NOVANEWS
Dear Friends,
The items below are more or less divided into Palestine — Israel—more or less, because the final of the 8 items, ‘Today in Palestine,’ includes both.
I don’t normally harp on a subject, but tonight is an exception. Item one is another depiction and reaction to the killing of Mustafa Tamini, this time by someone who was standing next to him when he was killed. I found this description to be powerful in its simplicity and feeling. Mustafa was not the first nor will he be the last to be killed by IOF soldiers. And while most killed by the IOF are Palestinians, there have also been internationals (Rachel Corrie and Tom Hurndall, for instance) and those who were badly injured but still live, as Tristan Anderson. And there have also been some Israelis who were badly injured. The IOF nevertheless targets Palestinians more readily than others.
Item 2 describes the protests of a West Bank village that has a truly horrendous struggle not only against the IOF but also against the colony that is stealing its lands, Kedumim. From personal experience, I can tell you that its inhabitants—all or most are fundamentalist idealists—are not pleasant people to deal with. The report, however, deals less with them than with the reason for the protests.
Item 3 combines 2 reports, both from the Palestinian Center for Human Rights. The first is the weekly report about Israel’s crimes against human rights perpetrated on Palestinians during the period from December 8 through the 14th, 2011. The second relates that Israel has placed barriers demarcating a supposed border 3 miles out to sea from the Gaza coast. According to international law a country’s territorial waters extend 22 kilometers (or 14 miles) from the baseline of a coastal state (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Territorial_waters). Thus what Israel is doing is illegal. But who will stop Israel? That is the question, notwithstanding PCHR’s request of the international community to pressure Israel into allowing Gaza fishermen to fish!
The following 3 items are about Israel, and mainly reflect the undemocratic direction that Israel is pursuing. The first of these (item 4) deals with the supposed release of the additional 500 or so Palestinian prisoners agreed upon in exchange for one Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit. The release is scheduled to take place on this coming Sunday, but won’t if the Israel Law Center has its way, probably not ever. In any event, apparently over 60% of those that Israel plans to release are prisoners who have already almost completed their term of interment. Most are not, apparently, hard core prisoners. Still, their families would like to have them home no less than Shalit’s family wanted their son home. Let’s hope that the release does take place. And as for ‘blood on one’s hands’ (the principle that those who do not want Palestinians released appeal to), few Palestinians can compete with Israelis as Ariel Sharon, et al.
Item 5 reveals that Israel’s Justice Ministry plans to propose a bill that restricts media on what it can report about police investigations and court cases. Just another step in keeping the public ignorant and in lock-step with the government.
Item 6 is about the probable closure of Channel 10, one of 3 Hebrew Israeli news channels. Presumably the closure is a vendetta by PM Netanyahu for an investigative report that Channel 10 did on his travel expenses.
Item 7==a pleasant piece of news for a change—returns to Palestine, relating that Iceland has decided to recognize Palestine as a state on the 1967 line. The 1967 line is not a border (Israel has avoided designating borders, largely because of its expansionist visions). The 1967 line merely represents the 1949 armistice line, which left the West Bank in Jordan’s hands, Gaza in Egypt’s. In 1967 Israel took the WB from Jordan and has been steadily expanding and colonizing the WB since. What Iceland’s (and those of other countries) recognition of Palestine will mean in the long run I don’t know. But one thing is certain: Israel won’t like it.
Item 8 , Today in Palestine, contains quite a bit that you have already had from me or other sources. This is especially true for the first section. But there is also much that will most likely be new to you. So I include it, with the hope that you will at least glance through the summaries.
That’s it for tonight.
All the best,
Dorothy
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Forwarded by the JPLO List
December 12, 2011
Words From The Man Who Stood Next to Mustafa Tamimi as He Was Shot
copied from my +972mag article here
Ibrahim Bornat, artist and activist from Bil’in, was standing next to Mustafa Tamimi when Tamimi was shot in the head with a tear gas canister at close range by an Israeli soldier (Bornat can be seen standing directly next to Tamimi in these now-iconic photos). Ibrahim is himself no stranger to the resistance. Since 2000, he has been in the hospital 83 times for injuries sustained by the Israeli military during demonstrations, and has been arrested five times. Here is his testimony about his experiences when Mustafa was critically injured on Friday, December 10.
Mustafa and I were alone, it was just the two of us, with the rest of the protesters quite far behind, and we were chasing the jeep and telling it to leave. We got separated from the rest, because the soldiers threw almost 50 tear gas canisters at once, so the whole protest was pushed back. The tear gas went over our heads and we got closer to the soldiers, shouting at them that they had thrown enough. The jeeps turned around to leave as they were shooting gas behind us. One jeep, however, lingered and seemed to be waiting for us to get closer. As we reached the jeep, the soldier opened the door and shot two rounds of tear gas. I think I saw this soldier’s face, but Mustafa definitely saw and whoever he is, Mustafa knows best.
Mustafa pushed me down, and one canister that was aimed for me flew over my head. The second one hit Mustafa, but I didn’t know it hit him at first because I thought ‘for sure they wont shoot at us from so close’. I thought he had just ducked down, and then I thought that maybe he had just passed out from the gas, because there was gas all around him. I went to him, laying face down on the road, and I turned him over and pulled the cloth off his face.
Of what I can say about it, it is worse than words can say. The whole half of his face was blown off, and his eye was hanging out, and I tried to push his eye back up. I could see pieces of the inside of his head, and there was a pool of blood gathering under him. His whole body was trembling. It started from his feet, then up to his arms, then it reached his chest, and then his head, and then a gasp came out and I’m sure at that moment he died. He gasped, and let out a bunch of air, and I knew at that moment his soul had left. I have seen many people, not a few, die in front of me, and I know death. Maybe later on they revived his heart, but I knew that his soul had left.
I ran back to get people, because we were far away, but there was no ambulance around, so the people around gathered him and put him in a service [a communal taxi] and tried to leave. The soldiers stopped the service and tried to arrest Mustafa, but when they saw that he was on the brink of death, they began to act as if they were humanitarian, to revive his heart. But what is ‘humanitarian’, to shoot someone to kill, and then to try to help him? These were the same soldiers from the jeep that shot him. They shot him, then say they want to help him. What they really did is prevent him from leaving. The body lay on the ground for half an hour. They wanted Mustafa’s ID, and they also wanted the ID of his mother, of another family member, and of Bassem Tamimi’s wife, because these people wanted to go out with him too. But I don’t know why they wanted the passport of a dead person! They were doing some kind of medical treatment while he was lying on the ground, but this was no hospital, and what he needed was to be taken to a hospital. He should have been flown out in that moment! There is nothing you can do for him on the street there.
I was with the family the whole night afterwards, especially with his father, who is very sick and on kidney dialysis. Mustafa’s family believed there was still some hope, so I did not want to tell them that I knew he was already dead. His father is very sick, and kept falling asleep and waking up again, and we didn’t tell him much at first, only that Mustafa had been shot but that, God willing, he would be okay. There are some things that are hard and give you no hope, and then there are some things that are hard, but there is something nice about them. Martyrdom is something that is hard, but it is also honorable, and that gave his family a lot of comfort.
I knew Mustafa as a brother in the resistance. We were close in the resistance to the occupation. Anyone who comes out with me in our resistance to the occupation is close to me, as close as my mother, brother, or father, whether they be Palestinian, Israeli, Jewish, Muslim, or international. He was free, and a person who is free fights the occupation. That’s the thing I can most say about him- he was freedom.
We defend ourselves through strength, through courage, through our right to this land, through steadfastness. The occupation, to defend itself, has to kill people. But we defend ourselves with our right. This is my philosophy.
http://freepaly.wordpress.com/?blogsub=confirming#blog_subscription-3
2. Forwarded by the JPLO List
JPLO Note: I was present at three such demonstrations during the past 3 months and confirm the veracity of this report. The military uses the excuse of even one stone rolling down the road to launch a full-scale attack on the demonstrators even advancing into the village, something like a pogrom. I spoke to the soldiers but they do not understand Yiddish and in English they are deaf. There is a documentary film about this struggle and others that is coming out soon.
West Bank village steps up protests against Israel’s theft of land
Ben Lorber
Palestinians in Kufr Qaddoum demand access to their farmland, October 2011.
(Wagdi Eshtayah/APA images)
December 13, 2011
For approximately five months, the residents of Kufr Qaddoum have united to demonstrate against the illegal Israeli settlement of Kedumim and the Israeli military’s closure of their village’s main road. Kufr Qaddoum, a West Bank village so old that, according to legend, Abraham was circumcised there with an axe, has since 1976 been plagued by Kedumim, a 3,000-inhabitant Israeli settlement that now surrounds the village on five hilltops. Kufr Qaddoum’s main road, which passes through Kedumim to link the village to Nablus, was closed by the Israeli military in 2003.
“The people of Kufr Qaddoum used this road long before the settlements came,” said Murad Shttaiwa, spokesman for the demonstrators. “Before 2003, we could drive through the settlement with no problems. Between 2004 and 2005, after the road was closed to cars, we walked through the settlement with no problems.”
In 2005, the road became closed to foot traffic as well. Before the new, indirect route to Nablus was constructed in 2008, “we used to walk and drive down unpaved dirt roads around Kedumim, but the settlers would still throw stones at cars and people,” Shttaiwa explained. “We would not react to it … for three years, we used to travel on a road made for animals.”
Now that Kufr Qaddoum’s main road is closed to villagers, a 13-kilometer straight journey to Nablus has turned into a 26-kilometer detour through a busy West Bank artery. “Three people have actually died trying to get through the main road,” Shttaiwa said, “because they were ill in ambulances, and the soldiers wouldn’t let the ambulance through.”
Taking the closures to court
When the road was first closed in 2003, villagers organized a single demonstration. “It was very peaceful,” Shttaiwa said. “The people left work and came, took their cars to where the barrier is [on the road], and then just sat and talked. We spoke with the soldiers and the soldiers stated to us that the road will eventually be opened.”
When the soldiers’ promise failed to materialize, however, villagers took the issue to court in 2004. After five years of waiting, in November 2010 Kufr Qaddoum finally received a positive response from the Israeli court system, authorizing its Palestinian villagers to use the road again. At that time, however, the Israeli military groundlessly claimed that the road is “unsuitable” and “unsafe” for human traffic. After all legal appeals failed, villagers decided to organize weekly demonstrations in July 2011.
Since then, Kufr Qaddoum has consistently held one of the most tight-knit, well-organized and well-attended Palestinian-led demonstrations against the Israeli occupation in the West Bank.
Hundreds of villagers, united with international activists and flanked by gas-masked media teams, walk down the main road towards Kedumim week after week, demanding the right to movement. “I’m very happy that a lot of people from the village are coming out for the demonstrations,” said Shttaiwa. “Even during Ramadan we thought people would fall back from protesting, but they still came out in numbers. Even during harvesting, they did not fall back, they still came out in numbers — after the harvest, they would put away their equipment and come out for the demonstrations.”
Funeral for the occupation
At the front line of the demonstration, villagers often stage a telling spectacle. A week before Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Authority’s president, gave a speech to the UN in September, villagers held a mock funeral for the occupation on 16 September, carrying a coffin draped with an Israeli flag.
A video of the demonstration, produced by the International Solidarity Movement, shows villagers setting the coffin ablaze moments before a phalanx of Israeli soldiers opened fire with tear gas (“Kafr Qaddoum September 16 2011,” 16 September 2011).
Later in September, villagers burnt an effigy of Benjamin Netanyahu after holding a mock trial condemning the Israeli prime minister for war crimes (“Kufr Qaddoum demands access,” International Solidarity Movement, 30 September 2011).
Demonstrations in Kufr Qaddoum have been accompanied by everything from a donkey painted with an Israeli flag to a live band from the Netherlands.
As demonstrations show no signs of losing steam, the Israeli military has escalated its attacks on Kufr Qaddoum. A recent report by the Palestinian news agency WAFA indicated that 12 persons — including five Palestinian children — were attacked with heavy tear gas and stun grenades during a weekly demonstration (“Israeli soldiers suppress Kufr Qaddoum weekly anti-settlements march,” 4 November 2011).
“Even though the demonstrations and the barriers are 500 meters away” from the village, explained Shttaiwa, “the soldiers will get closer and closer … [on 11 November], the soldiers got so close they were right outside my house, and the tear gas got inside the house, so my two-year-old son smelled it, and came up to me and said ‘Daddy, my eyes hurt!’”
Aggression gets worse
The military enters the village, in Shttaiwa’s words, because “the protests are getting stronger and stronger, and they want to stop the protests, so they are becoming more violent and more aggressive.” The Israeli military is also conducting frequent night raids into the village. Four days before a protest on 21 October, the army entered the village at night and arrested nine people (“Permission to enter their own lands: Kufr Qaddoum rampaged again by military,” International Solidarity Movement, 21 October 2011).
Though protests focus on the closure of their main road, the villagers of Kufr Qaddoum resist an occupation which touches on all aspects of their lives. More than half of the village’s land, approximately 11,800 dunams (one dunam equals 1,000 square meters), is situated in Area C of the West Bank — an area under the full administration of the Israeli army. Under the carve-up of the West Bank made by the 1993 Oslo accords, Area C includes all Israeli settlements and most of the Jordan Valley.
That means villagers need permission to access their own land from the Israeli District Coordinating Office. Olive harvesters, therefore, are unable to prepare their trees for the harvest throughout the year, and are only given a few days to complete the harvest itself.
Eyal Ha-Leuveni, a researcher with Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem, told The Electronic Intifada that it is “very difficult” for Palestinians who own land around the Kedumim settlement to go through the permit process. “First you have to prove your ownership of the land, and this depends on your family history — if one family member was involved in a crime, likely no family member will get a permit,” Ha-Leuveni said. “The permit process can take years, and in the meantime you get a temporary permit, which is very insecure.”
In addition, Palestinian farmlands in Area C are often stolen by settlers. In March 2008, a legal battle, waged by lawyers from Israeli human rights organization Yesh Din on behalf of Kufr Qaddoum residents, helped expose the method of land takeover characteristic of Kedumim and other settlements across the West Bank (“Court case reveals how settlers illegally grab West Bank lands,” Haaretz, 17 March 2008).
Kedumim’s local council members would map the “abandoned lands” around the settlements, even if they were outside the council’s jurisdiction, with the aim of taking them over. The council would “allocate” the lands to settlers, who would sign an official form stating that they have no ownership claim; and that the council is entitled to evict them whenever it sees fit, in return for compensating them solely for their investment in cultivating the land.
Kedumim’s former security chief, Michael Bar-Neder, testified that the land “allocation” was followed by an effort to expand the settlement. Bar-Neder said that once the settlers seized the lands, an application would be made to the military commander to declare them as owned by the State of Israel, since under an Israeli “law” covering the West Bank, anyone who does not cultivate his land for three years forfeits ownership of it (“Court case reveals how settlers illegally grab West Bank lands,” Haaretz, 17 March 2008).
It is important to emphasize that Israel’s “laws” regarding the West Bank lack any legitimacy as all Israeli settlements are illegal under the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949. In violation of international law, Israel has seized West Bank land, in the words of Ha-Leuveni, “first by military orders, then by state land, then by private acquisition.”
The area where Kedumim now sits, said Ha-Leuveni, “is land that was first taken by military orders, where the army claimed the land was needed for military needs. Israel abandoned this justification in the 1980s, but it did not return any of this land to Palestinian owners.”
In a process that accelerated throughout the 1980s, West Bank land transferred from military to state ownership. “All the policy of declaring state land,” added Ha-Nuevi, “is an Israeli invention. There are large parts of the ‘state land’ of Qedumim that were owned or at least cultivated by Palestinians before Israel called it state land.”
According to a July 2010 report on Kedumim by B’Tselem, “construction of approximately 59 [Kedumim] units deviated from the ‘state lands’ allotted to the settlement; two permanent structures and 12 caravans were erected on private Palestinian land; and a new neighborhood, comprising some 30 caravans, was built west of the settlement, deviating from the allotted ‘state land.’” (“By Hook and By Crook: Israeli Settlement Policy in the West Bank,” B’Tselem, July 2010).
In addition, Israel plans to erect a wall between Kedumim and Kufr Qaddoum, which, according to a 2005 report by The Economist, would grab another 5,000 dunams more than the 5,000 Kufr Qaddoum has already lost (“Life in the armpits of Palestine,” 7 April 2005).
Shttaiwa estimated that Kufr Qaddoum has already lost 58 percent of its land to Kedumim, and will lose 80 percent upon completion of the wall. Contrary to the Kedumim security officer’s statement, quoted in The Economist, that “not one centimeter of Qedumim is built on land known for sure to be private,” a 2009 B’Tselem map details that much of Qedumim is built entirely on privately-owned Palestinian land (“Private Palestinian land in the built-up and municipal area of Kedumim,” B’Tselem, 2009).
Illegal appropriation of Kufr Qaddoum land to the settlement
This process of illegal appropriation has plagued Kufr Qaddoum since the establishment of Kedumim in 1976. “Every year the settlement has expanded,” Shttaiwa told The Electronic Intifada. “Since the settlement came it has been expanding, as well as stealing more and more land. Over the years they have also attacked people harvesting their olives, thrown stones at them, and stolen their olives. It has gotten worse in recent years.”
Settler violence, Shttaiwa explained, increased after the first intifada, in which Kufr Qaddoum played a minimal role. “At the beginning we had no problems … [but] now these settlers are known to be pretty violent,” he said. “In the first intifada they killed a male from here and injured another one as well. After the second intifada, they began attacking olive trees.”
Two years ago, settlers spray-painted “This is Israel” and other graffiti upon the burial stones of a Kufr Qaddoum cemetery.
In testimony given to B’Tselem last year, farmer ‘Abd a-Latif ‘Obeid said that over the years, Kedumim settlers have intentionally sabotaged his olive harvest, dumped burning refuse onto his land, and stolen more than fifty dunams to build greenhouses and a park (“Testimony: Israel seizes land and hampers access for farmers near the Kedumim settlement,” B’Tselem, 21 June 2010).
“We’ve been suffering from this situation since 1984,” he states in the report. “All the land seizures, the settler attacks, and the need to coordinate entry are aimed at expanding the Kedumim settlement, which already has a large amount of land, and at taking, little by little, the rest of our land. They force us to neglect our land so it will be easier for them to annex it to the settlement.”
In addition, Kufr Qaddoum suffers from the socio-economic effects of occupation. A 2007 report by the Jerusalem-based Land Research Center estimates that, since 2002, 75 percent of Kufr Qaddoum’s residents became unemployed after construction of Israel’s wall in the West Bank and closure of Kufr Qaddoum’s main road shut out many possibilities for income generation in Israel and Nablus (“Closing of Israeli roads in Kafr Qaddum village,” Land Research Center, 7 February 2007).
Now, almost half of Kufr Qaddoum’s residents depend on foreign aid for living, and emigration has reached a record high of 10-15 percent of the total population.
“Everyone is affected”
The demonstrations in Kufr Qaddoum are a long-overdue response to the suffering the village has endured for decades. The whole village comes out to demonstrate — college students who are tired of paying 20 shekels ($5) a day to get to take an extended detour to school in Nablus; farmers who are tired of living in fear, tired of seeing their olive trees burnt, their land stolen, their livelihoods ruined; villagers who demand the right to move freely down a road that is their own.
“In Kufr Qaddoum and throughout Palestine,” Shttaiwa explained, “we do not have demonstrations for the sake of the demonstration itself. None of us likes to be dead, or likes to smell tear gas, or likes to damage his house. We only want our rights. We always say to the Israeli army, ‘give us our rights and we will not go for demonstrations. Leave our land and we will not go to demonstrations.’ That is our message in Palestine.”
Ben Lorber is an activist with the International Solidarity Movement in Nablus. He is also a journalist with the Alternative Information Center in Bethlehem. He blogs at freepaly.wordpress.com.
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3. PCHR
Palestinian Centre for Human Rights LTD(non-profit)
www.pchrgaza.org
(a) [PCHR_e] Weekly Report On Israeli Human Rights Violations in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (08- 14 December 2011)
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Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) Continue Systematic Attacks against Palestinian Civilians and Property in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT)
• 4 Palestinians (two resistance activists and a man and his child) were killed by Israeli air strikes in the Gaza Strip.
– The two activists were extra-judicially executed by IOF.
• 21 Palestinian civilians, including 8 children and 5 women, were wounded by IOF in the Gaza Strip.
• IOF have continued to use force against peaceful protests in the West Bank.
– A Palestinian civilian was killed and 5 others, including two children, were wounded.
• Israeli warplanes launched a number of air strikes against the Gaza Strip.
• 4 houses were heavily damaged.
• IOF conducted 44 incursions into Palestinian communities in the West Bank and a limited one into the Gaza Strip.
– IOF arrested 26 Palestinians, including 5 children.
– The detainees include Dr. Ayman Daraghma, Member of the Palestinian Legislative Council.
• Israel has continued to impose a total closure on the OPT and has isolated the Gaza Strip from the outside world.
– Israeli soldiers arrested 4 Palestinian civilians, at various checkpoints in the West Bank.
• Israeli has continued efforts to create a Jewish majority in East Jerusalem.
– Jewish extremists set fire to a mosque in West Jerusalem.
– IOF transformed Shu’fat checkpoint into an international crossing.
– IOF closed Bab al-Maghariba Bridge, but reopened it later.
– IOF demolished a house and a barbershop in Beit Hanina village.
• IOF have continued settlement activities in the West Bank and Israeli settlers have continued to attack Palestinian civilians and property.
– IOF confiscated 150 dunums [1] o agricultural land in al-Khader village, south of Bethlehem.
– Israeli settlers escalated attacks against Palestinian civilians in the northern West Bank.
Summary
Israeli violations of international law and humanitarian law in the OPT continued during the reporting period (08 – 14 December 2011):
Shooting:
During the reporting period, IOF killed 5 Palestinians, including a child, and wounded 26 civilians, including 10 children and 5 women in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
In the Gaza Strip, IOF killed 4 Palestinians, including a child.
On 08 December 2011, IOF extra-judicially executed two Palestinian resistance activists in the center of Gaza City. An Israeli warplane fired a missile at the car in which the two activists were traveling. Additionally, 4 civilian bystanders, including a woman, were wounded.
On 09 December 2011, a Palestinian civilian and his child were killed and 11 others were wounded, when Israeli warplanes bombarded a training site of the ‘Izziddin al-Qassam Brigades (the armed wing of Hamas) in the west of al-Nasser neighborhood in the north of Gaza City. As a result of the attack, two neighboring houses were destroyed over their residents. Five members of the victims’ family (3 children and two women) were among the wounded.
On 11 December 2011, 3 Palestinian civilians, including two children, were wounded when Israeli warplanes bombarded a house belonging to a Palestinian resistance activist in al-Zaytoun neighborhood in the east of Gaza City.
On 13 December 2011, two Palestinian civilians, including a child, were wounded by Israeli soldiers stationed at the border between the Gaza Strip and Israel in the northern and central Gaza Strip.
On 14 December 2011, a Palestinian civilian was wounded by Israeli soldiers stationed at the border between the Gaza Strip and Israel to the east of Gaza City.
On 09 and 10 December 2011, Israeli warplanes bombarded space areas in the west of the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah, but no casualties were reported.
The full report is available online at:
http://www.pchrgaza.org/portal/en/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=7952:weekly-report-on-israeli-human-rights-violations-in-the-occupied-palestinian-territory-08-14-december-2011&catid=84:weekly-2009&Itemid=183
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Public Document
For further information please visit our website (http://www.pchrgaza.org) or contact PCHR’s office in Gaza City, Gaza Strip by email (pchr@pchrgaza.org) or telephone (+972 (0)8 2824776 – 2825893).
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Palestinian Centre for Human Rights
(b) Press Release
(c) Ref: 142/2011
Date: 15 December 2011
PCHR Condemns Placing Large Floats 3 Miles from Gaza Seashore to Tighten the Siege Imposed on the Gaza Strip
The Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) condemns the placing of large floats by Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) 3 miles from the Gaza Strip seashore, beyond which Palestinian fishermen are banned from sailing. This measure serves to institutionalize the siege imposed on the Gaza Strip, and enhances IOF’s control over the Gaza Strip’s regional water. PCHR warns that this measure will lead to more attacks by IOF against Palestinian fishermen, depriving them of their means of subsistence, under the pretest of sailing beyond the sea floats.
PCHR has obtained affidavits from a number of Palestinian fishermen in the Gaza Strip, in which they expressed concerns that such Israeli measures would tighten the closure imposed on the Gaza Strip and restrict their work by limiting the permissible fishing area to only 3 nautical miles.
According to Mr. Mohammed Subhi al-Hissi, Head of the Union of Fishermen in Gaza City, the Israeli naval forces started to place large floats to serve as border signs, above which are lights and devices believed to be photographing and monitoring devices, at a distance of 3 nautical miles from the Gaza Strip seashore. The Israeli naval forces warned Palestinian fishermen through leaflets not to sail beyond such border signs, otherwise, they would be subject to shooting, detention and confiscation of fishing tools. Al-Hissi warned of the repercussions of this measure on the fishing industry in the Gaza Strip, which is the sole source of income for hundreds of fishermen and their families.
It should be noted that IOF have imposed a long term closure on the Gaza Strip since 1991, under which they have deprived Palestinian fishermen their right to fish Gaza’s waters. They also decreased the permissible fishing area in the Gaza Strip’s seawater from 20 nautical miles, as agreed under the Palestinian-Israeli Oslo Accords, [1] to 6 nautical miles in 2008, and to 3 nautical miles in 2009. During the Israeli offensive on the Gaza Strip in the period 27 December 2008 – 18 January 2009, IOF imposed a total closure on the Gaza Strip, completely preventing Palestinian fishermen from fishing. Following the offensive, IOF imposed a partial closure on the Gaza Strip preventing Palestinian fishermen from fishing beyond a distance of 3 nautical miles.
In light of the above:
1. PCHR condemns placing such large floats 3 miles from the Gaza Strip’s seashore, banning Palestinian fishermen from fishing beyond them.
2. PCHR calls upon the international community to exert pressure on IOF to open the fishing area up to 20 nautical miles.
3. PCHR condemns attacks by IOF against Palestinian fishermen, and believed that such attacks are part of the collective punishment measures against the Palestinian civilian population, including denying them of their means of subsistence, which is prohibited under the international humanitarian law and human rights law.
4 Jerusalem Post Thursday, December 15, 2011 18:10 IST
Photo by: Channel 10
Petition filed to delay new prisoner release
http://www.jpost.com/NationalNews/Article.aspx?id=249620
By JOANNA PARASZCZUK
Israel Law Center wants more time for citizens to contest prisoner release in second stage of Schalit deal.
In a High Court petition filed Thursday morning, the Israel Law Center (Shurat HaDin) asked justices to delay the second stage of the Gilad Schalit prisoner exchange deal. A total of 550 Palestinian security prisoners are set to be released on Sunday, according to a list published on the Prison Service website.
Thursday’s petition comes after the High Court decided not to accede to requests by terror victims in October to interfere in the release of 1,027 Palestinian security prisoners as part of the first stage in the government-brokered deal to free kidnapped soldier Schalit. Terror victims had complained that the government had not given them sufficient notice that terrorists convicted of murdering their family members were among those scheduled for release, but the court said it would not delay the deal after the state argued the timeline for the first stage was critical.
However, in its petition the Law Center now argues that as Schalit has now been returned safely to Israel, the court must allow for a “full democratic and public process” to take place and order the government to establish criteria determining which security prisoners should be released. According to the petition, although Israel is committed to honor the Schalit deal, there is nothing to prevent the government from delaying the second phase of prisoner releases in order to establish such criteria.
“Shalit is free, There is no immediate threat to life. It’s crucial that the democratic process is thoroughly played out. The citizens victimized by these terrorists must be able to bring their claims before the court,” said Law Center director attorney Nitzana Darshan-Leitner. “In a democratic state, all citizens who oppose the government’s policy must be given adequate notice and an opportunity to be heard by neutral judicial officers.”
The petition argues that the rights of terror victims and their families could be harmed if they are not given sufficient time to contest the release of specific prisoners, and Darshan-Leitner noted that the Prison Service website published the list of prisoners to be released on Wednesday, ahead of their release on Sunday.
“It takes time for the families to be notified and the cases be brought to court. Not allowing an adequate opportunity is a travesty of justice,” she said.
In addition to the Legal Center, terror victims Michael Norzich and Dr David Bauer also chose to be named on the petition. Norzich’s brother Vadim was murdered by a Palestinian lynch mob in Ramallah in 2000. One of the Palestinians convicted of carrying out that murder, Abed Alaziz Salaha, was released during the first phase of the Schalit deal.
Bauer, a US citizen living in Israel, was injured together with his son Jonathan in a Fatah suicide bombing in Jerusalem’s King George Street in 2002. The attack killed three and wounded 86 others. One of the men responsible for that bombing, Fatah terrorist Darwish Ghazi Darwish Dahdar, is among those set to be released on Sunday as part of the second phase.
In an interview with The Jerusalem Post on Thursday, Bauer said that in line with strict US anti-terror legislation, which stipulates that foreign terrorists suspected of harming US citizens outside U.S. soil can be subject to prosecution in the US, he and other terror victims have informed US attorney-general Eric Holder that several people convicted of killing and harming Americans may have been freed without the required public debate.
Bauer said he hoped the petition will “let Israel know that it is not the only country affected by the prisoner releases.”
“Several people who carried out our attack are still free,” he added.
5 Jerusalem Post Thursday, December 15, 2011
Photo by: Courtesy of Knesset
Justice Ministry to propose bill that limits media
http://www.jpost.com/DiplomacyAndPolitics/Article.aspx?id=249614
By LAHAV HARKOV
Initiative nicknamed the ‘concealment bill’ aims to restrict the ability of the press to cover police investigations and court cases.
The Justice Ministry plans to propose a bill that will severely limit the media’s ability to cover police investigations and court cases, The Jerusalem Post learned on Thursday.
The initiative will amend the penal code to include a punishment of one year in prison for anyone who publicizes materials and testimonies pertaining to criminal investigations. The proposed ban on publishing these materials will not have a time limit, and would apply to all cases, including those about public figures.
The initiative, which the Hebrew-language press has nicknamed the “Concealment Bill,” has yet to be submitted to the Knesset, but the Justice Ministry confirmed that it has been approved by both State Attorney Moshe Lador and Justice Minister Yaakov Neeman.
An official ministry statement explained that Lador has said more than once over the past year that he plans to fight leaks about investigations. Therefore, the Justice Ministry along with the State Attorney’s office, Public Defender’s office, Ministry of Public Security and the Israel Police worked on legislation on this issue.
The bill will ban publicizing materials from an investigation without permission from a judge and will forbid government workers to release such materials. In addition, those involved in the case – suspects and lawyers – may not give materials from investigations to the press, and photographs and videos of “law enforcement actions” relevant to the case may not be printed.
The Justice Ministry emphasized that the ban is on materials from an investigation and not content, meaning that, theoretically, verbal leaks would not carry a prison sentence. However, as the bill has not been finalized and there are differences of opinion on this matter, the ban may be expanded to include all information from investigations.
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6. Haaretz Editorial Thursday, December 15, 2011
The reality show of Israeli democracy
Even a Channel 10 reality show plays an important role in defending democracy. Reality shows’ other role is even more important: to pay for a strong, independent news organization that is not dependent on political patrons.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/the-reality-show-of-israeli-democracy-1.401503
Haaretz Editorial
Tags: Benjamin Netanyahu Tel Aviv Knesset
Yoaz Hendel, the head the National Information Directorate at the Prime Minister’s Office, joined up to defend his employer, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, over the expected closure of Channel 10. “Not every reality show on Channel 10 is defending democracy,” he said Tuesday evening at a conference at the Jabotinsky Institute in Tel Aviv. Hendel used the word reality, which has taken on lots of dubious meaning over the years, in an attempt to play down the station’s importance.
But Hendel is wrong: Even a Channel 10 reality show plays an important role in defending democracy. First, the broadcasting of the show itself allows the viewer to choose it and not a different one on a different channel at the same time. In this way, and without any connection to the program’s quality – after all neither Netanyahu nor Hendel are television critics – viewers’ ability to choose a station and watch “Survivor” is an exercise of cultural pluralism.
Reality shows’ other role is even more important: to pay for a strong and independent news organization that is not dependent on political patrons, as are the Israel Broadcasting Authority and Educational Television. A news organization can feel secure to broadcast significant investigative reporting about the government – including the prime minister’s trips abroad – without fear that this will lead to its closure.
It seems the prime minister and the eight coalition members in the Knesset Economic Affairs Committee were thinking about these two aspects – cultural pluralism and criticism of the government – when they voted against postponing Channel 10’s debt payments. The committee members’ cries of joy after they won a majority – bringing closer the firing of hundreds of employees – betrayed their true motives. Most of the hands raised with the aim of closing the station were raised as part of the antidemocratic legislative campaign engulfing the 18th Knesset, which mars the face of the legislature.
The overriding goals of the current Knesset session, with the prime minister’s support, remain silencing the pluralistic discussion and revenge against anyone who dares criticize the government. Channel 10 meets those criteria extremely well.
7. Haaretz Thursday, December 15, 2011
Latest update 17:36 15.12.11
Iceland formally recognizes Palestinian state within 1967 lines
Palestinian Foreign Minister says move has ‘great meaning’; declaration comes a little more than 2 weeks after Cyprus said it would establish formal ties with PA.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/iceland-formally-recognizes-palestinian-state-within-1967-lines-1.401615
By DPA
Tags: Palestinian state Middle East peace
Iceland on Thursday formally recognized Palestine and was to establish diplomatic relations with the state, two weeks after its parliament voted in favor of the move.
Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Malki, who was visiting the North Atlantic country for talks with his counterpart Ossur Skarphedinsson, welcomed the decision saying it had “great meaning” and went further than previous declarations of solidarity with Palestine.
According to the decision, Iceland recognizes an independent and sovereign State of Palestine within the pre-1967 Six Day War borders.
The two ministers also discussed the Palestinian bid to join the United Nations and how to restart the peace process in the Middle East, Reykjavik said.
Late last month, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported that Cyprus recognized a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders.
While European states are by and large less inclined to formally recognize a Palestinian state outside of peace talks with Israel, a growing trend to upgrade Palestinian missions to embassies has emerged.
Prominent European states who have already announced this upgrade include France, Spain and Ireland.
However, with its move, Cyprus decided to break ranks, sending Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas a letter from Cyprus President Dimitris Christofias, in which he reportedly recognized a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders.
According to the WAFA report, Christofias wrote in his letter to Abbas of the “historic deep relations” between Palestine and Cyprus, stating his hope that a peace agreement would be reached which would ensure an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital.
Recent moves by Cyrus and Iceland to recognize a Palestinian state come in the wake of a more substantial amid South American countries.
Brazil, Argentina, Ecuador, Bolivia and Uruguay have also recently recognized a Palestinian state along the pre-war borders. Chile and Peru have given their recognition to a Palestinian state as well, but without specifying borders.
8. Today in Palestine for December 14, 2011
http://theheadlines.org/11/14-12-11.shtml