Saturday, June 30, 2012

Israel :Yitzhak Shamir Dies At 96 (Former Israeli Prime Minister)

JERUSALEM (AP) — Former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, who clung throughout his life to the belief that Israel should hang on to territory and never trust an Arab regime, has died. He was 96 years old.

Israeli media said he died at a nursing home in Herzliya Saturday, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a statement mourning Shamir’s death.

Shamir served as prime minister for seven years, from 1983-84 and 1986-92, leading his party to election victories twice, despite lacking much of the outward charm and charisma that characterizes many modern politicians....read more

 

Palestine: Israel To Extend Its Sovereignty Of The West Bank.

A confluence of events is increasingly pointing to Israel taking action in the very near future to extend its sovereignty over a substantial part - if not all - of the 61% of the West Bank it has totally controlled since 1967 - unless Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas ends his posturing and submits to considerable loss of face by announcing he is now prepared to resume negotiations with Israel without preconditions of any kind....read more

http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/47704#.T-0DlnL0XDw.twitter

Friday, June 29, 2012

Israel Target Child Of Palestine In Leg Irons.

by Annie Robbins


548033 489556334394620 338336639 n
Defense for Children International Photo:Anne Paq/Activestills.org
Quote

When I first read Joseph Dana's article of last year, "Israeli army targets and arrests children in order to repress Palestinian dissent in the West Bank," it sent chills up my spine, and I was sure that someday, somehow this story would get out onto the world stage. Today we're one step closer.
The Independent's Terri Judd is reporting that the UK is ready to take on Israel over fate of children clapped in irons:...read more

http://mondoweiss.net/2012/06/arrests-of-palestinian-children-a-boy-in-leg-irons-is-becoming-a-big-story-in-uk.html

Israel clears West Bank settlement outpost Ulpana

Source  RT

Israel has finished evacuating some 30 settler families from an illegal West Bank outpost. Police and the military said they encountered little resistance on Friday as the evacuation was carried out in two phases. The second set of families left Ulpana peacefully on Thursday night, AP reports. However, 15 settlers from outside the outpost barricaded themselves inside one apartment to protest the eviction. Israel's Supreme Court earlier ordered that the outpost, built on privately owned Palestinian land, be dismantled by July 1.

Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Israel: Racism, Pure and Simple - Anti-African Hysteria Sweeps Israel.

The second world war started for much less...just in case anyone is interested.
 
 
by URI AVNERY
 
“We shall not be a normal people, until we have Jewish whores and Jewish thieves in the Land of Israel,” our national poet, Haim Nahman Bialik, said some 80 years ago.

This dream has come true. We have Jewish murderers, Jewish robbers and Jewish whores (though most prostitutes in Israel are imported by international slave traders from Eastern Europe through the Sinai border).

But Bialik was too unambitious. He should have added: We shall not become a normal people until we have Jewish Neo-Nazis and Jewish concentration camps.

The central news item nowadays in all our electronic and print media is the terrible danger of “illegal” African migrants....read more

http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/06/15/anti-african-hysteria-sweeps-israel/

Palestine : The U.S. Pay Israel To Abuse The Children Of Palestine.

The Foreign Office revealed last night that it would be challenging the Israelis over their treatment of Palestinian children after a report by a delegation of senior British lawyers revealed unconscionable practices, such as hooding and the use of leg irons.

In the first investigation of its kind, a team of nine senior legal figures examined how Palestinians as young as 12 were treated when arrested. Their shocking report Children in Military Custody details claims that youngsters are dragged from their beds in the middle of the night, have their wrists bound behind their backs, and are blindfolded and made to kneel or lie face down in military vehicles.

Children from the West Bank are held in conditions that could amount to torture, such as solitary confinement, with little or no access to their parents. They can be forced to stay awake before being verbally as well as physically abused and coerced into signing confessions they cannot read.

The team – led by Sir Stephen Sedley, a former Court of Appeal judge – heard that "every Palestinian child is treated like a potential terrorist". In a damning conclusion, the report points out repeated breaches of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which prohibits cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.

"We were sitting in court and saw a section of a preliminary hearing when a very young looking child, a boy, was brought in wearing a brown uniform with leg irons on. We were shocked by that. This was a situation where we had been invited into the military courts for briefings from senior judges," explained one of the report's authors, human rights barrister Greg Davies. "To hold children routinely and for substantial periods in solitary confinement would, if it occurred, be capable of amounting to torture," the report said. Last night the Foreign Office, which backed the report, said it would be taking up the claims with the Israeli authorities:
"The UK government has had long-standing concerns about the treatment of Palestinian children in Israeli detention, and as a result decided to fund this independent report. While recognising that some positive recent steps have been made by the Israeli authorities, we share many of the report's concerns, and will continue to lobby for further improvements."

While the legal team said it was in no position to prove the truth of the claims of cruelty made repeatedly by Palestinian children, but denied by the Israeli authorities – which offered unprecedented access to the delegation – it pointed to the disparity in the law.

Israeli children must have access to a lawyer within 48 hours and cannot be imprisoned under the age of 14. But Palestinian children as young as 12 are jailed and can be kept for three months without legal representation. Between 500 and 700 are jailed each year.

"The other shocking thing is they are incarcerated in breach of many conventions. The practical effect is parents can't get there because they can't get permits," said Marianna Hildyard QC.

While the investigating team welcomed improvements introduced by the Israeli authorities, both Palestinian and Israeli lawyers on the ground insisted much of it was "rhetoric ra ther than real change".

Last night, Israeli Embassy spokesperson Amir Ofek said the country appreciated the efforts of the delegation but blamed Palestinians who "glorify terrorism". He said: "As a result [children] are frequently involved in lethal acts. With the Palestinian Authority unable or unwilling to meet its obligation to investigate and prosecute these offences, Israel has no choice but to do so itself.

"Israel notes the detailed recommendations in the report and will study them closely as part of its ongoing efforts to find the most appropriate balance between preventing violence and treating perpetrators with humanity."

The report details claims children are dragged from their beds, bound and blindfolded


http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/uk-ready-to-take-on-israel-over-fate-of-children-clapped-in-irons-7888914.html

Sunday, June 24, 2012

Flotilla Flaws:Netanyahu Leadership Raises Doubts.

A damning report slamming Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's handling of the 2010 flotilla raid has raised fears over how a strike on Iran would be managed, press reports said on Thursday.

The 153-page report by State Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss dominated the headlines.
Most commentators heaped scathing criticism on Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak for their handling of the raid on the Mavi Marmara, the lead ship of a Gaza-bound flotilla, in which nine Turkish nationals were killed.

Most were quick to point out the deeply-flawed decision-making process exposed in the report raised serious questions about Netanyahu and Barak's ability to make sound decisions on crucial issues like a strike on Iran's nuclear program.

"The state comptroller issued a charge sheet," wrote Shimon Shiffer in the top-selling Yediot Aharonot newspaper.

"It cries out to the prime minister’s bureau that if this is how you manage affairs in an uncomplicated matter like how to stop the Turkish flotilla, who will believe that you will handle things differently while preparing to attack nuclear facilities in Iran?"

Lindenstrauss said there were "significant shortcomings" in the decision-making process which was led by Netanyahu, and accused the premier of failing to hold any structured, formal discussions with a group of top ministers nor with the National Security Council about the handling of the flotilla.

Instead, Netanyahu had held separate, private discussions with Barak and with Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, none of which were documented.

"At least one thing emerges from the state comptroller’s report on the Mavi Marmara that nobody can argue with and that is that we have good reasons to be concerned.. They’re called Netanyahu and Barak," wrote another Yediot commentator, Sima Kadmon.

"If this is what takes place in the most important bureaus in the country in the course of one flotilla... God preserve us from larger events, like bombing Iran, for example."

Netanyahu and Barak are "the two people who will decide whether to attack Iran," she wrote.

"Who can promise us that the decision-making process in that case will be better, that all the questions will be raised, that all the scenarios will be examined, that all the ramifications will be taken into account?"

(AFP)


http://english.al-akhbar.com/content/flotilla-flaws-raise-doubts-netanyahu-leadership-skills?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+AlAkhbarEnglish+%28Al+Akhbar+English%29

Zionist Strategy : Futile Dialogue.

Doc JAZZ.

By Tariq Shadid - The struggle for Palestinian rights has always been operating under tremendous pressure. The Zionist war machine has never ceased its expansionist drift ever since it forced its illegal roots into Palestinian soil in the beginning of the 20th century, and has never changed its modus operandi. It has always paired ruthless military aggression, ethnic cleansing and land theft with a narrative built on misleading euphemisms such as 'progress', 'civilization', 'democracy', 'security' and 'peace'. Never was there a time in the history of the Zionist state when murder and expansion committed in military uniforms was not explained as 'self defense' against 'terrorism', by those smartly clad in expensive suits with matching shirts and ties.


It may be true that dedicated pro-Palestine activists are on to this, and infallibly see through this well-rehearsed charade. Nevertheless, a more insidious front in the war of minds has always been running in the background, that many of them are not always immune to. For the sake of explanation, I shall call it the 'strategy of futile dialogue', and the effects of this Zionist tactic should not too easily be dismissed as irrelevant. After all, public speakers, politicians and activists are prone to succumbing to the confusing effect of that front. They are the ones who help shape public perception of the conflict, which in turn has an effect upon policy-makers all the way up to the echelons of national governments and the United Nations....read more

http://www.docjazz.com/index.php/articles/43-analysis/198-futile-dialogue-zionist-strategy

Sunday, June 17, 2012

Israel OK Attack Dogs As 'Non Lethal' Weapons.

dog attack

Kheirallah (left) and Amira Awad, injured by IDF attack dogs, 2011. (Photo: Musa Abu Hashhash)
Despite reports Thursday that the Israeli Defense Forces suspended using attack dogs against Palestinians, yesterday the military declared they will continue to use the live animals as "non-lethal weapons." The review was prompted after an incident last March when an army dog wrangled the arm of Ahmad Shtawi for 10-minutes, locking his jaw on the Palestinian protester, causing him to be hospitalized.
After the March 16, 2012 attack on Shtawi the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee released an account:....read more


http://mondoweiss.net/2012/06/israeli-army-oks-attack-dogs-as-non-lethal-weapons.html

Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Israel:Surviving Israeli jail - Torture, humiliation and giving birth

Giving birth with hands and feet tied

Samar Isbeh was arrested when she was 22 following a student protest. She was sentenced to 2.5-year term in prison. She is now 28, and lives in Gaza, while her own and her husband’s families live in the West Bank.
“I was arrested three months after my wedding. I was the head of the student council at the Islamic University. We organized a protest against occupation. I was arrested in my husband’s home in Tulkarm. Two days later my husband was arrested too and sentenced to 9 months in prison, although they had nothing to charge him with whatsoever,” says Samar.

Samar Isbeh (Photo: Nadezhda Kevorkova, RT)

Samar Isbeh (Photo: Nadezhda Kevorkova, RT)
She has now been deported to the Gaza Strip and is denied entry to Tulkarm, so she can see neither her husband nor her children.

“I was in my fist weeks of pregnancy when I got arrested. I went through every kind of torture. They tortured me in an underground cell for 66 days. They made me balance on a children’s chair, they kept me in a freezing cold disciplinary cell,” says Samar.

“My hands and feet were tied when I was going through labor. They C-sectioned me, not because I required it but simply out of hatred. They let me have the child but treated him as a prisoner, too. They gave us no milk or diapers, or only expired ones. I was kept in terrible conditions during and after I gave birth. I wasn’t allowed to go out for fresh air. The only medicine they ever gave me and my child for any condition was Paracetamol.” ...read more

http://www.rt.com/news/hunger-strike-israeli-jail-144/

#Israel #Africa: Africans Rounded Up to Be Deported .

 

Israel begins rounding up and interning Africans: Israel said on Monday that it had started rounding up African migrants in the first stage of a controversial "emergency plan" to intern and deport thousands deemed a threat to the Jewish character of the state, Africanglobe.net reports. Israel Radio reported that dozens of Africans, mainly from South Sudan, had already been detained in the Red Sea resort of Eilat, including mothers and children. The Israeli government wants to get rid of "60,000 African migrants, whose numbers are seen by many Israelis as a law-and-order issue and even a threat to the long-term viability of the Jewish state," according to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Thursday, June 7, 2012

Israel: African Concentration Camp For African Refugees In Israel.

http://www.alternativenews.org/english/index.php/news/opinion/4469-israel-declares-hunting-season-open-against-african-refugees-.html

yishai_eli
Israeli Minister of Interior Eli Yishai, whose family hails from the northern African country of Tunisia, has budgeted for creation of a concentration camp for African refugees in Israel (Photo: Knesset website)

Wednesday, June 6, 2012

Israel - AHAVA: London lawyer Takes On Corporation Abetting Israels Crimes.


Simon Natas is a London-based lawyer specializing in criminal defense law and human rights. Natas is involved with the organization Jews for Justice for Palestinians and has defended a number of Palestine solidarity activists, including four who blockaded the cosmetics retailer Ahava’s London flagship store in Covent Garden on two occasions in 2009. Ahava closed the store last September; this decision followed a long series of protests outside the store, which led its landlord to refuse to renew the lease.

The Electronic Intifada contributor Adri Nieuwhof interviewed Natas about the protesters’ case and the role of G4S Israel, a subsidiary of British-Danish security firm G4S, in Israel’s occupation and repression of Palestinians. Meanwhile, G4S won a massive security contract with the London 2012 Summer Olympics worth £200 million ($312.7 million) (“100,000 eye Olympics security jobs with G4S,” The Independent, 15 May 2012)....read more



http://www.bdsmovement.net/2012/london-lawyer-takes-on-corporations-abetting-israels-crimes-9091?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Israel Attacks Gaza. At about 2:00 am, the Israeli Air Force struck:

Original Italian:http://ilblogdioliva.blogspot.co.il/2012/06/attacco-israeliano-su-gaza-3-4-giugno


On the night of June 3, 2012, Israel conducted a series of air raids hitting several areas in the Gaza Strip. At about 2:00 am, the Israeli Air Force struck:

  • an inhabited house in Nuseirat refugee camp, central Gaza Strip. The house was struck by 4 missiles. Seven people were injured including 4 children;
  • an uninhabited area to the west of Nuseirat, in this case the missile has remained unexploded;
  • an uninhabited area between a mosque and a house, always in Nuseirat;
  • a farm in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip;
  • a farm in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza Strip;
  • an uninhabited house in Deir el Balah, in the central Gaza Strip;
The following night, June 4, 2012, the Israeli Air Force struck again several areas in the Gaza Strip:
  • a farm that produces cheese in the Zaitoun, east of Gaza City;
  • an uninhabited area in El Kashif mountain, north of Gaza City.
On June 4, in the morning, I went to visit the house in Nuseirat.  The house is completely destroyed. Two missiles have left two deep holes in the ground. Inside the house, two missiles punctured the ceiling of the bedroom, one of which also went through a wall. Debris and glass were scattered everywhere.

Another home nearby was heavily damaged. Part of the ceiling collapsed on a cot where a little girl of 3 months named Deema was sleeping
.

Video I shot on the spot:



http://youtu.be/9ujPPL-lpGo

Ibrahim Khalil Alfiqi, 23, was alone in the home hit by four missiles.The house was destroyed where he was soon to be living with his wife. In a month they were to hold a party for their wedding. Ibrahim had prepared everything. The bedroom was ready.

He had put a mattress in a room of the house where he was sleeping every night, next to the bedroom. At about 2:00 am, Ibrahim was awakened by a huge explosion. The door of the bedroom fell on him and he was hit by fragments of the ceiling. When he started to move the door to go outside he heard another explosion. He tried to open the outer door but did not succeed. Then he heard another explosion. He pushed the door with force and escaped. He went to the home of his brother Mohammed, next to his, and asked him how he was. He saw the ceiling of the house of his brother damaged.

Deema, the baby girl on whom part of the ceiling collapsed was injured. Ibrahim also saw some cousins ​​wounded. Ibrahim had a bleeding leg. He was transported by ambulance to the hospital together with Deema. Deema, 3 months, was subjected to X-rays and has reported several cuts because of the ceiling collapsed on her body, and a concussion to head due to the impact of the ceiling.

Alive by a miracle.

Ibrahim was wounded by shrapnel from a missile on the leg and bruising due to the impact of the door that fell on him.

Ibrahim then immediately wanted to leave the hospital because his mother was very worried and thought that the little girl was dead.

"I ran away not knowing what had happened in my house - says Ibrahim - then on my return from the hospital I saw that the bedroom was destroyed. Alhamdulilah I said, having survived, but looking at the room I wondered how I would rebuild it again."

Ibrahim has to buy replacements for every thing.  He has to buy windows, to replace the ceiling. Ibrahim earns only between 700 and 800 shekels a month, he can not now buy what the house needs.

His brother Mohammed Khalil Alfiqi, 26, was asleep in the home next door with his wife and two children, Deema, 3 months, and Leen, 3 years.

"It was about 2:00 in the morning - said Mohammed - we were sleeping. Suddenly we heard an explosion near the home of my brother Ibrahim. My brother works as a mechanic, not working for any political party, is a civilian. The celebration of his wedding is set for July 6. He does not have much money, he went into debt to buy everything for his apartment. "

The explosions also damaged the house of Mohammed. His daughter Deema, three months, was sleeping in the crib when the ceiling collapsed on her body. His wife and eldest daughter, Leen, have received medical assistance on site. Deema was instead transported to 'Al-Aqsa hospital in Deir El Balah. Deema reported bruising to the skull, cuts to the arms, stomach, close to one eye and a leg.

Mohammed earns about 1700 shekels a month, and pays university tuition for his wife, claims his father who does not work, and her sisters who are studying at university. Their family is from Swafet.

In total, people injured in this attack are seven: Alfiqi Ibrahim, 23 years; Deema Alfiqi, 3 months; Alfiqui Tareq, 23 years; Jebreel Mohammed, 4 years; Feras Jebreel, 5 years; Jebreel Hussien, 16 years; Wesam Jebreel , 3 years. The last four in that list reported cuts caused by glass and rubble.The family of Mohammed invites me to sit down in the courtyard of the house of Ibrahim, among the rubble.

A relative asks the small Leen, 3 years old, "Who woke you up this morning?", "A bomb," says Leen.

Some families invite me to stay for lunch ... as if it were a normal day.

As if the missiles had not just destroyed their home. As if we were not among the rubble. I remain amazed once again at the power of these people, and they are fascinated and enamored of their reception among the rubble of their eyes, which, despite everything, I smile....read more


http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=31267

Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Tel Aviv: Madonna Flashing SWASTIKA Creates Controversy In Tel Aviv.

Tel Aviv: Red Pepper contributor Ewa Jasiewicz says her recent expulsion from Tel Aviv is indicative of a widespread crackdown on international journalists and human rights activists in Israel

‘I do not recognise the authority of the Israeli judiciary’


Red Pepper contributor Ewa Jasiewicz says her recent expulsion from Tel Aviv is indicative of a widespread crackdown on international journalists and human rights activists in Israel


'We are entering a new stage in [Israel's] escalation towards fascism.' These were the words of Neta Golan, the Israeli co-founder of the direct action anti-occupation organisation the International Solidarity Movement (ISM).

In August 2004 I spent three weeks in an Israeli detention centre after being declared a security threat on entry to the country at Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion Airport. Using secret evidence, Israel's domestic intelligence agency the Shin Bet said I had links with 'terrorist' organisations.

Two court appearances later, it was declared that I wasn't a security threat, only that my naivety could be manipulated to serve terrorist agendas. I was to be allowed into Israel, but not the occupied territories.

But accepting that decision would have set a legal precedent and empowered the Israeli state even further in its agenda to exclude journalists and human rights activists from witnessing and reporting on the reality of Israel's illegal occupation of Palestine. And I do not recognise the authority of a judiciary that condones war crimes, collective punishment, the theft of land, colonisation and the criminalisation and killing of a people who have every right to resist, militarily or otherwise, that occupation.

I could not accept a decision that would allow me access to one territory, one side of the story, and blind me to the other. The appeal was rescinded, and I was kicked out of the country.

Speaking after my deportation, Yael Berda, my Israeli lawyer and herself an activist, said: 'The ability for the Israeli government to categorise journalists as security threats will induce fear and conformity in their work, and that is total anathema to any democracy.'

And elaborating on her description of Israel's increasing authoritarianism, Neta Golan said: 'We can see three stages of repression developing in Israel: the first is the escalating criminalisation of the Palestinians; the second is the targeting and criminalisation of international peace activists; and the third is the criminalisation of Israeli activists.'

Golan's analysis would seem to be confirmed by the case of Tali Fahima. The 29-year-old Israeli befriended one of Israel's most-wanted resistance leaders: Zakaria Zubeidi, the head of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades in Jenin. She has publicly stated that she admires Zubeidi and believes him to be a freedom fighter, and that the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades have every right to resist the occupation militarily.

Fahima was arrested in Jenin on 10 August on suspicion of collaborating with Palestinian 'terror activists' to carry out attacks on Israeli targets. No evidence was offered to support the allegation. She has become the first Israeli human rights activist to be subjected to 'preventative detention': internment without charge or trial, something hitherto reserved for Palestinians.

Golan, who is married to a Palestinian, sees similarities between her situation and that of Fahima: 'Because the Israeli government says all Palestinians are terrorists, anyone with connections with Palestinians can be accused of having links with terrorists.'

Israel's project of silencing and demonising the Palestinian struggle is being corroded by the ISM and advocacy journalists reporting on the truth of the repression and helping to catalyse social relationships between Palestinians and Israelis. It is these relationships, not the possibility of foreign activists and journalists being manipulated by terrorists, that are a threat to the Israeli authorities: they contradict the government's propaganda that peaceful co-existence is impossible.


Ewa Jasiewicz is a Palestine solidarity activist, union organiser and part of the editorial collective of Le Monde Diplomatique Polish Edition.


http://www.redpepper.org.uk/I-do-not-recognise-the-authority/

Monday, June 4, 2012

Gaza Israel: Madonna Whitewashes Israels Crimes Of Occupationn And Apartheid


During her performance in Tel Aviv, Madonna wrapped herself in an Israeli flag and called the country the "energy center of the world." In this touching after-show picture, Madonna is in the arms of Israeli prime minister Netanyahu and his wife.
Some of the world's biggest stars – from Madonna to the Red Hot Chili Peppers – are being accused of putting profit before principle in a growing backlash against artists performing in Israel.
Campaigners angry at human rights abuses against the Palestinian people – symbolised by Israel's policy of demolishing the homes of Palestinians and allowing Israeli settlers to take over their land – are demanding a boycott of Israeli venues in a campaign that echoes the 1980s protests against South Africa and the infamous venue Sun City.

Last week Madonna came under fire for her decision to perform in Israel to kick off her world tour last Thursday. "

By performing in Israel, Madonna has consciously and shamefully lent her name to fig-leafing Israel's occupation and apartheid and showed her obliviousness to human rights," said Omar Barghouti of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel.

Attempts by Madonna to deflect criticism by offering free tickets to local campaigners backfired, with a number rejecting the offer. Boycott from Within, an Israeli campaign group, accused the singer of "a blatant attempt at whitewashing Israeli crimes".

Mr Barghouti added: "As we've learned from the South African struggle for freedom, entertaining Israeli apartheid should never be mislabelled as singing for peace." The star's publicist did not respond to requests for comment.

Acts such as alleged war crimes during Israel's 2008 invasion of Gaza and the 2010 killing of peace activists by Israeli commandos on an aid ship are fuelling the return of an anti-apartheid campaign on a scale not seen in a generation.

Saeed Amireh, 21, a peace activist from Nilin in the West Bank, said: "We don't have freedom of movement. They don't want peace; they just want us to disappear. They are suppressing our very existence."..read more



http://stopwar.org.uk/index.php/palestine-and-israel/1456-madonna-whitewashes-israels-crimes-of-occupation-and-apartheid

Saturday, June 2, 2012

Gaza Israel : Doron Almog Mass Murderer . War Criminal Cancels UK Visit For Fear Of Being Arrested For His War Crimes.

A senior Israeli officer has cancelled a planned visit to Britain fearing arrest for alleged war crimes. Major-General Doron Almog is the ex-commanding officer of the Israel Defence Forces Southern Command. He was invited to a fundraising dinner in London later this month but senior government officials advised him to cancel his trip.

Despite the fact that the British government amended the procedures for the law of universal jurisdiction precisely to prevent such arrests, officials in Israel told Almog that they cannot guarantee that a warrant will not be issued for his arrest. He stands accused of committing war crimes in the Gaza Strip during Operation Cast Lead in 2008/9. More specifically, that he issued the order to raze 59 inhabited houses to the ground in the southern Gaza town of Rafah. Such an act is regarded as collective punishment, which is prohibited in international law.

Almog was also one of the group of officers and politicians who decided to drop a one-ton-bomb on a house in a densely populated area of the Gaza Strip in order to assassinate Salah Shehadi in July, 2002. Fifteen people were killed in the explosion, including nine children; around 150 were injured.

This is not the first time that the major-general is at the centre of such concerns. Seven years ago he was tipped off that a British judge had issued an arrest warrant for him, so he didn't leave the aircraft on which he had arrived at Heathrow Airport, opting instead to fly straight back to Tel Aviv.