after pledging to intensify its military offensive on the territory that has killed 51 Palestinians in two weeks. more

 Severe shortages stymie life in Gaza 
Ilene R. Prusher in The CS Monitor - As the Palestinian conflict with Israel over a kidnapped soldier drags on, most crossings out of Gaza have been closed. Hardly a trickle of goods and people goes in or out. At least half the electricity has been knocked out, slowing sanitation, sewage treatment, refrigeration, communication, and transportation. more

 Bulletin on Suicide Bombing 
If Americans Knew - On Monday, April 17th, a suicide bombing in Tel Aviv killed nine Israelis, the deadliest such bombing in two years. The media provided graphic information on this bombing but omitted considerable information of relevance. In the last two and a half weeks alone Israeli forces have killed at least 26 Palestinians – at least 5 of them children – and injured 161 Palestinian men, women and children. A college student lost her right eye today after being shot by an Israeli sniper last week. more

 Palestinian civilians, first victims of the escalation of violence and the withholding of direct financial aid 
Médecins du Monde - Since 1st April, the northern Gaza strip has been the target of relentless shelling by the Israeli military forces, allegedly in response to the firing of Palestinian rockets . Over 2,500 shells have been fired, in addition to air strikes which regularly target civilian areas. Civilian populations are the first victims and it has resulted so far in the death of 16 people and 77 injured. In addition, daily incursions in Nablus since 1st April have incurred 1 casualty, 32 injured and 50 arrests. more

 Photo: Palestinian Child Bleeds 
Nayef Hashlamoun in PalestineToday.org - A Palestinian woman reacts as she sits beside her daughter, as Israeli soldiers stand around a Palestinian injured girl Nisreen Abu Hashhash, an 8-year-old Palestinian girl who was injured in the face by a rubber bullet. more

 Americans Tortured in Israeli Jails 
Jerri Bird in The Link - Forty-five thousand United States citizens of Palestinian origin are living in or visiting the West Bank, according to U.S. officials. Some of these citizens are imprisoned by Israel—without ever being charged with a crime; some have their U.S. passports taken from them—without ever being charged with a crime; all report that they were tortured. more

 Torture, Anyone? 
Nabeel Abraham in Lies of Our Times - On February 4, 1992, Mustafa Akawi, a 35-year-old Palestinian, died while being detained in a prison on the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Akawi’s death touched off demonstrations by Palestinians and calls by human rights groups for an investigation. The first that readers of the New York Times learned about these events was in a photo caption that appeared on February 7. The photo depicted two outstretched arms collaring a Palestinian demonstrator. The caption noted that the Israeli police had announced an investigation into “the death of a Palestinian prisoner in the West Bank” (“Arabs Protest Killing of West Bank Prisoner,” p. A11). An astute reader might conclude that Akawi had died as a result of torture, but the Times, keeping to past practice, avoided the suggestion. more

 UN expert: Jewish settlers 'terrorize' Palestinians 
The Associated Press in Haaretz - Jewish settlers are able to "terrorize" Palestinians with impunity, intimidating children on their way to school and destroying farmers' trees and crops, a United Nations expert on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict said in a report. more

 In Gaza, there's no milk, no sugar and tomatoes are rotting on the vines 
Arnon Regular in Haaretz - "In a few days there'll be a flour shortage, and if that happens there'll be a conflagration here - but it will be directed against the Israelis, not Hamas," Deputy Minister of Economics in the Palestinian Authority, Nasser Saraj, said yesterday about the closure of the Karni border crossing. The crossing has been completely closed since February 21, and since the beginning of the year it has not been open for more than 12 days. more

 Palestinian Detainee Talks About Extreme Torture and Abuse 
Saed Bannoura, IMEMC - Palestinian detainee Baha’ Ahmad Al Arameen, 23, from Al Ezariyya town, near Jerusalem, said that he was extremely clubbed and hit by the soldiers after arresting him from his home on December 15, 2005, and was subjected to torture during interrogation in Al Maskobiyya detention facility in Jerusalem. more

 Memo to Jon Stewart: Glad You’re Against Torture, So Why’d You Give Israel a Pass? 
Alison Weir in CounterPunch - I’ve just phoned The Daily Show at 212.767.8600 and left you a message; I also faxed you at 212.468.1890. I hope other people will also! I’m sure glad you’re against torture. I just wish you were also against torture by Israel. I was pretty astounded to hear you chatting with John McCain last night, nodding along as AIPAC-buddy McCain explained that the US should emulate Israel, “which doesn’t torture people.” more

 War by Remote Control 
Meron Benvenisti in the major Israeli daily Haaretz - As opposed to the expectations of many, the disengagement has not brought about real progress toward peace, but undoubtedly caused a revolutionary change in the way war is conducted. The violence of body touching body and eye meeting eye, the friction saturated with hatred at the checkpoints and in the alleyways, and the sight of spilled blood – the intimate violence of conflicted communities – is changing in front of our eyes, and has become a push-button war, shooting via TV screens, robots and computers, and long range artillery. more

 Shooting and Hitting 
Shahar Ginossar in Yediot Ahronot, Translated from Hebrew by Mark Marshall -
‘Another paediatrician and another baker
Got a bullet in the face from a paratroopers unit
All day we search houses and kill children’
From a song of a paratroopers’ unit that participated in Operation Calm Waters in Nablus, beginning of 2004 more

 Israeli aircraft drop threatening leaflets on Gaza 
Electronic Intifada - Gaza, Al-Watan, September 27, 2005 – Israeli warplanes last night dropped thousands of leaflets directed at residents of the Gaza Strip. more

 I saw youths with murder in their eyes, I saw a paramedic abandon someone wounded 
Nir Hasson in Haaretz - Someone alerted a paramedic; He wavered for twenty seconds on whether or not to treat Hilal, and during that time one of the attackers yelled to him: “If you treat him, we’ll kill you.” He turned with an embarrassed look and left. The injured man lay, blood covering his face, losing consciousness. more

 Suicide, number 1 killer in the Israeli army 
Saed Bannoura in IMEMC - An Israeli source reported that 16 Israeli soldiers committed suicide since the beginning of 2005. Similar to 2004, suicide remains the number one killer in the Israeli army. more

 A Moment that Changed my Life 
IMEMC - On April 22, 1991, I was only 18 years old; I was out with some of my comrades planning to conduct a march and rally in the streets of our town, Beit Sahour, against the Israeli occupation of our land. This march was one of many peaceful protests held as part of what had become known as the ‘first Intifada’ (popular uprising), which had begun in 1987. more

 Inside scarred minds 
Daniel Day-Lewis in The Sunday Times of London Magazine - On his first visit to the Gaza Strip, Daniel Day-Lewis meets the Palestinian families living in the heart of the danger zone – and the psychologists who are counselling them more

 Israeli Troops Kill 3 Palestinian Teens 
Ibrahim Barzak in the (AP) - GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - Israeli troops fired at a group of Palestinians in a southern Gaza Strip refugee camp Saturday, killing three teenagers in the deadliest incident in Gaza since Israel and the Palestinians declared a cease-fire two months ago. more

 Israel Plans to Dump Tons of Garbage in West Bank 
David Ratner in Haaretz - For the first time since 1967, Israel has decided to transfer garbage beyond the Green Line and dump it in the West Bank. The project was launched despite international treaties prohibiting an occupying state from making use of occupied territory unless it benefits the local population. more

 The Boy Who Kissed the Soldier: Balata Camp 
Starhawk - “What source can you believe in order to create peace there?” a friend writes when I come back from Palestine. I have no answer, only this story:
June 1, 2002: I am in Balata refugee camp in occupied Palestine, where the Israeli Defense Forces have rounded up four thousand men, leaving the camp to women and children. The men have offered no resistance, no battle. more

 Who’s in Charge Here? 
Amira Hass in Haaretz - The Israeli intelligence officials and those who quote them in the press are right when they say that it’s not Abu Mazen and the Palestinian Authority security services who are in control in the Gaza Strip. The intelligence sources and those who quote them are misleading however, when they say that armed gangs and the Hamas run Gaza. The IDF runs Gaza. more

 177 Palestinian Prisoners Killed Since 1967 
International Press Center (PNA) - Figures released by the Prisoner and Ex-Prisoner Ministry showed that 177 Palestinian detainees were killed inside the Israeli jails since 1967. Planning and Statistics Department of the Ministry said, in a statistical report, 69 Palestinian prisoners (39%) were killed due to being liable to severe torture whilst 37 prisoners (20.9%) died due to the lack of medical health care. more

 One Big Prison: New Report Warns Against Continued Strangulation of Gaza Strip after Disengagement 
B’Tselem - Israel has cut off the Gaza Strip from the rest of the world to such an extent that it is easier for Palestinians in Israel or the West Bank to visit relatives in prison than visit a relative in Gaza. This is one conclusion of the 100-page report that B’Tselem and HaMoked publish today. One Big Prison documents the ongoing violations of human rights and international law resulting from Israel’s restrictions on the movement of people and goods between Gaza and the West Bank, Israel, and the rest of the world. The report also warns against Israel’s attempt to avoid its responsibility toward residents of the Gaza Strip following disengagement. more

 How Much is Enough? 
Khaled Amayreh in Al-Ahram Weekly - As Palestinians agree to a general cease-fire Israel announces it will steal yet more land, reports Khaled Amayreh in the West Bank. more

 Israel Abducts, Tortures Wives Of Palestinian Resistance Fighters 
Islam Online and News Agencies in Palestine Chronicle - [Feb. 2003] Israeli occupation forces have recently started a heavy abduction campaign among the wives of the Palestinian resistance fighters and the women affiliated to Islamic groups in Palestinian universities. more

 Vandals Foul Palestinian village’s Water Supply 
Amira Hass in Haaretz - The Madama village’s spring was deliberately contaminated and its water supply system was sabotaged 10 days ago, village council head Ayed Kamal said Sunday. This is the sixth time in the past three years that the spring, the only source of water of the village’s 1,700 residents, and the water system, has been deliberately damaged. The village is located near the extremist Yitzhar settlement and its outposts. more

 Border Policeman gets 14 months jail for abusing Palestinians 
Yuval Yoaz in Haaretz - Border Policeman Nir Levy was convicted by Jerusalem Magistrate's Court on Thursday in the aggravated assault and abuse of a helpless Palestinian civilian. more

 New year, old story 
Gideon Levy in Haaretz - During operations last weekend in the Gaza Strip, the army demolished 14 Palestinian homes, injured 30 Palestinians and killed 10, including a mentally disabled youth. Ringing in 2005. more

 Another Faceless Crime 
Jonson (ISM) in Palestine - When I look back upon my experience staying in a house that was set for demolition I only think of the kind eyed father crippled by Israeli fire two years ago, the mother numb from the loss of her son, periodically asking tentative questions in Arabic and the friend sitting opposite us in the newly rented family house staring incessantly at the wall, thinking of past times with his young friend, in between handing us glasses of coke, an atmosphere of loss hung over our uncomfortable conversation. more

 Palestine: the assault on health and other war crimes 
Derek Summerfield in the British Medical Journal - Does the death of an Arab weigh the same as that of a US or Israeli citizen? The Israeli army, with utter impunity, has killed more unarmed Palestinian civilians since September 2000 than the number of people who died on September 11, 2001. In conducting 238 extrajudicial executions the army has also killed 186 bystanders (including 26 women and 39 children). Two thirds of the 621 children (two thirds under 15 years) killed at checkpoints, in the street, on the way to school, in their homes, died from small arms fire, directed in over half of cases to the head, neck and chest—the sniper’s wound. more

 No One Changed the Rules 
Gidoen Levy in Haaretz - A gross injustice was done to the Naval Commando unit. The members of the Shayetet, as the elite unit is known in Hebrew, were on another routine liquidation mission, like dozens of others before it, and they executed the mission superbly – wounding, liquidating and getting out without any casualties. more

 Israel shocked by image of soldiers forcing violinist to play at roadblock  
Chris McGreal in the UK Guardian - Of all the revelations that have rocked the Israeli army over the past week, perhaps none disturbed the public so much as the video footage of soldiers forcing a Palestinian man to play his violin. more

View footage of the incident

 ‘I punched an Arab in the face’ 
Gideon Levy in Ha’aretz - Staff Sergeant (res.) Liran Ron Furer cannot just routinely get on with his life anymore. He is haunted by images from his three years of military service in Gaza and the thought that this could be a syndrome afflicting everyone who serves at checkpoints gives him no respite. more

 Of Settler Crimes and Media Silence 
Al Jazeera - If Americans appreciated the scale of human-rights abuses committed by Israeli colonists in the occupied territories, they would condemn the journalists who keep them in the dark, a US peace activist says. more

 Israeli officer: I was right to shoot 13-year-old child  
Chris McGreal in the UK Guardian - An Israeli army officer who repeatedly shot a 13-year-old Palestinian girl in Gaza dismissed a warning from another soldier that she was a child by saying he would have killed her even if she was three years old. more

 ‘Speak Hebrew or shut up’ 
Etgar Keret in the UK Guardian - Israel’s official code of ethics says troops can only use force if threatened. But at a checkpoint near Nablus, Israeli author Etgar Keret witnessed another code of behaviour in operation... more

 Death in a cemetery 
Gideon Levy in Haaretz Daily - How many of us can imagine the night of horror that the Salah family endured? To lie on the floor of the living room for what seemed an eternity, embracing as one being, trembling with fear as the house was blasted with bullets and missiles; to watch the sniper’s laser ray doing its dance of death across the apartment, searching out its victims; to see the missiles slamming into the walls of the house, missile after missile, as though an earthquake had struck... more

 Living beside the checkpoints 
Amira Hass in Haaretz Daily - The soldiers at the Haware checkpoint at the southern entrance to Nablus shouted commands in Arabic: Rukh (walk), Wakf (stand), Iftah (open). Dozens of women, crowded between the rows of cement plates, waited about half an hour for their turn to be checked. The last thing that interested them was the bad pronunciation and the use of the masculine gender. The women were thinking about the taxis waiting on the southern side of the checkpoint, about 200 meters away, that would take them home. The men stood in a separate line. The men and women watched silently as the three soldiers stopped a young man between the cement plates. Two aimed their rifles at him as the third shackled his hands behind his back with white plastic bracelets. more

 In Jenin, Seven Shattered Dreams 
Molly Moore in the Washington Post - As Mahmoud Kaneri, 25-year-old stonemason, traced the name across the polished tombstone in the Jenin Martyrs Cemetery, he was transported to another time and another place – a theater stage where he and his closest childhood friends once stood in shimmering robes and delivered lines imbued with optimism. more

 If it were the reverse 
Gideon Levy in Israel’s Haaretz Daily - What would happen if a Palestinian terrorist were to detonate a bomb at the entrance to an apartment building in Israel and cause the death of an elderly man in a wheelchair, who would later be found buried under the rubble of the building? more

 The Nightmare Comes True 
Uri Avnery in CounterPunch - I thought it was terrible. I was wrong. It is far, far worse!—These words sum up my feelings at that moment. I was standing on a hill overlooking the infamous Kalandia checkpoint. more

 Israel’s Common Use of Torture Must Be Exposed 
Mustafa Barghouthi in The Daily Star - The pictures of American soldiers torturing prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq have shocked the world. To the Palestinian people however, these photographs of hooded or naked figures come as no surprise. For the tens of thousands of Palestinians who have served time in Israeli prisons, the pictures only bring back memories of their own torture. more

 Genocide By Public Policy 
Sam Bahour and Michael Dahan in AMIN - Many words are taboo when used to describe Israel’s actions against Palestinians. One word in specific, genocide, sparks emotions that echo across Israel, Europe and America. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines genocide as “the deliberate and systematic destruction of a racial, political, or cultural group.” What is happening in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip today is dangerously encroaching on genocide, close enough so that the pictures of Palestinians in Rafah loading their meager belongings on carts and evacuating their homes are too reminiscent of another time, another place and another people. more

 An Old Refrain that Stabs at the Heart 
Meron Benvenisti in Ha’aretz - The sights of Rafah are too difficult to bear – trails of refugees alongside carts laden with bedding and the meager contents of their homes; children dragging suitcases larger than themselves; women draped in black kneeling in mourning on piles of rubble. And in the memories of some of us, whose number is dwindling, arise similar scenes that have been a part of our lives, as a sort of refrain that stabs at the heart and gnaws at the conscience, time after time, for over half a century – the procession of refugees from Lod to Ramallah in the heat of July 1948; the convoys of banished residents of Yalu and Beit Nuba, Emmaus and Qalqilyah in June 1967; the refugees of Jericho climbing on the ruins of the Allenby Bridge after the Six-Day War. more

 Activists say Border Police held boy, 13, as human shield  
Reuters and Ha’aretz Service - When older Palestinian boys started throwing stones at Border Police officers in the flashpoint West Bank village of Biddu last week, 13-year-old Muhammed Badwan went along to watch. He ended up on the hood of a Border Police jeep, at least one of his skinny arms tied to a wire mesh screen that blocks the windshield from incoming stones. more

 Palestinian Children Killed by Israel 
Khalid Amayreh in Al Jazeera - One of the most disturbing aspects of the strife between Israel and the Palestinians has been the killing and maiming of children. more

 Another Palestinian Shot in Biddu 
ISM in Biddu, West Bank - Five citizens of the West Bank village of Biddu have been killed by the Israeli military over the last month and a half during protests against the Apartheid Wall that the government of Israel is building on their farmland. Despite the use of excessive and lethal force against protesters, the people of Biddu remain committed to resisting the Wall through non-violent protests. more

 5-Year-Old Girl Injured by Israeli Tank Fire 
Phyllis (ISM) in Tulkarm, West Bank - This afternoon, Jaafar Tibi, a teacher at Dhanabbi School was driving his three young daughters home. more

 One year after the shooting of Brian Avery 
Lasse S. (ISM) - Yesterday a year ago an Israeli soldier shot my American friend Brian Avery in the face. Yesterday a year ago I stopped running, turned around, and saw Brian laying on his stomach faced down on a street in Jenin. Yesterday a year ago my white T-shirt turned red. more

 Settlers Guarded By Israeli Soldiers Continue To Destroy Ba’qaa Valley Crops
Jerry Levin (CPT), Hebron, West Bank - CPT has learned that ten days ago, the Abdul Jawad Jabber family suffered another ruinous attack on their fields by reportedly forty Israeli settlers, many of them armed. At about noon March 28, the settlers, escorted and guarded by three jeeploads of Israeli soldiers, invaded a Jabber grape arbor at the corner of the settlers-only entrance road to Harsina Settlement and Highway 60 and began to systematically saw down—level with the ground—twenty three grape vines. Some of the vines were thirty years old and about three inches across at the cut. more

 The Way to School
Andrew (ISM) Jenin, Palestine - I am standing about 10 meters from the settler road (Israeli only) and roadblock that divides the western part of the village of Abaa and the city of Jenin from the eastern part of the village. Ahead of us on the far side of the road looms the grey concrete of an Israeli army tower. The tower dominates the area where the Palestinian road to eastern Abaa becomes subsumed by the settler road and a series of trenches, concrete and razor wire obstacles. more

 The one-family Bantustan in Mas’ha one year into its residents’ demise
Anna (IWPS) in Mas’ha, West Bank - Hani unlocks a tiny gate embedded between an alarmed fence and an eight metre high concrete wall, and ushers the Danish television crew across a military road and quickly into his home. Two Canadian farmers, and three activists from Germany, South Africa and France are already seated inside, having come to interview Hani and Munira Amer on “life in the one-family Bantustan”, as their home has become known since Israel built the Apartheid Wall and three fences around it. Hani says that since today is the anniversary of the main catastrophe to befall his family, he wants to tell us about his life from the beginning. more

 Nuns on the Wall
Sr. Marie Dominique Croyal, Directress of the Home of Our Lady of Sorrows in East Jerusalem/Abu Dis - I would like to inform you about what is happening in our neighborhood and around our house concerning the construction of the new wall of separation, 9 meters high (30 feet), which began on January 11, 2004. It replaces a much lower wall that allowed people to climb over it once they were no longer permitted to go from Bethany and Abu Dis to Jerusalem. more

 In Gaza, Israeli brutality on display daily
Rana El-Khatib - “Israel good!” were the last words my husband and I heard as we left the final checkpoint within Erez, the border crossing maintained by Israel to control all entries and exits to and from Gaza. I turned back to get a closer look at the soldier. I saw a petite, attractive blond, her face almost smiling. Her arms rested comfortably on a large-against-her-frame M-16. Her words echoed chillingly in my head — not because I did not want to believe her, but because I had just seen the other side of Israel: the “not-so-good” Israel. more

 Child Unable to Pass Through the Apartheid Wall Dies 
Mohamed Hashem, a two year old child from the village of Ras Atieh south of Qalqiliya died Sunday, February 8, 2004 as his family, imprisoned behind the Apartheid Wall, was not able to reach emergency medical attention. Early Sunday morning the child began feeling sick and quickly developed a high fever. The parents brought the child to the local doctor in Habla who determined that the boy should to be taken to the hospital immediately. more

 Hell walking on earth 
Mustafa Barghouti in the Al-Ahram Weekly - The disastrous cycle of violence gripping Israel and Palestine receives plentiful news coverage. Largely unreported however, are the more insidious aspects of the conflict. Israel has committed a litany of atrocities during its occupation of Palestine, but the crimes visited daily upon the innocent civilians of Rafah are among the most heinous. Even in the wider context of the occupation as a whole, Rafah’s situation is particularly tragic, and the conditions imposed on its citizens increasingly desperate. There can be no doubt that Israeli policy in Rafah amounts to a process of ethnic cleansing, and, as has been so often the case throughout history, a humanitarian catastrophe is being allowed to continue unimpeded. The world sits idly by. more

 No Exit
Israeli journalist Uri Blau in Harper’s Magazine - Uri Blau: What is the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word “territories”?
Roi [nineteen, paratrooper, serving in Hebron for the past six months]: The first thing that comes to my mind is children throwing Molotov cocktails. Basically, you should shoot them in the legs and you don’t.
Tzvi [twenty, serving in the Gaza Strip]: My first memory is of security patrol. You see unbelievable things there: people sitting under the bulldozers, begging us not to demolish their houses. There’s a guy who lives in a tent where his house stood once, and now this tent is on ground that has been annexed by the settlement. But there are stories much worse than this. Real pogroms. Angry settlers coming out with sticks and pitchforks and burning down houses. Just like that. more

 Birth and Death at the Checkpoint
Israeli journalist Gideon Levy in Ha’aretz - Rula was in the last stages of labor. Daoud says the soldiers at the checkpoint wouldn’t let them through, so his wife hid behind a concrete block and gave birth on the ground. A few minutes later, the baby girl died. more

Special Report: Israel’s Treatment of Americans
Founder of Partners for Peace Jerri Bird - The Department of State’s annual human rights reports have documented for many years a depressing litany of extra-legal human rights abuses perpetrated against the Palestinian people by Israel: countless home demolitions, land confiscations, arbitrary arrests, and widespread torture. Similar practices have also been reported in detail by numerous Israeli, Palestinian and international human rights organizations for years. But it may come as an unpleasant surprise for the American public to learn that for over 30 years, Israel has also repeatedly detained, tortured and incarcerated Americans of Arab origin, without suffering any sanctions or even a public reprimand from Washington. more

‘Accidents’ that happen
Greg Rollins (CPT, Hebron) - In life, accidents happen, some suspicious, some real. In the West Bank, accidents are often suspicious. Take, for example, the spring of 2001, when an Israeli soldier in Hebron “accidentally” dropped a concussion grenade into a crowded schoolyard. more

Palestinian Life Totally on Hold While Israel Feasts
Palestine Monitor - In an unprecedented announcement the Israeli Central Command Major General issued an order prohibiting all Palestinian vehicular traffic in the North West Bank for the next four days. more

 The Violence of Curfew
Sam Bahour - A Palestinian-American businessman living with his wife and children in the Palestinian City of Al-Bireh in the West Bank describes life under curfew and how Israel is systematically destroying Palestinian livelihood, and with it, any hopes for a future reconciliation between the two peoples. more

Feeling Palestinian
Kate Raphael (IWPS) - I have had guns pointed straight at me, even touching my chest like that. The big difference was only that this time, unlikely as it seems, they thought I was Palestinian. That simple fact put my life in danger in a way that I don’t think it ever was, even when I walked up to tanks in Gaza, even when I was standing in front of armored personnel carriers in Bethlehem, or walking into an occupied house in my village. If I had been a Palestinian, would I be sitting here writing this now? Would I be in prison, or dead or in a hospital? I don’t know. more

Being a Target
Alison Weir (Independent Journey to Palestine, prior to founding If Americans Knew) - I don’t want to be overly dramatic, but I was sort of shot at yesterday. I say “sort of” because I don’t think the Israeli soldiers in their tower were trying to hit me, or the people with me... if that had been their purpose I have no doubt that they would have. There is massive evidence here that their aim is quite good. I think they were simply asserting their power. And I think they were trying to intimidate me, as a foreigner, into leaving the area. more

 Living with the Holocaust
Senior Research Scholar Sara Roy - Some Israeli soldiers standing nearby went up to the old man and stopped him. One soldier went over to the donkey and pried open its mouth. “Old man,” he asked, “why are your donkey’s teeth so yellow? Why aren’t they white? Don’t you brush your donkey’s teeth?” The old Palestinian was mortified, the little boy visibly upset. The soldier repeated his question, yelling this time, while the other soldiers laughed. The child began to cry and the old man just stood there silently, humiliated. This scene repeated itself while a crowd gathered. The soldier then ordered the old man to stand behind the donkey and demanded that the he kiss the animal’s behind. At first, the old man refused but as the soldier screamed at him and his grandson became hysterical, he bent down and did it. The soldiers laughed and walked away. They had achieved their goal: to humiliate him and those around him. We all stood there in silence, ashamed to look at each other, hearing nothing but the uncontrollable sobs of the little boy. The old man did not move for what seemed a very long time. He just stood there, demeaned and destroyed. more