NOVANEWS
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False choice: Netanyahu says Abbas must choose peace w/ Hamas or Israel
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Cairo 2
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Cairo 2 part II
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Noura Erakat: Constructing the prototypical terrorist in America…Guess who?
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Israeli prof says Israel is committing suicide like Germany– and lobby ‘coerced’ Obama to go along
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JNF feeling the heat over Al Araqib
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Nearly half of Israeli Jews support settler ‘price tag’ attacks against Palestinians
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Pinkwashing at Yale
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Rape used ‘as a weapon’ in Libya
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Bahrain– the sideshow
False choice: Netanyahu says Abbas must choose peace w/ Hamas or Israel
Mar 28, 2011
Philip Weiss
Mubarak tried this for years with the Muslim Brotherhood. And everyone in Gaza will tell you that Hamas is just part of the political landscape. Intolerance, from Haaretz:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Monday that reconciliation between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas could spell the end of the peace process, after an aide to Mahmoud Abbas said that the Palestinian president was would be willing to give up U.S. aid if needed to secure unity with the rival faction.
“You can’t have peace with both Israel and Hamas,” Netanyahu said. “Choose peace with Israel.”
Cairo 2
Mar 28, 2011
Philip Weiss
President Obama’s most critical statement tonight was that letting Qaddafi win would have imperilled the nascent democracies in Tunisia and Egypt. “The democratic impulses that are dawning across the region would be eclipsed by the darkest form of dictatorship, as repressive leaders concluded that violence is the best strategy to cling to power.”
I can’t share the left’s cynicism about Obama’s motives; I believe that he believes what he said. He believed in democracy in Cairo ’09 and he does now. His faith in the movement sweeping the Middle East was paramount in his thinking: he referred to it over and over again tonight.
It is pointed out often that Obama is doing nothing about Bahrain and Yemen, because of the Saudi Arabia interest, and who can dispute that. Even a president has limited powers. “In this particular country -– Libya — at this particular moment, we were faced with the prospect of violence on a horrific scale. We had a unique ability to stop that violence.”
Is his policy hypocritical? Of course. But what about the hypocrisy of the U.N. Human Rights Council, which pressed the landmark Goldstone investigation even as it was ignoring Sri Lanka, where tens of thousands of civilians died? International law is in its early stages of application; of course it is politicized; still, those who support human rights have to support int’l bodies when humanitarian law is fairly applied, as it was to both sides of the Gaza conflict. And the same law was repeatedly cited as a cause for action in Libya, and tonight Obama embraced “universal” rights, such as the freedom of speech.
I’ve been divided about this intervention because I so despise violence, and in the end I’ve been supportive; but it seems to me that the error of those on the left who find it so easy to oppose the intervention is that they regard the action as a continuation of colonial and imperialist history. So they chalk it up to the traditional superpowers’ pursuit of national interest and treasure. But I think history has changed with the Arab revolutions; that the objects of history became agents of history, and when Obama spoke about the inspiration of Arab youth, he was speaking for all the educated world.
Egypt wasn’t just a Time Magazine cover, it was a hinge. The western communications tools that the youth used, from facebook to twitter to CNN, caused western elites to be fully invested in their revolution. The internet has transformed civilization and the traditional power structure as the printing press once did; and Obama’s abandonment of Mubarak is the proof. The revolutions are a landmark in the growing influence of international law and communications.
Now the Libyan rebellion also has a face: Iman al-Obeidi, the incredibly brave rape victim in Tripoli who sought out the western cameras out of faith that the world would do the right thing. When Obama spoke of atrocities tonight, he was resonating with the international outrage at her treatment.
And the doctrine he laid out at the end of his speech, a summons to the world to intervene when human dignity is at stake, reflected his own values; he married a woman whose dissertation at Princeton was about the alienation of “blackness” in a liberal white world.
I’m stirred by the speech because I think its ultimate impact will be on Palestine. In fact, I think Obama is conscious of its Palestinian application. Again and again he made statements tonight– massacre, atrocities, freedom of speech, universal rights, “the writ” of the U.N. Security Council, 40+ years of tyranny, the rights of refugees, the support of the Arab League, America’s “unique ability” to have an effect– that apply to the Palestinian experience.
These words will have great consequences. You cannot build a coalition that includes Turkey without taking on Turkey’s human-rights agenda: Gaza. You cannot act on behalf of the Arab League without addressing the statelessness of Palestinians. You can’t prevent a massacre in Benghazi without establishing a red line against wanton Israeli violence. AsGilbert Achcar writes:
One can safely bet that the present intervention in Libya will prove most embarrassing for imperialist powers in the future. As those members of the US establishment who opposed their country’s intervention rightly warned, the next time Israel’s air force bombs one of its neighbours, whether Gaza or Lebanon, people will demand a no-fly zone. I, for one, definitely will. Pickets should be organized at the UN in New York demanding it. We should all be prepared to do so, with now a powerful argument.
I think religious forces can be more powerful than imperialist forces, and Israel/Palestine is one such example. Obama is muzzled and hogtied by the Israel lobby in American political life (Moshe Shoked savagely likens it to the Elders of Zion in Haaretz) and Obama is doing what he can to subvert its power– by building an international coalition around the principle of human rights in the Middle East. He too is on facebook, appealing for international help.
Cairo 2 part II
Mar 28, 2011
Adam Horowitz
I haven’t weighed in on the US intervention in Libya so far because, although I’m against it, I didn’t really feel strongly enough about it to chime in one way or another. My opposition comes mainly from the unclear goal of the mission (is it “narrowly focused on saving lives” as Obama said tonight or to overthrow Qaddafi?), a lack of trust in US intentions and and the general belief that the unintended consequences of foreign military intervention seem ill equiped to successfully impact a civil war in a predictable way.
Watching Obama’s speech on Libya tonight has moved me to share some thoughts. Unlike Phil, I found the speech to be infuriating. Tonight’s speech was a case study in the exultation of American exceptionalism in complete disregard of the history and current policies of the United States, and it helped reveal the base hypocrisy of US foreign policy in the Middle East.
The main theme tonight was a time-tested one: America is too special and moral a country to not have intervened on behalf of the Libyan people. Obama repeatedly praised the “shining city upon a hill” throughout his speech:
For generations, the United States of America has played a unique role as an anchor of global security and advocate for human freedom.
and more dramatically:
To brush aside America’s responsibility as a leader and – more profoundly – our responsibilities to our fellow human beings under such circumstances would have been a betrayal of who we are. Some nations may be able to turn a blind eye to atrocities in other countries. The United States of America is different.
And towards the end Obama soothed, “because wherever people long to be free, they will find a friend in the United States.”
I haven’t wanted to attack the Libya intervention in the grounds that it is completely hypocritical, because honestly I understand that any government’s policies are politically and economically driven and thus bound to be hypocritical, but tonight’s celebration of American moral leadership pushed me over the edge. One might support the American attack on Libya, and I can understand the reasons you would, but please don’t believe for a second that it had anything to do with “US values” or that the US is operating on “behalf of what’s right.” I also think it’s an enormous stretch to claim, as Phil did, that the US is building an “international coalition around the principle of human rights in the Middle East.” (to counter one only has to look at Bahrain, Yemen, Ivory Coast, etc.) I think the most favorable reading of the situation is the the US intervened on behalf of close allies in Europe who were frightened of a massive refugee crisis if Qaddafi began completely massacring his opponents. Rather than fighting in defense of human rights, it seems the US is yet again building an international coaltion to punish its enemies while ignoring the transgressions of its allies.
And of course there’s Israel. Read this passage from tonight’s speech and see if you can see the one small change I made:
Innocent people were targeted for killing. Hospitals and ambulances were attacked. Journalists were arrested, sexually assaulted, and killed. Supplies of food and fuel were choked off. The water for hundreds of thousands of people in [Gaza City] was shut off. Cities and towns were shelled, mosques destroyed, and apartment buildings reduced to rubble. Military jets and helicopter gunships were unleashed upon people who had no means to defend themselves against assault from the air.
The only part that I’m not sure is accurate is whether journalists were sexually assaulted in Gaza.
The bald faced hypocrisy of Obama’s glorious speechifying, while continuing to provide complete diplomatic cover for Israel, is criminal. I see no reason to believe, as Phil wrote, that “Obama is conscious of [his speech’s] Palestinian application.” Actually, he might be conscious of it, but doesn’t mean he will do a damn thing about it. When it comes to its allies, the US government is most interested in maintaining the status quo until it becomes untenable. This was the “hinge” that we saw in Egypt from the administrationt’s perspective. It didn’t involve the US embracing international law or the grievances of the Egyptian people, but instead it was the US understanding that Mubarak was out and that it had get aligned with the new power players in Egypt. When it comes to Israel/Palestine, the US is still all chips in (to the tune of $3 billion a year) on the side of Israel, and it doesn’t seem that Obama’s newfound appreciation for human rights will alter that ledger anytime soon (and that’s why it’s up to civil society to make the status quo untenable, but that’s a different post).
Ironically, Obama offered the following warning tonight against inaction in the case of Libya, “The writ of the UN Security Council would have been shown to be little more than empty words, crippling its future credibility to uphold global peace and security.” Strong stuff. It echoes very closely one of the warnings offered by the authors of the Goldstone Report on the danger of ignoring the need for accountability for the fighting during Operation Cast Lead, “To deny modes of accountability reinforces impunity, and tarnishes the credibility of the United Nation and of the international community.” So far, the Obama administration has done much more to tarnish the credibility of the international community than it has to uphold global peace and security. Tonight’s speech may have tried to blur that reality, but the record speaks for itself.
Noura Erakat: Constructing the prototypical terrorist in America…Guess who?
Mar 28, 2011
annie
This past weekend I had the good fortune to attend an unprecedented two day seminar at Hastings College of Law in San Francisco, Litigating Palestine: Can Courts Secure Palestinian Rights? With indomitable spirit, one of the first speakers, Noura Erakat delivered a presentation “Palestinians in US Federal Courts: Constructing a ‘Terrorist’ Prototype” with such prescience and clarity I approached her at the end of the panel and requested the possibility of posting her speech here. She published her speech over the weekend at Jadaliyya and generously granted us liberty to reprint at our own discretion. I hope everyone takes the time to read the entire article Constructing the Prototypical Terrorist in America: Arab, Muslim, and Palestinian.
Erakat opens with the hate rally in Yorba Linda Community Center, an event Adam covered here earlier this month but takes the discourse to a whole new level deconstructing what it means to be a American National and how, particularly through our longstanding relationship with Israel, Israel is incorporated into that National group status whereas minorities (Arabs, Muslims and in particular Palestinians) remain on the ‘outside’. Unsurprisingly along with them their supporters also emerge as outsiders too.
(all bolded text is my own)
The social construction of race in the US has a rich legacy that has categorized white, black, and non-white others in the creation of an imagined ethno-national American. Several processes work together to construct racial identities, including racial profiling, the deployment of Orientalist tropes, and the distinctions between nationality, citizenship, and identity.[1]
While there is no legal difference between the American citizen and the national, in social practice there exists a hierarchy of citizenship that affords the perceived American national, read as White, a presumption of citizenship as a matter of identity. Membership in the US national fabric is based on feeling or affection to someone else based on kinship or feelings of solidarity/likeness, which excludes racial minorities and diminishes their ability to exercise citizenship as a political or legal matter. Therefore, racial minorities may be entitled to formal rights as citizens but they will not represent the nation as they are excluded from the American body politic, to the contrary “ the consolidation of American identity takes place against them.”[2] Whereas naturalization is supposed to challenge the immutability of racial difference by bestowing insider status to new citizens, such status has only been afforded to European immigrants.[3] Unlike their counterparts, racial minorities are relegated to “second class citizenship.” Moreover the group-making process is one marked by “boundary construction, akin to what sociologists call group-making in the tradition of Weberian social closure.”[4]
Foreign policy plays a key role in this group-making process in two ways. First, it reifies belonging by constructing the “other” whom threatens the coherence of the national body politic. Second, the other is excluded because the “US is particularly prone to displacing its foreign policy conflicts onto the members of its community who are perceived to be affiliated with, or responsible for, the external threat by virtue of their transnational identities.”[5]
While critical race scholars have demonstrated how immigration law, racial profiling policies, and mainstream media portrayals have worked to create a group that others and excludes Arabs and Muslims as menacing threats, intransigently foreign and disloyal—this process has not accounted for Israel’s centrality in the construction of an insider American identity. The US’s long-standing relationship to Israel may have begun as a strategic choice at the height of the Cold War and the ascent of Pan-Arab nationalism, but it has come to constitute a pillar of US identity. The US political establishment- its legislature, executive branch, and judiciary- works in concert to construct the national boundaries that include Israel and exclude those critical of the State and its policies. In light of this, the prototypical terrorist is not only Arab and Muslim, as would be the case in an examination of US-domestic policy only, but also Palestinian. Palestinian in this context meaning all actors posing a threat to Israel regardless of ethnic and national distinctions.
Congress’s response to the settlement row in Spring 2010 exemplifies Israel’s status as “insider,” as opposed to political ally. In the aftermath of Vice President Biden’s embarrassing visit to the Middle East where Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rebuffed the US’s calls to halt settlement expansion scores of Congressional members from both sides of the aisle lined up to chastise the Obama Administration for its public handling of the affair. Despite being the source of US foreign policy, no less than twenty-three members expressed terse disapproval either in press statements or from the House floor. Several dozen other members sent four open letters to the Obama Administration as well. Significantly, the lawmakers’ choice of language mirrors an AIPAC press release dated March 14, 2010 and therefore nearly every member echoed the sentiment that Israel should not be treated like any other country but rather with heightened sensitivity and special treatment. Representative Todd Tiahart described President Obama’s public position as “disrespectful,” and characterized Secretary Clinton’s decision to “openly question” Israeli policies as “inappropriate” as the US has a “moral and strategic obligation to support this beacon of democracy in the Middle East.” (March 13, 2010) No other member better captured the centrality of Israel within the US national identity as did Representive Mike Pence who explained that “[t]he American people consider Israel our most cherished ally and we her closest friend and guardian…[a]s I just told the Prime Minister, I never thought I’d live to see the day that an American administration would denounce the State of Israel for rebuilding Jerusalem…[t]he American people and the American Congress in both parties support the State of Israel.” (March 23, 2010)
The lawmakers’ choice of language and tone both reflects Israel’s insider status and works to construct its critics as threats to US national security. While the description of Israel as the only democracy in the Middle East, works to distinguish Israel from its authoritarian counterparts, it also acts as a marker that others Israel’s Arab and Muslim neighbors. Their written and oral statements condemn the US President in defense of a foreign state; describe their relationship to Israel as moral; describe the US as Israel’s guardian; and affirm the immutability of the US’s relationship to Israel irrespective of circumstances. This behavior is more reflective of a family dispute than a diplomatic affair and works to reify the boundaries circumscribing American national identity wherein Israel enjoys the privileges of inclusion.
In cases adjudicating the Arab-Israeli conflict in which claimants charged Israeli actors with crimes against humanity, federal courts’ undue deference to the executive in its use of the political question, a juridical principle that prevents the judiciary from adjudicating an issue that the Constitution textually commits to another branch of government, doctrine both reflects and establishes Israel’s insider status. In cases arising from a similar context but where the defendants are Palestinian and Arab actors accused of committing terrorist acts, federal courts did not invoke the same juridical prohibitions thereby constructing the “outsider” status of Palestinians.
Legislative and executive action has virtually ensured the success of cases filed against Palestinians. The Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA) refers to a collection of terrorism related provisions that provide US nationals with civil remedies and criminal penalties for acts of international terrorism. The available claims are also actionable by the claimant’s estate, survivors, or heirs. While the ATA’s definition of international terrorism does not limit terrorist actions to non-state actors, Section 2337 of the statute prohibits suits against any state actors. In effect, states cannot be held liable pursuant to the ATA with the exception of those “state sponsors of terror” that fall within the framework of the Flatow Amendment, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Cuba, North Korea, and Libya. Coupled with the Palestinian Anti-Terrorism Act the success of ATA suits against Palestinians is nearly guaranteed.
For a breakdown of legislation and court cases supporting the construction this ‘Terrorist’ Prototype”: Constructing the Prototypical Terrorist in America: Arab, Muslim, and Palestinian is a must read. Here’s the finale:
Together all three branches of government have participated in a group-making processs wherein they institutionally equate threats to Israel as terrorist ones and those actors who pose such threat as terrorist, whom I define here as “Palestinian.” Distinctions are erased and all actors are portrayed as terrorists without nuance, let alone applicable definitions of terrorism. This group-making process reflects the treatment of Arabs, Muslims, and Palestinians in the US. Consider then the tone of a Detroit law enforcement officer described by an attorney representing Arab Americans: ‘it was the stated opinion of the FBI that every single Arab in Dearborn is either a member of Hezbollah or a sympathizer.” US law enforcement officers consider Arab-Americans in Dearborn as potential security threats because of their presumed affinity to Hezbollah which has never attacked the US or it citizens but instead directed its militancy at Israel which had been an occupying power in Lebanon until 2000. Would the same hysteria exist about the Chechen rebels against Russia or Albanians in Serbia? Despite their Muslim identity, they may not be raced in the same way because they do not pose a threat to an entity that has been granted insider status and constructed as part of the ethno-national imaginary of the “true American.” The Palestinian, as an identity characterized by antagonism towards Israel, is disloyal precisely because Israel is constructed as part of the US fabric, and opposition to the State or its policies equates to being with “them” against an American “us.”
Noura Erakat is a Palestinian human rights attorney and activist. She is currently an adjunct professor of international human rights law in the Middle East at Georgetown University and is the US-based Legal Advocacy Coordinator for Badil Center for Palestinian Refugee and Residency Rights. Most recently she served as Legal Counsel for a Congressional Subcommittee in the House of Representatives, chaired by Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich. She has helped to initiate and organize several national formations including Arab Women Arising for Justice (AMWAJ) and the U.S. Palestinian Community Network (USPCN). Her publications include: “Litigating the Arab-Israeli Conflict: The Politicization of U.S. Federal Courts” in the Berkeley Law Journal of Middle Eastern and Islamic Law, “Arabiya Made Invisible: Between the Marginalization of Agency and the Silencing of Dissent” in a Syracuse Press anthology, and “BDS in the USA: 2001-2010,” in the Middle East Report.
Israeli prof says Israel is committing suicide like Germany– and lobby ‘coerced’ Obama to go along
Mar 28, 2011
Philip Weiss
This commentary was published by Haaretz in Hebrew, “No to Boycott, Yes to Suicide,” by Moshe Shoked a professor emeritus of anthropology at Tel Aviv University. He responds to the boycott bill, which would make it a crime to push for boycott of Israeli institutions. Excerpts, focusing on the German analogy.
The Knesset is entitled to believe that the entire world is against us, and make laws in that spirit, but in the Middle East’s only democracy, one is still allowed to argue that the state is committing suicide.
It is hard not to recall the 1930s and 1940s, when another great nation took its own life under a mad vision of border expansion. And the most terrible aspect of this is that before Berlin was destroyed, Germany’s leaders, as well as the majority of its citizens, had not turned their backs on the insanity of the Greater Germany dream. Like the postcards circulated by the protagonists of Hans Fallada’s book, “Alone in Berlin”, my articles, and articles written by others, are disturbing the peace of the real patriots, the believers in the divine promise to Abraham, those who distort the lessons of the Holocaust, and the silent majority sheepishly following the vacuous, frightening slogans of the right wing.
…As part of the nationalist education at our schools, we lead our youth on expeditions to the killing furnaces of Poland, for the upkeep of the belief in our right way, and we lead them on visits to the tombs of our ancient patriarchs in Nablus and Hebron, to reaffirm the mythological right.
We have managed to coerce US President Barack Obama into making a fool of himself for us, in front of the whole world. Who will not believe now that the world is indeed ruled by Elders of Zion languishing on heaps of dollars, which serve them in the moving and shaking of the globe? Who will not look forward eagerly to the day when the Jewish lobby’s power is eroded, and its “Zionist extension”, guarding its patriarchs’ tombs is left abandoned, exposed to the vengeance of its enemies?
Translated by Ofer Neiman.
JNF feeling the heat over Al Araqib
Mar 28, 2011
Adam Horowitz
The Jewish National Fund is starting to respond to the critics over its shameful role in the ongoing repeated destruction of the Bedouin village Al Araqib. This is from an email newsletter the JNF’s CEO, Russell Robinson, sent out today:
On my most recent trip to Israel I met with one of the Bedouin of Al Arakib, their lawyer, and a rabbi, all of whom have been very vocal in their tirade against JNF. While the situation of the Bedouin in the Negev remains a complicated one, I can tell you one simple thing: no other organization is doing anywhere near as much as JNF is to help enhance the quality of life for this population. Many complain, many protest, many write petitions, many make noise, but JNF is consistently pushing the projects that will do more for this population than any other NGO on the ground or in cyberspace.
In the same newsletter Robinson also addressed a campaign targeting the JNF being organized by the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network. For some odd reason this section was labelled “For Your Eyes Only”:
Anti-JNF Protest: The International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJAN) along with other organizations has called for March 30, 2011 to be a BDS (Boycott, Divest, Sanction) day against Israel. The IJAN has also threatened to picket JNF/KKL offices around the world on this same day. According to ADL, the IJAN seeks to facilitate global anti-Israel activity on the part of anti-Zionist Jews. Since its inception, IJAN chapters around the U.S. have co-sponsored and endorsed numerous anti-Israel demonstrations and have advanced boycott efforts against Israel, including organizing campaigns to pressure celebrities to cancel planned visits to Israel. We take these protests and your safety seriously. It is important to say at the outset that there is nothing to indicate these protests will be anything other than peaceful; however, even peaceful protests require that we have a plan, which we do to ensure the security of our staff around the country.
You can learn about the IJAN campaign at www.stopthejnf.org and sign the call to action here. Among other things, the campaign is calling for organizations working with the JNF, and especially those with environmental and anti-racist mandates (such as the Arava Institute), to break ties with the organization.
Also, Max Blumenthal has been all over the Jewish National Fund/Al Araqib story and he has been encouraging people to leave comments about Al Araqib on the JNF’s Facebook page and to support Jewish Voice for Peace’s campaign to tell the JNF No More Demolished Villages. You can find the number to your nearest JNF office on the JVP website, along with a sample call script.
The JNF is clearly on the defensive. The newsletter ends with with a sense of panic, promising the organization’s supporters that the JNF “is not hiding inside its Blue Box or under our trees.” To fight back they are:
planning to issue positive statements about our work; ask the community to sign an open letter to Hilary Clinton, U.S. Secretary of State; join the national “Buy Israel Goods (BIG) Day”, plant trees, host JNF meetings, contact members of congress, change your Facebook status and share Israel’s and JNF’s positive message.
I think they’ll have to do more than change a Facebook status to turn the tide on this one.
Nearly half of Israeli Jews support settler ‘price tag’ attacks against Palestinians
Mar 28, 2011
Kate
Poll: 46% in favor of ‘price tag’
Ynet 28 Mar — Ynet-Gesher survey conducted after Itamar massacre shows nearly half of Jewish public believes extreme rightists’ actions against Palestinians are justified … While most seculars oppose “price tag” activities (36% in favor, 57% against), most traditional, national-religious and ultra-Orthodox Jews believe these actions are justified (55%, 70% and 71%, respectively) … About 76% of the seculars and 66% of the traditional Jews believe the rabbis have the power to prevent the “price tag” activities, while the national-religious and haredim say the rabbis are incapable of doing so.
46% of Jewish Israelis support settler “price tag” terror, Congress blames Palestinians for incitement / Max Blumenthal
The one-two punch of settler “price tag” attacks carried out under the watch of the army and with the encouragement of state-funded religious nationalist rabbis is common all over the West Bank. Most Jewish Israelis view the army with reverence, and are reluctant to criticize its conduct under any circumstance. And though settler violence is considered a matter of controversy in Israeli society, a new poll shows that a staggering number of Israelis support the pogroms meted out by fanatical settlers against defenseless Palestinians.
And more news from Today in Palestine:
Settler vandalism, harassment reported in south
BETHLEHEM (Ma‘an) — Villagers said ultra-orthodox settlers chopped down dozens of fruit trees in fields belonging to a Palestinian farmer from the southern West Bank village of Husan, in the latest incident of apparent settler vandalism. Jabir Taha Hamamra told Ma‘an that he was surprised Monday morning when he walked into his fields to discover several trees had been chopped down … Destroyed by the vandals, Hamamra said, were 25 olive trees, two almond trees, one fig tree, and four walnut trees.
In Yatta, a collection of towns in the southern West Bank, dozens of settlers were reported to have assaulted a group of shepherds east of the population center. Israeli military patrols were seen nearby the group, which gathered in the Al-Bweib agricultural area.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=373048
Settler car strikes child near Hebron
HEBRON (Ma‘an) 28 Mar — For the third time in the past month, an Israeli settler driving in the West Bank struck a Palestinian south of Hebron, but [this time] did not drive away. Though the first two incidents were hit-and-runs, Monday’s accident saw the settler remain in the area until police arrived and initiated an investigation. The incident occurred near Tarama village west of Hebron early in the morning, as the as yet unidentified young girl was on her way to school.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=372980
Land, property, resources theft and destruction / Ethnic cleansing
Beit Ummar to be fenced in from south
HEBRON (Ma‘an) 27 Mar 22:04 — For a third day in a row, Israeli forces appeared in large numbers around the southern West Bank town of Beit Ummar, installing road gates and fence posts in a move residents fear will close them in and stifle the population center. Local activist Mohammad Ayyad Awad … said the installations were part of Israeli military preparations to fence the town in, and prevent residents from accessing the surrounding areas … According to his observations, Awwad said the fence would stretch 150 meters along the town’s southern flank, closing it off from the Bethlehem-Hebron road, and would have a height of at least seven meters. Metal gates, he added, were being installed on the street leading from the town to the cemetery. Last week a settler opened fire on Beit Ummar residents at a funeral procession as they walked to the cemetery, injuring two, one critically.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=372901
Arrest raid targets Beit Ummar, 14 detained
HEBRON (Ma‘an) 28 Mar 16:30 — Israeli forces detained 14 Palestinians overnight from the southern West Bank town of Beit Ummar, as construction of military road blocks and a fence surrounding one side of the residential area continue. Local activist Muhammad Ayyad Awad estimated that 150 Israeli soldiers entered the town during the campaign, which began at 2:30 a.m., as soldiers entered homes with sniffer dogs and took residents. Twelve of the 14 taken were identified, seven of them under the age of 18, one of whom was only 15 years old … In the early morning hours, as workers tried to leave the town via the bus and service taxi station at the southeastern entrance of the area, Awwad said, confrontations erupted. The activist said Israeli forces were preventing buses and taxis from collecting passengers, stranding workers in the town.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=372965
Day after evacuation, Bedouin get demolition notes
TUBAS (Ma‘an) 28 Mar — A third set of warnings was delivered to the Bedouin of ‘Ein Al-Hilwa on Monday morning, notifying residents that their tent homes and animal shelters would be demolished. The herding community lives next to Al-Malih, a village whose nearest neighbor is a site declared as an Israeli military training ground, in the northern Jordan Valley. The entire valley-area has recently included in a list of areas where control would not be handed over if a Palestinian state were created in the West Bank and Gaza.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=373002
3 demolition orders issued in Samra
28 Mar 06:49 — Early this morning, the occupational Civil Administration came to Samra community, in the Northern Jordan Valley, to give 3 Bedouin families demolition orders. Abed Awad Daraghmeh, Mayoub Mohamad Amer and Fozi Abed Awad Daraghmeh were given only three days to remove their houses and leave the area, after what the army will come to destroy the houses. Samra is a small community located between Hadidiya and ‘Ein Il Hilwe, two villages that receive constant occupation aggression and displacement.
http://www.jordanvalleysolidarity.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=201:3-demolition-orders-issued-in-samra&catid=15:2010&Itemid=21
Military jeep set alight with Molotov in ‘Ein Aluza
Silwan, Jerusalem (SILWANIC) 28 Mar 01:07 — Eyewitnesses have reported that a Molotov cocktail was hurled at a military jeep in the ‘Ein Aluza district of Silwan tonight, with Israeli forces responding with heavy barrages of gas and sound bombs. Residents in the area also claim to have heard the sound of live ammunition. No injuries have been reported as yet.
http://silwanic.net/?p=14087
Clashes in ‘Ein Silwan Street
Silwan, Jerusalem (SILWANIC) 28 Mar 18:15 — Clashes have erupted in ‘Ein Silwan Street between Palestinian youth and Israeli forces stationed at settler-occupied properties on the edge of Wadi Hilweh district. Israeli forces have fired tear gas grenades at the youth, who have responded by throwing stones and shouted messages against the settlement and demolition policies in Silwan.
http://silwanic.net/?p=14100
Druze keep tabs on Syria unrest
Ynet 28 Mar — The residents of the village of Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights became Israeli residents overnight. Ever since that moment, 44 years ago, many have dreamt of the day they would go back to living under Syrian sovereignty. The recent whirlwind sweeping through Syria – and the biggest challenge Bashar Assad has had to face since taking power 11 years ago – has raised many speculations among family members living on the other side of the border.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4048856,00.html
Israel builds town to ensure the Arabs won’t rear their heads / Roi Maor
28 Mar — The State of Israel is building a town in the country’s north. Its purpose: to make sure “the Arabs won’t rear their heads” and to “put them in proportion.” Anybody objecting to this goal should “go live with the Palestinians” and is “harming Israel’s security.”
http://972mag.com/israel-builds-town-to-ensure-the-arabs-wont-rear-their-heads/
Interview: Mapping the disappearance of a nation / Adri Nieuwhof
28 Mar — Malkit Shoshan’s The Atlas of the Conflict — Israel-Palestine won the annual book design competition in the “Best Books from all over the World” category at the Leipzig Book Fair in Germany on 18 March. To produce the book, Shoshan, an Israeli architect and designer who was brought up in a Zionist context, painstakingly mapped the creation of Israel, which erased Palestine in the process. The atlas is the result of her determination to understand the full scale of the creation of one nation and the disappearance of another.
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article11881.shtml
Activism / Solidarity / Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions
VIDEO: Is Nuri El Okbi a Bedouin version of Australia’s indigenous land rights campaigner Eddie Mabo? / Amos Roberts
28 Mar — Professor John Sheehan, an Australian authority on native title compensation, certainly thinks he could be. [‘terra nullius’ (‘nobody’s land’), mentioned in the article, is the doctrine which allowed the whites to claim what is now Australia] He’s currently helping Nuri in his struggle to reclaim land taken from his family by the Israeli authorities 60 years ago. Despite living in the Negev Desert for hundreds of years, long before modern-day Israel was even formed, Bedouin who want to live on their ancestral land are being accused by Israel of ‘trespassing’ … The Israeli government says the Bedouin do not qualify as indigenous people, and it’s just enforcing laws it inherited from the British and the Ottomans WATCH
[You might also want to watch the Aboriginal group Yothu Yindi and their video “Treaty Now” about their land rights struggle, which was partly successful. Their lead singer was Australian of the Year in 1993, and the song ‘Treaty Now’ hit #1. So success can happen… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7cbkxn4G8U ]
http://www.israeli-occupation.org/2011-03-28/al-arakib-is-nuri-el-okbi-a-bedouin-version-of-australias-indigenous-land-rights-campaigner-eddie-mabo/
Mighty Israel and its quest to quash Palestinian popular protest / Amira Hass
Haaretz 28 Mar — The military has delegated its best soldiers, investigators and judges to safeguarding Israel against the organizer of Nabi Saleh’s popular uprising … We met several times in the past two weeks – in Ramallah, not in Nabi Saleh. Facing the suppression of that village’s weekly demonstrations is a challenge best reserved for the experienced. Huge quantities of tear gas, rubber-coated bullets flying between buildings, gas canisters with (illegally) extended ranges, beatings, shovings and home invasions – this is what the Israel Defense Forces employs against the small village of 500. Since the demonstrations began in 2009, 155 of the residents have been injured, 40 percent of whom are children. Thirty-five houses have been damaged in the process of dispersing demonstrations, and seven caught fire.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/features/mighty-israel-and-its-quest-to-quash-palestinian-popular-protest-1.352248
16 Israeli activists detained in south Hebron hills
[with photo] AIC 28 Mar — Recent weeks have been characterized by ever increasing cooperation between Israeli settlers and the army. This cooperation was forged in order to conduct an ongoing attack on Palestinians throughout the entire West Bank using violence, shooting, vandalism and the sowing of fear … In response to this situation, activists from Ta’ayush and Solidarity Sheikh Jarrah conducted a protest and solidarity action in the south Hebron Hills this past Saturday, 26 March … Almost immediately the soldiers began detentions, detaining 16 activists, both women and men. The detentions were forceful and violent, and some of the detainees were beaten while all were handcuffed.http://www.alternativenews.org/english/index.php/topics/hebron/3461-16-israeli-activists-detained-in-south-hebron-hills-protest-
On Land Day, 30 March 2011, join international efforts to stop the Jewish National Fund
IOA 29 Mar — The Palestinian BDS National Committee has called for a Global Day of Action to commemorate Palestinian Land Day. Palestinian Land Day is the annual commemoration of the 1976 general strike and marches against massive land expropriation by Israel in which six Palestinians were killed and hundreds of others were jailed and wounded. Since then it has been a day to recall many decades of Palestinian resistance to historic and on-going displacement and dispossession. A key pillar of the colonization of Palestine — from the founding of the State of Israel to the present — has been the … Jewish National Fund (JNF). The JNF enjoys charity status in over 50 countries. This is despite its role in the on-going displacement of indigenous Palestinians from their land, the theft of their property, the funding of historic and present-day colonies, and the destruction of the natural environment. (Download the Stop the JNF Campaign fact sheet)
http://www.israeli-occupation.org/2011-03-28/on-land-day-30-march-2011-join-international-efforts-to-stop-the-jewish-national-fund/
Join new campaign to boycott Israeli diamonds
AIC 27 Mar — Global Palestine Solidarity has launched a petition urging the Kimberley Process to widen its definition of conflict diamonds to include all diamonds that fund human rights violations. Israeli economist Shir Hever: “Diamond industry funds Israel’s war machine with some US $1 billion yearly.”
http://www.alternativenews.org/english/index.php/topics/economy-of-the-occupation/3456-join-new-campaign-to-boycott-israeli-diamonds-
Swiss rights group to protest Peres visit to the country
GENEVA, (PIC) 28 Mar — More than 20 human rights groups in Switzerland will gather in Geneva on Monday to protest a visit by Israeli President Shimon Peres to the country. They have been working to prosecute Peres over war crimes he committed in the 2008-2009 war on Gaza.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k%2bc
IOF
Israeli forces enter Nablus overnight
NABLUS (Ma‘an) 28 Mar — Despite a total security hand-over to Palestinian Authority forces in early 2010, an Israeli military patrol entered Nablus Monday morning, making a tour of the center and Old City. Palestinian sources in the city said no detentions were reported.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=372981
Soldier suspected of humiliating Palestinian kids
Ynet 28 Mar — Videos found in staff-sergeant’s phone show Palestinian children being ordered to act out movements to popular Israeli children’s song, army says. Additional photos show soldier pointing rifle at blindfolded man’s head — Military Police are holding a criminal investigation against a soldier suspected of recording Palestinians in humiliating situations, Ynet learned Monday … An indictment against R. is forthcoming. Military Police say they have succeeded in finding the Palestinian man shown in the photos and that they would soon question him, but that the children in the videos have not yet been found.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4048907,00.html
One-day-old Palestinian baby inspected at checkpoint
JENIN, 27 Mar (WAFA) – A Palestinian one-day old baby was inspected and forced through X-ray search by Israeli forces stationed in a checkpoint at Barta‘a al-Sharqiya, a village northwest of Jenin, north of the West Bank. Mohammad Omrah, the baby’s father, was escorting his wife and newborn back from the hospital one day after the birth in his car, but they were held back for over an hour under the rain at the checkpoint … He continued “after putting the baby through the X-ray device, they held us outdoors in the cold and rain. My wife was forced to leave the car for inspection, although she had had a caesarean operation the day before. She was also held for half an hour before we were allowed to pass.”
http://www.uruknet.info/?new=76277
Gaza attacks
Bombing of Khuza‘a facilities
[with photos] ISM 26 Mar — Khuza‘a is a village located in the southern Gaza Strip, in the Khan Younis governorate, near the border with Israel. It is a quiet place inhabited mainly by farmers. On the night of March 21st a warehouse used by the local authority to maintain vehicles and materials needed to provide essential services to citizens was bombed and destroyed … The house of the family of Samir an-Najjar is adjacent to the bombed site. The bomb destroyed the shack where they kept four sheep killing them all, it also created cracks in some of the columns and supporting walls, and destroyed the septic tank. Half a day after being destroyed by the bomb the septic tank was filled with earth to create a passage in the midst of the debris to one of six children, shot in the head by a bullet during the Israeli attack Operation Cast Lead and confined to a wheelchair. During the night of the bombing the family needed to go to hospital where sedatives were administered to the daughter in shock. The night after the bombing the children were crying in their sleep and waking up with horrible nightmares.
http://palsolidarity.org/2011/03/17188/
Israel warns Palestinians against rocket attacks
JERUSALEM (AP) 28 Mar — Israel’s prime minister is warning Gaza militants of a military retaliation if they resume firing rockets at southern Israeli communities. Benjamin Netanyahu says it must be clear that Israel will not tolerate “a drizzle of rockets and missiles” on its cities.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110328/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_palestinians
‘Israel’s response to rocket fire too soft’
Ynet 28 Mar — IDF officers avoid criticizing government but claim Israel may pay the price for the way it chose to respond to the firing of rockets from Gaza. Hamas has emerged stronger from the recent conflict, some officers say … “After Operation Cast Lead a very clear equation was created whereby the IDF responds disproportionately to any violation of the state of calm. This was the way and the message was conveyed to the other side,” one officer said. “Ever so often there were attempts to test us but a harsh response together with deterrence achieved by the operation had sent the message until the next time.”
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4048579,00.html
Iron Dome system deployed in south but might not stay
Haaretz 28 Mar — The army deployed its Iron Dome anti-missile defense system for the first time yesterday, temporarily positioning one battery north of Be’er Sheva just as the Negev had its first day free of rocket or mortar fire in more than a week. The Israel Defense Forces is planning on keeping its two anti-missile batteries mobile for now, leaving open the possibility of stationing them on the northern border as well as in the south.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/iron-dome-system-deployed-in-south-but-might-not-stay-1.352203
Siege
OPT: UNRWA hobbled by unwieldy customs procedures on Gaza border
RAMALLAH, 28 Mar (IRIN) – Israeli trucker Nazar Zarro hoists himself up into the cab of his articulated lorry loaded with emergency flour supplies bound for UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) food distribution centres in the Gaza Strip. Zarro makes the 100km trip from Israel’s Ashdod port to Kerem Shalom crossing – where the borders of Gaza, Israel and Egypt meet – five days a week. The emergency flour rations will be loaded and unloaded eight times – part of a complex system of Israeli security procedures – until they reach food insecure families in Gaza.
http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=92300
US surgeons land in the Gaza Strip for charity work
GAZA, (PIC) 28 Mar — The Shuhada al-Aqsa hospital in Gaza has received a delegation of American surgical specialists from the University of California in a bid to cover some of the medical deficit in the besieged Gaza Strip. The urologists are scheduled to remain in the Strip to carry out advanced surgical operations over the next five days and have already taken necessary tests ahead of the operations.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k%2bc
Gaza crossing
GAZA (Ma‘an) — Israel informed Palestinian liaison officers at the last operating Gaza crossing that 210-220 truckloads of goods would be permitted into the coastal enclave on Monday … UN monitors have said the current import level is at some 40 percent of what imports were before Israel imposed its siege on Gaza.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=372944
Goods: needs vs. supply Feb 26-Mar 27
Industrial fuel: need vs. supply Feb 26-Mar 27
Detention
Knesset merges 4 bills pertaining to Hamas prisoners’ rights
The Knesset’s Internal Affairs Committee has decided to merge four bills dealing with Hamas prisoners rights in order to advance the release of captive soldier Gilad Shalit. During the meeting, the soldier’s grandfather, Zvi Shalit, asked MK Danny Danon not to dub the bill “the Shalit bill” and asked it only be implemented after Gilad’s release.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4048824,00.html
IPS refuses to remove Palestinian prisoner’s tumor
GAZA, (PIC) 27 Mar — The Israeli Prison Service (IPS) has refused to remove a cancerous growth from a Palestinian man held in the Gilboa prison, the Tadhamon international rights group has reported. Tariq al-Aasi from the Balata refugee camp east of Nablus was diagnosed with colon cancer two years ago and has since suffered from a lack of hemoglobin and weight loss, Tadhamon researcher Ahmed al-Beitawi said.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k%2
Militias loyal to Abbas detain municipality chief
NABLUS, (PIC) 28 Mar — Security militias loyal to de facto Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas detained Omar Eshtiye, the head of the municipal council of Til village in Nablus, locals reported. They said that Eshtiye was summoned for interrogation but was taken into custody when he showed up.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k%
Call for action: April 17th Palestinian Prisoners Day
The International Solidarity Movement (ISM) Gaza calls for a global day of action to draw attention to Palestinian political prisoners who are illegally detained in Israel. April 17th marks the Palestinian Prisoners Day, a day in commemoration of the 5834 Palestinians who are currently (as of February 1st, 2011) held in Israeli prisons. No less than 221 of them are children and 798 of them are serving life sentences. We call upon you to organize events on April 17th or during that week in your countries to oppose Israel’s numerous violations of human rights and international law concerning Palestinian prisoners.
http://palsolidarity.org/2011/03/17230/
Occupied Palestine from A to Z: Canaan of Palestine / Reham Alhelsi
27 Mar — “Ya Abu Nidal, lahhiq ibnak, lahhiq darak, hurry up, the soldiers are raiding your home and want to take your son Nidal.” A neighbour came running to tell Canaan who was ploughing the land and tending the olive and almond trees. In a matter of seconds, Abu Nidal was running all the way down the hill towards the village and his home. Neighbours, relatives and other villagers were standing outside his home, some trying to talk to the Israeli occupation soldiers
http://www.uruknet.info/?new=76282
Refugees
Majority of Palestinian voices still being ignored / Rich Wiles
27 Mar — At the heart of Palestine’s struggle is the refugee case, which remains almost a taboo subject in many forums including in the seemingly endless and fruitless ‘Peace Process’, which seems on the verge of what one can only hope is a final collapse. Time and again, in speeches and in op-eds around the world, ‘pro-Palestinian’ commentators speak of ‘over 40 years of Occupation’ as if the unjust colonial appropriation of 78% of Palestinian land pre-1967 were somehow morally different from the occupation of the remainder of Palestine. Similarly, the estimated three quarters of a million Palestinians who were ethnically cleansed from their homes during al-Nakba and the 7 million or so Palestinians who were born as refugees following these events are treated as political lepers whose insistence upon their rights, including the Right of Return,is regarded as quixotic and even malicious.
http://www.uruknet.info/?new=76268
Racism / Discrimination / Repression of dissent
New bill takes aim at leftist groups
Ynet 28 Mar — Likud MKs propose that any group petitioning High Court must present list of donors from past three years. ‘Judges can now be sure hostile groups won’t make their way into court under guise of public-interest,’ they write
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4048650,00.html
Hebrew University to discipline students for screening Jenin, Jenin film
AIC 27 Mar — The board of Hebrew University summoned representatives of the university’s Hadash Party to a hearing before the Dean of Students last week. The hearing was for Hadash’s screening of the film Jenin, Jenin, and is yet another act by Hebrew University in actively collaborating in Israel’s repression of the Palestinian people.
http://www.alternativenews.org/english/index.php/topics/news/3458-hebrew-university-to-discipline-students-for-screening-jenin-jenin-film-
Zuabi: Revoking my parliamentary privileges is political persecution
Haaretz 28 Mar — Knesset voted to revoke Arab MK Hanin Zuabi’s privileges after she participated in Gaza aid flotilla last year; High Court debates petition submitted by Zuabi to have her privileges reinstated.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/zuabi-revoking-my-parliamentary-privileges-is-political-persecution-1.352331
Media
Israel, right or wrong / Paul Balles
26 Mar — A staunch defender of anything Israel does, the Washington Post’s Richard Cohen feeds Jewish paranoia, distorts Palestinian history and attacks Israel’s critics.
http://www.intifada-palestine.com/2011/03/israel-right-or-wrong/
Politics / International
Abbas would give up US aid for Palestinian unity
RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) 28 Mar — An aide to the Palestinian president says Mahmoud Abbas is making a heavy push for reconciliation with Hamas and is willing to give up hundreds of millions of dollars in U.S. aid if that’s what it takes to forge a Palestinian unity deal. [and the large amount in EU aid?]
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110328/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_palestinians_reconciliation
Fatah: Abbas awaiting Hamas response
RAMALLAH (Ma‘an) — There has yet to be a response from Hamas following a meeting between party members and President Mahmoud Abbas on Saturday, member of the Fatah central committee Nabil Sha‘th told Ma‘an … Abbas, who leads the Fatah party, met with Hamas officials to discuss a proposed trip to Gaza and efforts to mend internal Palestinian division by way of the formation of a unity government.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=373027
Abbas moves on PLO constitution amendments
RAMALLAH (Ma‘an) 28 Mar — President Mahmoud Abbas asked the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization to convene the body’s Constitution Committee, government news agency WAFA reported. He advised the committee that it should draw up amendments to the PLO charter by the end of September.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=373078
Report: Turkey brokering Hamas-Israel truce
TEL AVIV (Ma‘an) 27 Mar — An Israeli news site quoted official sources saying that Turkey has been brokering a limited truce between Palestinian factions in Gaza and Israel, in a bid to put an end to recent border escalations. Israeli news website Inyan Merkazi said the Turkish Prime Minister himself was heading the negotiations, saying a meeting with Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Gaza resistance leaders and Israeli officials was held on Saturday.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=372869
Israel questions Argentina over Buenos Aires attacks
BBC 27 Mar — Israel has demanded an explanation from Argentina over reports it proposed to Iran it would stop investigating two bombings if trade ties improved. Argentina, Israel and the US have blamed Iran for the bombings of the Israeli embassy and a Jewish community centre in Buenos Aires in the 1990s. Iran has denied involvement in the bombings
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12876932
Swiss president announces plan to break Gaza siege
GAZA, (PIC) 23 Mar — Swiss President Micheline Calmy-Rey has announced her country is developing a project to open up all crossings to the Gaza Strip, which has been suffocating for the last five years from an Israeli blockade. She also said if Egypt would agree to open the Rafah crossing to bring in building materials and commodities, her country would be ready to restore it. The statements came Monday during a meeting with several high-profile politicians in Europe staged by the European-Palestinian relations council. [have not seen this story confirmed independently of the Hamas site PIC]
http://www.veteranstoday.com/2011/03/24/swiss-president-announces-plans-to-break-gaza-siege/
Iraq
Sunday: 11 Iraqis killed, 18 wounded
At least 11 Iraqis were killed and 18 more were wounded in attacks across the country. In Baghdad, a bomb exploded near a food ration warehouse in Iskan, wounding nine people. One person was killed and three others were wounded in a blast in Yarmouk. A person was wounded during a blast in Jihad. A sticky bomb wounded four in Qadisiya. In Mosul, seven people were killed in a home invasion. Gunmen killed a man during a drive-by shooting. One policeman was wounded in a grenade attack. Police liberated two children and arrested their kidnappers. Gunmen killed a police colonel late last night in Ramadi. In Kut, the body of a policeman was found. Two al-Qaeda cells were captured in Babel province.
http://original.antiwar.com/updates/2011/03/27/sunday-11-iraqis-killed-18-wounded/
U.S.
“A story about lost and broken things”: Mohammad Jawad, a child in Guantánamo, and the lawyer who fought for him / Andy Worthington
27 Mar — Every now and then, someone in the mainstream media cuts through the general — and shameful — indifference about Guantánamo, publishing a powerful story that should change hearts and minds. This is the case with a feature in the latest issue of GQ by Michael Paterniti about one of the more notorious cases of cruelty at Guantánamo — that of the teenage prisoner Mohammed Jawad, released in August 2009 — although it will probably do no more than awaken a few more people to the gross injustices perpetrated at Guantánamo, and elsewhere in the “War on Terror,” by the Bush administration.
http://www.uruknet.info/?new=7626
