By Amira Hass, Haaretz Correspondent, and The Associated Press
An international human rights group on Tuesday accused the Israel Defense Forces of failing on six occasions to verify the targets of drone aircraft during the Gaza conflict in January, killing at least 29 Palestinian civilians.
The report by Human Rights Watch (HRW) states that in the six incidents in question, "Israeli forces either failed to take all feasible precautions to verify that the targets were combatants, apparently setting an unacceptably low threshold for conducting attacks, or they failed to distinguish between combatants and civilians and to target only the former. As a result, these attacks violated international humanitarian law (the laws of war)."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1096753.html
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
What if Albania had become the Jewish state?
By Nir Hasson
In 1935, British Zionist journalist Leo Elton traveled to Albania, apparently at his own initiative, to see if it would be possible to establish a Jewish national entity there. It seems the only surviving trace of his voyage is his report 10 years later to Hebrew University's first president, Judah Leib Magnes. The document rests in the Central Archive for the History of the Jewish People at the university's Givat Ram campus in Jerusalem.
Elton's journey was spurred on by the increasing persecution of German Jews two years into the Nazi regime and Britain's refusal to increase the quotas on Jewish immigration to Mandatory Palestine. Elton writes that he first read of the idea in British newspapers reporting that the Albanian government welcomed Jewish immigration.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1095526.html
In 1935, British Zionist journalist Leo Elton traveled to Albania, apparently at his own initiative, to see if it would be possible to establish a Jewish national entity there. It seems the only surviving trace of his voyage is his report 10 years later to Hebrew University's first president, Judah Leib Magnes. The document rests in the Central Archive for the History of the Jewish People at the university's Givat Ram campus in Jerusalem.
Elton's journey was spurred on by the increasing persecution of German Jews two years into the Nazi regime and Britain's refusal to increase the quotas on Jewish immigration to Mandatory Palestine. Elton writes that he first read of the idea in British newspapers reporting that the Albanian government welcomed Jewish immigration.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1095526.html
Friday, June 19, 2009
Seeking a Proud and Peaceful Future
Jimmy Carter in Gaza: Palestinians want more than just to survive.
Transcript of former US President Jimmy Carter's Address to the United Nations Relief Works Agency's Human Rights Graduation in Gaza, June 16, 2009.
By Jimmy Carter - Gaza
Director of UNRWA operations John Ging, thank you for inviting me to Gaza. Distinguished guests, children of Gaza, I am grateful for your warm reception.
I first visited Gaza 36 years ago and returned during the 1980s and later for the very successful Palestinian elections. Although under occupation, this community was relatively peaceful and prosperous. Now, the aftermath of bombs, missiles, tanks, bulldozers and the continuing economic siege have brought death, destruction, pain, and suffering to the people here. Tragically, the international community largely ignores the cries for help, while the citizens of Gaza are being treated more like animals than human beings.
http://www.palestinechronicle.com/view_article_details.php?id=15208
Transcript of former US President Jimmy Carter's Address to the United Nations Relief Works Agency's Human Rights Graduation in Gaza, June 16, 2009.
By Jimmy Carter - Gaza
Director of UNRWA operations John Ging, thank you for inviting me to Gaza. Distinguished guests, children of Gaza, I am grateful for your warm reception.
I first visited Gaza 36 years ago and returned during the 1980s and later for the very successful Palestinian elections. Although under occupation, this community was relatively peaceful and prosperous. Now, the aftermath of bombs, missiles, tanks, bulldozers and the continuing economic siege have brought death, destruction, pain, and suffering to the people here. Tragically, the international community largely ignores the cries for help, while the citizens of Gaza are being treated more like animals than human beings.
http://www.palestinechronicle.com/view_article_details.php?id=15208
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Netanyahu, Mideast peace and a return to the Axis of Evil
By Akiva Eldar
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. In the West Bank settlement of Itamar, they're even building a nursery school.
No empathy for the refugees from Jaffa who lost their entire world, not a word for the Muslim connection to Jerusalem neither a fragment of a quote from the Koran, nor a line of Arabic poetry.
Netanyahu's provincial remarks were not intended to penetrate the hearts of the hundreds of millions of Al Jazeera viewers in the Muslim world. Instead, he sought to appease Tzipi Hotovely, the settler Likud lawmaker, and make it possible to live peaceably with the settler foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman. Netanyahu's demand that Palestinians recognize Israel as the state of the Jewish people didn't even leave him an opening for forging reconciliation with the Arab citizens in the country.
The prime minister's declaration that Jerusalem will remain he "undivided capital" of Israel - only Israel - slammed the door before the entire Muslim world. And his Hebron is solely the city of the Jewish patriarchs; the Arabs have no such rights at all. The Palestinians can have a state, but only if those foreign invaders show us they know how to eat with a fork and knife. Actually, without a knife.
The demilitarization of the Palestinian state was mentioned in the Clinton guidelines, the Taba understandings and the Geneva accord, as was the right of return to Palestine, not Israel. The difference between these documents and the Bar-Ilan address is not only that the former recognized the Palestinians' full rights to the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The real difference lies in the tone - in the degrading and disrespectful nature of Netanyahu's remarks. That's not how one brings down a wall of enmity between two nations, that's not how trust is built.
It's hard to believe that a single Palestinian leader will be found who will buy the defective merchandise Netanyahu presented last night.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1093048.html
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. In the West Bank settlement of Itamar, they're even building a nursery school.
No empathy for the refugees from Jaffa who lost their entire world, not a word for the Muslim connection to Jerusalem neither a fragment of a quote from the Koran, nor a line of Arabic poetry.
Netanyahu's provincial remarks were not intended to penetrate the hearts of the hundreds of millions of Al Jazeera viewers in the Muslim world. Instead, he sought to appease Tzipi Hotovely, the settler Likud lawmaker, and make it possible to live peaceably with the settler foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman. Netanyahu's demand that Palestinians recognize Israel as the state of the Jewish people didn't even leave him an opening for forging reconciliation with the Arab citizens in the country.
The prime minister's declaration that Jerusalem will remain he "undivided capital" of Israel - only Israel - slammed the door before the entire Muslim world. And his Hebron is solely the city of the Jewish patriarchs; the Arabs have no such rights at all. The Palestinians can have a state, but only if those foreign invaders show us they know how to eat with a fork and knife. Actually, without a knife.
The demilitarization of the Palestinian state was mentioned in the Clinton guidelines, the Taba understandings and the Geneva accord, as was the right of return to Palestine, not Israel. The difference between these documents and the Bar-Ilan address is not only that the former recognized the Palestinians' full rights to the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The real difference lies in the tone - in the degrading and disrespectful nature of Netanyahu's remarks. That's not how one brings down a wall of enmity between two nations, that's not how trust is built.
It's hard to believe that a single Palestinian leader will be found who will buy the defective merchandise Netanyahu presented last night.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1093048.html
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Meanwhile, back in Israel
By Gideon Levy
So let's take a look at what's happening in our country after U.S. President Barack Obama's speech. A historic speech like his was supposed to make waves in Israel, stimulate discussion and spark debate. And here is what has happened: Our own Barak, Defense Minister Ehud, who used to be considered at least as brilliant as Obama, told Etgar Keret in an interview with Haaretz yesterday: "Where does the [Palestinian nation] live? In a cage? A jail? A swimming pool?" And Barak's own answer to this question: "It lives in its country."
After the prime minister's top diplomatic adviser determined that two states is a childish solution, along comes another statesman and determines that we're all children. Stupid children, it must be said, to whom you can sell any bit of nonsense, including all the nonsense in that interview.
The Palestinians, who cannot travel from one village to another without permission from Israel, who have no basic human rights and who have been trampled underfoot, humiliated and imprisoned without any sign of sovereignty, are already living as a free people in their country. If the defense minister really thinks so, then there is grave cause for concern: Mr. Security is deranged and has lost touch with reality. If he doesn't think so, then he's messing with us. Which is worse?
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1092075.html
So let's take a look at what's happening in our country after U.S. President Barack Obama's speech. A historic speech like his was supposed to make waves in Israel, stimulate discussion and spark debate. And here is what has happened: Our own Barak, Defense Minister Ehud, who used to be considered at least as brilliant as Obama, told Etgar Keret in an interview with Haaretz yesterday: "Where does the [Palestinian nation] live? In a cage? A jail? A swimming pool?" And Barak's own answer to this question: "It lives in its country."
After the prime minister's top diplomatic adviser determined that two states is a childish solution, along comes another statesman and determines that we're all children. Stupid children, it must be said, to whom you can sell any bit of nonsense, including all the nonsense in that interview.
The Palestinians, who cannot travel from one village to another without permission from Israel, who have no basic human rights and who have been trampled underfoot, humiliated and imprisoned without any sign of sovereignty, are already living as a free people in their country. If the defense minister really thinks so, then there is grave cause for concern: Mr. Security is deranged and has lost touch with reality. If he doesn't think so, then he's messing with us. Which is worse?
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1092075.html
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Israel's Dirty Dozen (s): A Case of Zionist "Foot and Mouth Disease"
by Mohamed Khodr
In one of my favorite movies "The Dirty Dozen", Lee Marvin gathers twelve men of disrepute who've committed murder, felony crimes, fraud, and robbery for an undercover mission against a German target. Although all but two die they succeed in their mission. The Nazis are such evil people that we cheer these men as they kill military and civilian men and women alike in cold blooded fashion shoving them into the basement, blocking all access and laying siege to the palace until all are murdered. We feel detached and desensitized to the death of the Nazi "terrorists and murderers" because of our historical knowledge and indoctrination through the media and movies that all Nazi's are evil.
Most dangerous among these gangs are Israel's American Columnists whose allegiance to this country is questionable given their propensity to keep the Arab-Israeli conflict alive and well to the financial, military, and expansionist land policy of Israel: They are the real "Dirty Dozen (s)" They are the rich, successful, unchallenged purveyors of bias, hate, myth making, and lies who adorn the pages of the Op-Ed pages of our most powerful papers and who value Israel's interest above America's.
The Dirty Dozen (s) Honor Roll
Jeff Jacoby, George Will, Cal Thomas, Charles Krauthammer, Daniel Pipes, Steve Emerson, Edward Luttwak, Mark Halprin, William Safire, Thomas Friedman, Mort Zuckerman, R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr, Don Feder, James Pinkerton, Judith Miller, etc. etc. etc.
http://www.mediamonitors.net/khodr16.html
In one of my favorite movies "The Dirty Dozen", Lee Marvin gathers twelve men of disrepute who've committed murder, felony crimes, fraud, and robbery for an undercover mission against a German target. Although all but two die they succeed in their mission. The Nazis are such evil people that we cheer these men as they kill military and civilian men and women alike in cold blooded fashion shoving them into the basement, blocking all access and laying siege to the palace until all are murdered. We feel detached and desensitized to the death of the Nazi "terrorists and murderers" because of our historical knowledge and indoctrination through the media and movies that all Nazi's are evil.
Most dangerous among these gangs are Israel's American Columnists whose allegiance to this country is questionable given their propensity to keep the Arab-Israeli conflict alive and well to the financial, military, and expansionist land policy of Israel: They are the real "Dirty Dozen (s)" They are the rich, successful, unchallenged purveyors of bias, hate, myth making, and lies who adorn the pages of the Op-Ed pages of our most powerful papers and who value Israel's interest above America's.
The Dirty Dozen (s) Honor Roll
Jeff Jacoby, George Will, Cal Thomas, Charles Krauthammer, Daniel Pipes, Steve Emerson, Edward Luttwak, Mark Halprin, William Safire, Thomas Friedman, Mort Zuckerman, R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr, Don Feder, James Pinkerton, Judith Miller, etc. etc. etc.
http://www.mediamonitors.net/khodr16.html
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Netanyahu convinced Obama seeks clash with Israel to appease Arabs
By Aluf Benn
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu believes that U.S. President Barack Obama wants a confrontation with Israel, based on Obama's speech in Cairo last week, Netanyahu's confidants say.
In Netanyahu's opinion, the Americans believe an open controversy with Israel would serve the Obama administration's main objective of improving U.S. relations with the Arab world, the aides say.
In his speech, Obama called for a "new beginning" in relations between America and Islam, and spoke at length about the Israeli-Arab conflict.
He demanded that Israel recognize the Palestinians' right to a state and freeze construction in the West Bank settlements.
Netanyahu objects to a complete suspension of construction beyond the Green Line. This is Netanyahu's main bone of contention with the Obama administration.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1091428.html
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu believes that U.S. President Barack Obama wants a confrontation with Israel, based on Obama's speech in Cairo last week, Netanyahu's confidants say.
In Netanyahu's opinion, the Americans believe an open controversy with Israel would serve the Obama administration's main objective of improving U.S. relations with the Arab world, the aides say.
In his speech, Obama called for a "new beginning" in relations between America and Islam, and spoke at length about the Israeli-Arab conflict.
He demanded that Israel recognize the Palestinians' right to a state and freeze construction in the West Bank settlements.
Netanyahu objects to a complete suspension of construction beyond the Green Line. This is Netanyahu's main bone of contention with the Obama administration.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1091428.html
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