NOVANEWS
Local official: Army uproots olive trees in Nablus village
NABLUS (Ma’an) — Israeli forces uprooted olive trees in the Nablus village of Beit Dajan on Thursday, a local official said. Village council head Naser Abu Jesh told Ma’an that Israeli military jeeps accompanied by bulldozers razed 12 dunums of land in the eastern part of the village on the pretext that it is a military zone. The land is owned by Jamal Abu Kanan. Beit Dajan is located next to the illegal Israeli settlement of Hamra.
link to www.maannews.net
Israel Police expel Harvard students from Palestinian village
Confrontation occurs after a bus full of Harvard students began traveling along a security route inside the village of Walaja, which is intended solely for Israeli security vehicles.
link to www.haaretz.com
Jerusalem Mufti calls for an end to ‘Israeli terrorism’ against religious sanctuaries
The Mufti of Jerusalem, Sheikh Muhammad Hussein, has drawn attention to Israel’s continued violation of freedom of worship in Israel and the occupied Palestinian Territories., Sheikh Hussein asserted that the Israeli government’s recent announcement that it would be closing the Ibrahimi Mosque to Muslim worshippers for two days next month because of the upcoming Jewish holidays, is a gross encroachment on religious sanctuaries and the right of Muslims to worship.
link to www.middleeastmonitor.org.uk
Who’s afraid of a Bedouin?, Charlotte Silver
Last June, Israel’s Supreme Court reached a ruling that some saw as a compromise to a legal battle that had lasted nearly a decade. Beer Sheva’s Big Mosque that has been closed to prayer since 1948 would be converted into a museum of Islamic culture. The decision disappointed thousands of Muslim citizens who wished to re-open the Ottoman-built mosque as a place of worship, thereby fulfilling a gaping need: there is currently no public space for Muslims to worship in Beer Sheva.
link to electronicintifada.net
Palestinians prepare to lose the solar panels that provide a lifeline
Israel is planning to demolish ‘illegal’ solar panels that are the only source of electricity for Palestinians in West Bank villages. Two large solar panels jut out of the barren landscape near Imneizil in the Hebron hills. The hi-tech structures sit incongruously alongside the tents and rough stone buildings of the Palestinian village, but they are fundamental to life here: they provide electricity. Imneizil is not connected to the national electricity grid. Nor are the vast majority of Palestinian communities in Area C, the 62% of the West Bank controlled by Israel. The solar energy has replaced expensive and clunky oil-powered generators. According to the Israeli authorities, these solar panels – along with six others in nearby villages – are illegal and have been slated for demolition. Nihad Moor, 25, has three small children. The family live in a two-room tent kitted out with a fridge, TV and very old computer. She also has a small electric butter churn, which she uses to supplement her husband’s small income from sheep farming.
link to www.guardian.co.uk
War on Gaza
GAZA CITY (Ma’an) — Israel launched airstrikes on two sites in the Gaza Strip overnight Wednesday, less than 48 hours after agreeing to an Egypt-brokered truce. Witnesses said that Israeli missiles landed on agricultural land, causing a fire and severe damage. No injuries were reported. In a statement, the Israeli army said its warplanes targeted “a rocket launching site in the northern Gaza Strip and a terror tunnel in the southern Gaza Strip.”
link to www.maannews.net
Death of child raises toll to 26 Palestinians
The number of Palestinian victims who were killed during the recent Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip rose to 26 martyrs after a 7-year old boy died of serious injuries on Wednesday morning.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk
Israeli artillery shelling targets central Gaza
The Israeli occupation forces on Tuesday night fired a number of artillery shells into the central Gaza Strip, but no casualties were reported, according to local sources.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk
IOF troops fire at funeral in violation of calm
Three Palestinian citizens were wounded on Tuesday at the hands of Israeli occupation forces while participating in a funeral of two martyrs who fell in the Israeli air raid on Monday night.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk
25 killed due to Israeli attacks on Gaza
Gaza, March 13, This isn’t knew, I know but that doesn’t make it the norm and it shouldn’t be the norm in any way. Gaza survived four continuous days of Israeli attacks that left 25 dead and 80+ injured. Among those injured, some are critical, some are children and some are women. Among those dead there were elderly, women and children. If you have a heart that enables you to claim that children, women and elderly should be killed because they live in Gaza which automatically means they are terrorists, I don’t consider you a human being. Children are children; I would never celebrate the death of Israeli child, ever.
link to gazatimes.blogspot.com
Beit Furik, Nablus: Family unable to attend funeral for son killed in recent Gaza air strikes
“We called him Nassr, but I think his real name was Mahmoud,” says Ahmed while we were on the bus from the Beit Furik municipality building. Outside the bus window, the walls of the little town just outside of Nablus are plastered with freshly printed martyr posters. The picture shows a middle aged man photoshopped between the Dome of the Rock and the Palestinian flag.
link to palsolidarity.org
Nayif Qarmout was murdered yesterday; he was also buried yesterday, in a small cemetery in the heart of Jabalia, the refugee camp where he lived. He was only 14 years old. He was murdered by an Israeli missile while playing football with his friends. He was a handsome young man, the photo on his martyr posters make that obvious. It was something that I never would have guessed at his funeral, looking at his bloody bruised face. Today, Nayif’s family mourned. The reception line of men lining the entrance to the mourning tent was the most shattered group of men I have ever seen. Their faces were blank, dead, as though Nayif was not the only murdered yesterday. Nayif’s photo was on the wall, he looks so young, a child just turning into a man. We sat down and ate dates as a young man brought coffee around. Nayif’s uncle, Abdullah came over to talk to us.
link to palsolidarity.org
For Three Days the Fire Blazed, Tamar Fleishman – The West Bank
Since Talat Ramia’s murder tranquility had yet to be restored to the streets of Ar-Ram. For the past three days the younger residents had been going out to the streets and protesting against the murder of their friend, while the army pushes them back with a barrage of fire and gas grenades. “He was only twenty five, from a very poor family, his brother is the one who cleans cars at the checkpoint…”, said my friend A’ who added: “Even though I didn’t know him very well, I wanted to cry when they told me the soldiers had killed him for no reason, really it was for no reason…”
link to palestinechronicle.com
Under the Rubble of Gaza, The Real Reason Israel Attacks
Joharah Baker – MIFTAH – Israel wants one thing, into which it pours all of its military, political and diplomatic efforts to achieve, which is to prevent a Palestinian state from ever coming into being. This has been the case ever since Israel’s creation in 1948 over the ashes of what was Palestine. And it is the case today; its recent invasion of Gaza is just one more piece to the quickly forming puzzle.
link to www.kibush.co.il
Other Israeli Violence
IOF troops storm West Bank areas
The Israeli occupation forces (IOF) stormed Al-Khalil and Jenin provinces at dawn Thursday and rounded up three youths in Dhaheria village, local sources said.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk
Witnesses: Israeli troops raid Tulkarem
TULKAREM (Ma’an) — Israeli forces raided Tulkarem at dawn on Thursday, locals told Ma’an. Soldiers stationed themselves in a southern district of the city and checked locals’ ID cards, witnesses said. No detentions were reported. An Israeli military spokesman did not immediately return a call seeking comment.
link to www.maannews.net
Siege of Gaza
Occupied Lives: Switching off hospitals
The reality generated by Israel’s longstanding illegal closure, the international sanctions against Gaza’s authorities, and political in-fighting between the Ministries in Gaza and Ramallah, has resulted in a fuel and electricity crisis in the Gaza Strip. Consequently, water and sanitation installations, hospitals, and other healthcare facilities are facing severe difficulties in providing basic services to the people of Gaza, undermining the right to health and the right to life. Such problems have been a consistent feature of life in the Gaza Strip since the current closure was imposed in 2007.
link to www.pchrgaza.org
Hana Shalabi
UN expert urges Israel to free female
A United Nations human rights expert has urged the Israeli regime to free Hana Shalabi, a Palestinian female prisoner, who has been on hunger strike since being rearrested by Tel Aviv about a month ago.
link to www.presstv.ir
A message from #HanaShalabi’s family 14 March 2012
“We call upon the Palestinian National Authority, all Palestinian national factions and all Palestinians to go to the streets and participate in the support action planned on Saturday March 17 in solidarity with our daughter Hana Al-Shalabi and all administrative detainees. We will continue supporting our daughter’s hunger strike and we want to let our daughter Hana know: we are with you in your hunger strike until you achieve your demand; your immediate release from the unjust Israeli jails. Your support to Hana is necessary to achieve Hana’s immediate release; it is also needed to support our daughter in her open hunger strike which she has started on February 16, 2012. Finally, we call upon all administrative detainees to join Hana’s hunger strike until you achieve your own immediate release and put an end to the unjust Israeli policy of administrative detention which violates human rights and International law.”
link to 3isianmadani.blogspot.com
Detainees / Political Prisoners
IOF soldiers round up 12 Palestinians
Israeli occupation forces (IOF) rounded up 12 Palestinian citizens in the West Bank provinces of Ramallah, Al-Khalil, and Qalqilia at dawn Thursday, local sources said.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk
Israeli troops re-arrest Palestinian freed in Shalit deal
Israeli troops have re-arrested another of the Palestinians released in October under a swap deal with Israel, the Palestinian Prisoners’ Society said on Tuesday.
link to news.yahoo.com
Political detainees in PA jail threaten hunger strike
Political detainees in the Palestinian Authority jail in Jericho are threatening to go on hunger strike if court orders for their release were not carried out.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk
Palestinian prisoners to launch open hunger strike next month
Wa’ed society for detainees and ex-detainees said the Palestinian prisoners coordinated their efforts to start the largest open hunger strike next April in all Israeli jails.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk
Solidarity / Actvism / BDS
“I can’t take part in these crimes”: Israeli refusenik interviewed, Jillian Kestler-D’Amours
Eighteen-year-old Noam Gur, the first Israeli to reject mandatory military service this year, speaks out about refusing to partake in Israel’s ongoing crimes against humanity even if it means jail time.
link to electronicintifada.net
“Diamonds Crafted in Israel Should be Banned”
The International diamond-regulatory system set up to end the trade in blood diamonds is under pressure to ban diamonds from Israel because human rights activists state they are funding the Israeli military.
link to www.almanar.com.lb
AICinema 15.3: Screening of Film Roadmap to Apartheid
Please join us at the AICinema on Thursday 15 March at 8.00 p.m. for an Israel Apartheid Week screening of Roadmap to Apartheid, together with the film’s directors.
link to www.alternativenews.org
AIC Video: Women and Resistance
Suha Barghouti is the Chair of the Palestinian NGO network, and a long-time human rights activist.
link to www.alternativenews.org
In anticipation of the Global March to Jerusalem on Palestinian Land Day (March 30), a new album called “Jerusalem for Us All” brings together tracks donated by a score of international artists working in hip hop, jazz, rock, folk, and a variety of classical cultural traditions.
link to mondoweiss.net
Iranian Athletes Support Global March to Jerusalem
As people from all over the world belonging to different types of religions have decided to show their support for the valiant nation of Palestine and Al-Quds, a large number of well-known Iranian athletes voiced support for the Global March to Jerusalem. Since around 65 years ago, Palestinian territories were occupied by the usurper Zionist regime and millions of innocent people were forcefully displaced from their motherland, the statement said, and added with the wave of Islamic Awakening, which has swept through the Middle East and North Africa, now it is the time for the Muslims people in the world, specially the Palestinians, to rise against the Zionist occupiers and get rid of oppression and tyranny.
In a first ever musical collaboration between South Africa and Palestine, South African band, The Mavrix and Palestinian Oud player, Mohammed Omar, have released a music video called “The New Black.”
link to electronicintifada.net
Political Developments / Diplomacy / Other News
Malaysian FM: No relations with Israel
Malaysian foreign minister Hanifa Aman has affirmed that his country’s policy would not change regarding establishing diplomatic relations with Israel.
link to www.palestine-info.co.uk
Turkey’s Erdogan: Israel must stop ‘massacre’ of Palestinians in Gaza
Turkish PM’s comments came as Egypt mediates tense ceasefire between Israel, Gaza militants, and as Israel warns its citizens against travel to Turkey over imminent terror threat.
Turks outraged by Israel’s travel advisory
Turkish elements claim Israeli decision to warn tourists against visiting Turkey motivated by desire for revenge over Erdogan statements.
Israel running ‘apartheid regime’ in Hebron, says man who could be next leader of Germany
Analysis / Op-ed
‘WSJ’ runs 4 letters rebutting Oren’s claims on Palestinians, Philip Weiss
The myth of Israel’s favorable treatment of Palestinian Christians, Fida Jiryis
NGO Monitor uses fake Martin Luther King Jr. quote in latest “anti-Semite” smear, Ali Abunimah
The killing of Zuhair al-Qaissi exposes Israel’s attitude to its supreme court, Mya Guarnieri
Motherhood Celebrated in Irish, Palestinian War Literature, Yousef M. Aljamal – Gaza
Iran
Report: U.S. asked Russia to warn Iran of ‘last chance’ to avoid military strike
Poll shows only 25% of Americans support military assistance for Israel against Iran
Maariv Reports Cabinet Favors Iran Attack, U.S. Delivers Iran ‘Final’ Ultimatum, Richard Silverstein
Saudi Arabia
Saudi protests spread to different cities
Protests have spread to a number of cities in Saudi Arabia following the suppression of a demonstration held by female students at a university last Wednesday, the Arab Network for Human Rights Information (ANHRI) said on Tuesday. The Cairo-based NGO released a statement saying the anger of students has spread and “gone beyond [the city of] Abha to larger parts of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” where “several protests have taken place in the cities of Riyadh, al-Namas, Ar’ar, Qatif, and al-Rabeeah.”
Lebanese Druze leader Walid Jumblatt has repeatedly called for the Druze of Sweida in southern Syria to join the anti-Assad uprising. Jumblatt’s overtures, however, have so far fallen on deaf ears.
Lebanese Druze Clergy to Jumblatt: Not in Our Name
Walid Jumblatt’s relationship with the spiritual authorities within the Druze community is temperamental. The sheikhs are partners when they share Jumblatt’s view on a particular decision, and when the clerics defy the lord of Mukhtara, suddenly it is all about socialism and the separation of politics and religion. Today, Jumblatt and the Druze clergy are on opposing sides of the Syrian crisis.
Assad’s Frustrated Foreign Enemies, Ibrahim al-Amin
Various parties have been assessing the outlook for the crisis in Syria based on the evidence on the ground. The domestic scene is set to remain polarized for a long time. National understandings that can restore the country’s political unity and a cohesive national identity cannot be expected any time soon. The external scene has meanwhile become more complicated in light of the intensifying battle between the two camps over who will take hold of Syria, or who will wield the most influence in it.
Nowadays, it has become commonplace to hear comments such as these: You cannot be serious asking me about a story whose source is Al Jazeera! Is it reasonable to base your case on a news item from Al Jazeera? Do you feel comfortable within yourself working for Al Jazeera? Can you speak your mind or register your objections if you work for Al Jazeera? Do you really waste hours of your time watching Al Jazeera?
Fighting from civilian areas? Perfectly understandable– in Syria, Philip Weiss
From a story about Syrian violence on NPR Monday night: “Melissa Block speaks with Al Jazeera correspondent Anita McNaught about Syria’s governmental crackdown on Idlib. She was there over the weekend, and is now in Antakya, Turkey, on the border with Syria.”
http://mondoweiss.net/2012/03/fighting-from-civilian-areas-perfectly-understandable-in-syria.html
Other Arab / World News
StratforLeaks: Google Ideas Director Involved in ‘Regime Change’
Top Google execs, including the company’s CEO and one of Barack Obama’s major presidential campaign donors Eric Schmidt, informed the intelligence agency Stratfor about Google’s activities and internal communication regarding “regime change” in the Middle East, according to Stratfor emails released by WikiLeaks and obtained by Al-Akhbar. The other source was Google’s director for security and safety Marty Lev.
Jeremy Scahill: Why is President Obama Keeping Yemeni Journalist Abdulelah Haider Shaye in Prison?
The Obama administration is facing scrutiny for its role in the imprisonment of a Yemeni journalist who exposed the U.S. role in a 2009 bombing in Yemen that killed 14 women and 21 children. In January 2011, a Yemeni state security court gave the journalist, Abdulelah Haider Shaye, a five-year jail sentence on terrorism-related charges following a disputed trial that was condemned by several human rights and press freedom groups. Within a month of Shaye’s sentencing, then-Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh announced he was going to pardon the journalist. But Saleh changed his mind after a phone call from President Obama. Thirteen months later, Shaye remains behind bars. We speak award-winning investigative journalist Jeremy Scahill and Mohamed Abdel Dayem of the Committee to Protect Journalists.
Amnesty International to Clinton: No more aid for Egypt
The State Department is getting ready to decide if Egypt has done enough to earn its $1.5 billion in U.S. aid for this year, and one leading human rights organization is telling Secretary of State Hillary Clinton the answer is no. “Amnesty International USA is deeply concerned about the ongoing repression of the Egyptian people by the Supreme Council for the Armed Forces (SCAF) in Egypt,” the advocacy groupwrote in a Wednesday letter to Clinton. “Given the human rights violations in Egypt, the US State Department cannot in good faith certify to the US Congress that the Egyptian government is protecting human rights.”
link to thecable.foreignpolicy.com
Kuwait to probe torture and corruption allegations
The Kuwaiti parliament voted on Wednesday to set up probes into allegations of corruption, smuggling and torture, the state KUNA news agency reported. Members of the new opposition-dominated parliament agreed to set up two commissions of inquiry into allegations of corruption relating to members of the previous parliament, KUNA said. Former prime minister Sheikh Nasser Mohammad al-Ahmad al-Sabah, a member of the Gulf emirate’s ruling family, is accused of having transferred hundreds of millions of dollars of public funds into private accounts he held abroad.
Maid in Lebanon abuse video kills herself
Suicide comes days after footage emerged of Ethiopian woman being violently dragged on Beirut street by male employer.
Outrage over rape victim suicide in Morocco
Morocco’s internet activists mobilized on Wednesday in outrage over the suicide of a 16-year-old rape victim who killed herself after she was forced to marry her rapist.