10 aug 2017
Yehoshua Elitzur, 44, is getting extradited from Brazil after he fled from Itamar settlement 10 years ago, before his plea hearing for killing two Palestinians Sael Jabara al-Shatiya, east of Nablus, in 2004.
Elitzur was initially accused of murder, but was sentenced to 20 years in prison, in 2005, for manslaughter.
The prosecutor, according to the PNN, couldn’t prove Elitzur’s intention to murder Al-Shatiya. During his plea hearing, Elitzur was confined to house arrest, but managed to flee to Germany and, soon after, to Brazil.
In 2005, Interpol issued an international arrest warrant for Elitzur, who was found and arrested 2 years ago, in Brazil. Now, Brazilian authorities have accepted the request from Israel to extradite him.
Elitzur was initially accused of murder, but was sentenced to 20 years in prison, in 2005, for manslaughter.
The prosecutor, according to the PNN, couldn’t prove Elitzur’s intention to murder Al-Shatiya. During his plea hearing, Elitzur was confined to house arrest, but managed to flee to Germany and, soon after, to Brazil.
In 2005, Interpol issued an international arrest warrant for Elitzur, who was found and arrested 2 years ago, in Brazil. Now, Brazilian authorities have accepted the request from Israel to extradite him.
Former Israeli soldier Elor Azarya began his 18-month prison sentence on Wednesday, for the point-blank shooting and killing of a Palestinian in 2016 — after a last-minute attempt to postpone his incarceration.
Azarya was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to a year and a half in prison, for shooting and killing 21-year-old Palestinian Abd al-Fattah al-Sharif as the disarmed Palestinian lay severely wounded on the ground, after allegedly committing a stabbing attack in the southern occupied West Bank city of Hebron, in March of 2016.
Azarya shot al-Sharif in the head, with a number of witnesses quoting him as saying, “This dog is still alive!” and “This terrorist deserves to die!” before he pulled the trigger.
According to Ma’an, Israeli media reported that dozens of Israelis gathered both outside of Azarya’s home in Ramla and in front of the military prison known as Prison Four, in central Israel, to show support for Azarya, who has been seen by many Israelis as an unjustly punished hero.
Israeli news outlet Ynet reported that the demonstrators’ slogans included “Elor is a hero!”, “Do not fear, Elor, Israel is with you!” and “If you don’t return the boy, we will overturn the state!”
Meanwhile, The Times of Israel said that Azarya held a party on Tuesday night, before heading to prison, during which Israeli pop song “Mother’s Hero” was played — a likely reference to the portrayal of Azarya as Israel’s son who was only doing his duty.
Israel’s shoot-to-kill policy has received widespread support among Israeli citizens, as a 2016 poll by the Israel Democracy Institute found that 47 percent of Jewish Israelis supported the sentiment that “any Palestinian who carries out a terror attack against Jews should be killed on the spot, even if he has been captured and clearly does not pose a threat.”
“This is a sad day for the state, for the (Israeli army) and for some 85 to 90 percent of the citizens of Israel,” The Times of Israel quoted Azarya’s lawyer Yoram Sheftel as saying on Wednesday.
“This is a day of happiness for the Arab enemy and, therefore, this a day of happiness for the Israeli media. Never before has a person gone to prison when so many citizens regret he is going to prison.”
Sheftel had requested, on Sunday, that Azarya’s prison sentence be postponed until Israeli army Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot ruled on whether to commute Azarya’s sentence to community service — a request that was rejected by the Israeli military court of appeals on Tuesday, Ynet reported.
The verdict confirming Azarya’s sentence, which was upheld by an appeals court in late July, will only become peremptory — final — on Sept. 7, meaning that Eisenkot could not grant Azarya’s request before then.
During the appeals process, Israeli judges highlighted that Azarya had “never expressed remorse or questioned his actions” as one of the main reasons for not lowering his sentence.
In addition to seeking a sentence reduction from Eizenkot, Azarya’s lawyers could also request a pardon from Israeli President Reuven Rivlin.
Azarya’s defense had argued that the young Israeli man has been unfairly targeted and that his sentencing represents a “selective enforcement of the law,” according to Human Rights Watch (HRW).
“Indeed, Human Rights Watch has repeatedly documented the fact that the problem is not the conduct of a single soldier, but an atmosphere of immunity from punishment for illegally killing Palestinians,” the rights group said in June.
“Responsibility for upholding ethical and legal norms doesn’t rest solely on the shoulders of a single 20-year-old soldier, but also on the senior officials who sent him — and too many others — the wrong message regarding the use of deadly force.”
The case has been denounced as a “show trial” for focusing on the case to distract from a wider culture of impunity for Israeli forces, as Azarya was charged with manslaughter for what was termed by rights groups as an “extrajudicial execution” and by the victim’s family as “cold-blooded murder.”
Following the initial announcement of the 18-month sentence, the al-Sharif family had said that they were “not surprised” by the lenient sentence — noting that the soldier received less prison time than a Palestinian child would for throwing stones.
Azarya was the only member of Israeli forces to be charged with killing a Palestinian in 2016 — when at least 109 Palestinians were shot and killed by Israeli forces and settlers — according to Human Rights Watch.
According to rights group Yesh Din, of the 186 criminal investigations opened by the Israeli army into suspected offenses against Palestinians in 2015, just four yielded indictments.
Azarya was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to a year and a half in prison, for shooting and killing 21-year-old Palestinian Abd al-Fattah al-Sharif as the disarmed Palestinian lay severely wounded on the ground, after allegedly committing a stabbing attack in the southern occupied West Bank city of Hebron, in March of 2016.
Azarya shot al-Sharif in the head, with a number of witnesses quoting him as saying, “This dog is still alive!” and “This terrorist deserves to die!” before he pulled the trigger.
According to Ma’an, Israeli media reported that dozens of Israelis gathered both outside of Azarya’s home in Ramla and in front of the military prison known as Prison Four, in central Israel, to show support for Azarya, who has been seen by many Israelis as an unjustly punished hero.
Israeli news outlet Ynet reported that the demonstrators’ slogans included “Elor is a hero!”, “Do not fear, Elor, Israel is with you!” and “If you don’t return the boy, we will overturn the state!”
Meanwhile, The Times of Israel said that Azarya held a party on Tuesday night, before heading to prison, during which Israeli pop song “Mother’s Hero” was played — a likely reference to the portrayal of Azarya as Israel’s son who was only doing his duty.
Israel’s shoot-to-kill policy has received widespread support among Israeli citizens, as a 2016 poll by the Israel Democracy Institute found that 47 percent of Jewish Israelis supported the sentiment that “any Palestinian who carries out a terror attack against Jews should be killed on the spot, even if he has been captured and clearly does not pose a threat.”
“This is a sad day for the state, for the (Israeli army) and for some 85 to 90 percent of the citizens of Israel,” The Times of Israel quoted Azarya’s lawyer Yoram Sheftel as saying on Wednesday.
“This is a day of happiness for the Arab enemy and, therefore, this a day of happiness for the Israeli media. Never before has a person gone to prison when so many citizens regret he is going to prison.”
Sheftel had requested, on Sunday, that Azarya’s prison sentence be postponed until Israeli army Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot ruled on whether to commute Azarya’s sentence to community service — a request that was rejected by the Israeli military court of appeals on Tuesday, Ynet reported.
The verdict confirming Azarya’s sentence, which was upheld by an appeals court in late July, will only become peremptory — final — on Sept. 7, meaning that Eisenkot could not grant Azarya’s request before then.
During the appeals process, Israeli judges highlighted that Azarya had “never expressed remorse or questioned his actions” as one of the main reasons for not lowering his sentence.
In addition to seeking a sentence reduction from Eizenkot, Azarya’s lawyers could also request a pardon from Israeli President Reuven Rivlin.
Azarya’s defense had argued that the young Israeli man has been unfairly targeted and that his sentencing represents a “selective enforcement of the law,” according to Human Rights Watch (HRW).
“Indeed, Human Rights Watch has repeatedly documented the fact that the problem is not the conduct of a single soldier, but an atmosphere of immunity from punishment for illegally killing Palestinians,” the rights group said in June.
“Responsibility for upholding ethical and legal norms doesn’t rest solely on the shoulders of a single 20-year-old soldier, but also on the senior officials who sent him — and too many others — the wrong message regarding the use of deadly force.”
The case has been denounced as a “show trial” for focusing on the case to distract from a wider culture of impunity for Israeli forces, as Azarya was charged with manslaughter for what was termed by rights groups as an “extrajudicial execution” and by the victim’s family as “cold-blooded murder.”
Following the initial announcement of the 18-month sentence, the al-Sharif family had said that they were “not surprised” by the lenient sentence — noting that the soldier received less prison time than a Palestinian child would for throwing stones.
Azarya was the only member of Israeli forces to be charged with killing a Palestinian in 2016 — when at least 109 Palestinians were shot and killed by Israeli forces and settlers — according to Human Rights Watch.
According to rights group Yesh Din, of the 186 criminal investigations opened by the Israeli army into suspected offenses against Palestinians in 2015, just four yielded indictments.
2 aug 2017
At the behest of the attorney general, the Israeli high court of justice on Tuesday postponed its hearing on a petition filed by international human rights groups demanding an end to Israel’s reduction of electricity supply to the beleaguered Gaza Strip.
Lawyer Khaled Dusouqee, who filed the petition on behalf of French and Swedish human rights groups, stated that the Israeli attorney general submitted a request asking for postponing the hearing to give the government some time to discuss the issue and provide a response.
Dusouqee added that the court judge adjourned the hearing for two weeks and demanded the Israeli government to respond to the complaint filed by the organizations before the end of this period, otherwise he would issue a final judgment on the case.
Israel decided last June to reduce the amount of electricity supply to Gaza at the request of the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah.
Accordingly, electricity provided for Gaza through Israel’s cross-border power lines have been decreased from 120 to 48 megawatts.
Lawyer Khaled Dusouqee, who filed the petition on behalf of French and Swedish human rights groups, stated that the Israeli attorney general submitted a request asking for postponing the hearing to give the government some time to discuss the issue and provide a response.
Dusouqee added that the court judge adjourned the hearing for two weeks and demanded the Israeli government to respond to the complaint filed by the organizations before the end of this period, otherwise he would issue a final judgment on the case.
Israel decided last June to reduce the amount of electricity supply to Gaza at the request of the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah.
Accordingly, electricity provided for Gaza through Israel’s cross-border power lines have been decreased from 120 to 48 megawatts.
Members of Israeli Likud Party are scheduled to submit a new bill which supports the death penalty for Palestinian prisoners who are allegedly involved in anti-occupation attacks, Israeli media sources said.
According to the sources, the bill came under the garb of "anti-terrorism measures."
Deputy Knesset Chair MK Nava Boker (Likud) proposed a bill which would allow Israeli courts to sentence to death "those who acted as emissaries of our enemies and terror organizations, killing...the innocent."
"I have no doubt that the death penalty, together with other methods, will provide real deterrence and help us eradicate terror in Israel,” she claimed.
Earlier last month, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Army Minister Avigdor Lieberman urged Israeli military courts to seek the death penalty for anti-occupation youths.
According to the sources, the bill came under the garb of "anti-terrorism measures."
Deputy Knesset Chair MK Nava Boker (Likud) proposed a bill which would allow Israeli courts to sentence to death "those who acted as emissaries of our enemies and terror organizations, killing...the innocent."
"I have no doubt that the death penalty, together with other methods, will provide real deterrence and help us eradicate terror in Israel,” she claimed.
Earlier last month, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Army Minister Avigdor Lieberman urged Israeli military courts to seek the death penalty for anti-occupation youths.
1 aug 2017
The Israeli district court in Occupied Jerusalem on Monday confirmed the validity of three real estate deals struck between officials from the Greek Orthodox Church and overseas straw buyers that acted secretly on behalf of an Israeli right-wing settler group.
According to Maariv newspaper on Tuesday, the district court judge ruled that the agreements, in which three major east Jerusalem buildings, including two hotels, had been leased for 99 renewable years by Ateret Cohanim organization through three overseas holding companies, were “valid and did not involve a fraudulent activity.”
The leased buildings are located in a sensitive Palestinian-populated area of the Old City of Jerusalem.
The judge said the contracts had been signed in 2004 by those authorized by the Patriarchate and the plaintiffs, and thus ordered the Church to pay 30,000 shekels to Ateret Cohanim group in legal costs.
The judgment will bring more unwelcome attention to the Patriarchate, which is already under fire for a series of real estate sales in west Jerusalem, according to Israeli newspapers.
The 2004 agreements were to lease buildings, not to sell them, but they are for 99 years, renewable for another 99 years, which essentially puts them into the settlers’ hands for good in one of the most visible positions in the Old City, between the Jaffa Gate (Bab al-Khalil) and the Old City market.
The agreements were so appalling and devastating to the Palestinians because behind them stood Ateret Cohanim, which works to acquire property to establish a Jewish majority in the Old City and in Arab neighborhoods of east Jerusalem.
The first lease was signed in August 2004 between the Patriarchate and Richards Marketing Corporation for the transfer of the New Imperial Hotel at a cost of $1.25 million.
The second, also signed in August 2004, was reached with Berisford Investments Ltd. for the lease on the Petra Hotel, at a cost of $500,000.
A third deal was signed in October 2004 by Gallow Global Ltd. to lease an Old City property and grounds in Muazmia Street 18 for $55,000.
According to Maariv newspaper on Tuesday, the district court judge ruled that the agreements, in which three major east Jerusalem buildings, including two hotels, had been leased for 99 renewable years by Ateret Cohanim organization through three overseas holding companies, were “valid and did not involve a fraudulent activity.”
The leased buildings are located in a sensitive Palestinian-populated area of the Old City of Jerusalem.
The judge said the contracts had been signed in 2004 by those authorized by the Patriarchate and the plaintiffs, and thus ordered the Church to pay 30,000 shekels to Ateret Cohanim group in legal costs.
The judgment will bring more unwelcome attention to the Patriarchate, which is already under fire for a series of real estate sales in west Jerusalem, according to Israeli newspapers.
The 2004 agreements were to lease buildings, not to sell them, but they are for 99 years, renewable for another 99 years, which essentially puts them into the settlers’ hands for good in one of the most visible positions in the Old City, between the Jaffa Gate (Bab al-Khalil) and the Old City market.
The agreements were so appalling and devastating to the Palestinians because behind them stood Ateret Cohanim, which works to acquire property to establish a Jewish majority in the Old City and in Arab neighborhoods of east Jerusalem.
The first lease was signed in August 2004 between the Patriarchate and Richards Marketing Corporation for the transfer of the New Imperial Hotel at a cost of $1.25 million.
The second, also signed in August 2004, was reached with Berisford Investments Ltd. for the lease on the Petra Hotel, at a cost of $500,000.
A third deal was signed in October 2004 by Gallow Global Ltd. to lease an Old City property and grounds in Muazmia Street 18 for $55,000.
28 july 2017
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday said he supports the death penalty for Palestinians who are involved in anti-occupation attacks.
“Time has come to impose death penalty,” Netanyahu said during his visit to the family of the three settlers who were killed last Friday in a stabbing attack.
“It’s anchored in the law. You need the judges to rule unanimously on it, but if you want to know the government’s position and my position as prime minister, in a case like this, of a base murderer like this, he should be executed.”
Last Friday, 19-year-old Omar al-Abed, from a nearby West Bank village, was shot and injured for allegedly being involved in a stabbing attack in the illegal settlement of Halamish. Three settlers were proclaimed dead during the incident.
Earlier Sunday, Israeli Army Minister Avigdor Lieberman, Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked, and Education Minister Naftali Bennett urged Israeli military courts to seek the death penalty for al-Abed after Intelligence Minister Yisrael Katz had initiated the demand on Saturday night.
Following the incident, Israeli forces notified al-Abed’s family with demolition of their house.
“Time has come to impose death penalty,” Netanyahu said during his visit to the family of the three settlers who were killed last Friday in a stabbing attack.
“It’s anchored in the law. You need the judges to rule unanimously on it, but if you want to know the government’s position and my position as prime minister, in a case like this, of a base murderer like this, he should be executed.”
Last Friday, 19-year-old Omar al-Abed, from a nearby West Bank village, was shot and injured for allegedly being involved in a stabbing attack in the illegal settlement of Halamish. Three settlers were proclaimed dead during the incident.
Earlier Sunday, Israeli Army Minister Avigdor Lieberman, Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked, and Education Minister Naftali Bennett urged Israeli military courts to seek the death penalty for al-Abed after Intelligence Minister Yisrael Katz had initiated the demand on Saturday night.
Following the incident, Israeli forces notified al-Abed’s family with demolition of their house.
25 july 2017
Mohammed Sharaf
The Israeli police acquitted on Tuesday the settler charged with shooting and killing the Jerusalemite youth Mohammed Sharaf on Friday in Ras al-Amud neighborhood in East Jerusalem, Haaretz reported.
Palestinians had released a videotape capturing the fatal shooting of Sharaf by the settler.
After summoning the settler for interrogation, the Israeli police announced that he is not the one who killed Sharaf.
The police said that they are facing difficulties collecting evidence because the young man was buried shortly after he died, and added that they had conducted an investigation at al-Makassed hospital where Sharaf was taken after being shot.
The Israeli police acquitted on Tuesday the settler charged with shooting and killing the Jerusalemite youth Mohammed Sharaf on Friday in Ras al-Amud neighborhood in East Jerusalem, Haaretz reported.
Palestinians had released a videotape capturing the fatal shooting of Sharaf by the settler.
After summoning the settler for interrogation, the Israeli police announced that he is not the one who killed Sharaf.
The police said that they are facing difficulties collecting evidence because the young man was buried shortly after he died, and added that they had conducted an investigation at al-Makassed hospital where Sharaf was taken after being shot.
24 july 2017
Ahead of Sunday’s security cabinet meeting, several ministers of Israel’s right-wing government have called for the Palestinian young man who carried out a recent deadly attack in Halamish to be executed.
The ministers called for passing the death penalty for 19-year-old Palestinian Omar al-Abed who infiltrated into a house in the illegal settlement of Halamish in the West Bank last Friday night and stabbed to death three Jewish settlers from the same family in retaliation to Israeli measures at the Aqsa Mosque.
Israeli war minister Avigdor Lieberman said in an interview with Ynet that with such incident, there is certainly a place for the death sentence in the corridors of West Bank military courts.
Education minister Naftali Bennett also said that the option of death penalty exists in Israeli military courts and that there is no need for legislation.
He called on the military prosecution to demand the death penalty for Abed.
Justice minister Ayelet Shaked also called for going to military courts to extract a capital punishment verdict against the young man.
Transportation and intelligence minister Yisrael Katz made similar comments on Saturday night. He also said that he would raise the demand in the cabinet meeting and that the attorney-general told him that the death penalty was a possibility if it was the security cabinet’s position.
Although Israel’s military courts had reportedly not issued death sentences since 1962, its military and security forces have been carrying out “shoot-to-kill” orders for long years, extrajudicially executing scores of Palestinians on site when they could have been subdued or disarmed through non-lethal means.
The ministers called for passing the death penalty for 19-year-old Palestinian Omar al-Abed who infiltrated into a house in the illegal settlement of Halamish in the West Bank last Friday night and stabbed to death three Jewish settlers from the same family in retaliation to Israeli measures at the Aqsa Mosque.
Israeli war minister Avigdor Lieberman said in an interview with Ynet that with such incident, there is certainly a place for the death sentence in the corridors of West Bank military courts.
Education minister Naftali Bennett also said that the option of death penalty exists in Israeli military courts and that there is no need for legislation.
He called on the military prosecution to demand the death penalty for Abed.
Justice minister Ayelet Shaked also called for going to military courts to extract a capital punishment verdict against the young man.
Transportation and intelligence minister Yisrael Katz made similar comments on Saturday night. He also said that he would raise the demand in the cabinet meeting and that the attorney-general told him that the death penalty was a possibility if it was the security cabinet’s position.
Although Israel’s military courts had reportedly not issued death sentences since 1962, its military and security forces have been carrying out “shoot-to-kill” orders for long years, extrajudicially executing scores of Palestinians on site when they could have been subdued or disarmed through non-lethal means.
21 july 2017
View of Jerusalem’s Old City district, seen on April 14, 2014
A bill aimed at preventing any future divisions of Jerusalem, by requiring a two-third majority in Israel’s parliament, in order to do so, passed its preliminary reading in the Knesset, on Wednesday.
The bill, titled “Basic Law: Jerusalem, the Capital of Israel,” passed with 58 Members of Knesset (MKs) voting in favor, 48 voting against it, and one MK abstaining from the vote, according to a statement released by the Knesset.
According to Ma’an, the bill aims to mend Israel’s Basic Law on Jerusalem, to necessitate the approval of 80 of the 120 Knesset members to make any changes to the law, instead of the regular majority vote.
According to the statement, the proposal explains that the bill has a “security purpose.”
“Since the IDF’s withdrawal from Lebanon [in 2000] and the disengagement from the Gaza Strip [in 2005] proved that wherever Israel withdraws from, terrorist factors enter, threatening the security of citizens of Israel,” the bill reportedly states, insinuating that if Israel withdrew from occupied East Jerusalem, it would be taken over by “terrorist” factions.
MK Shuli Moalem-Refaeli from the ultra right Jewish Home party, who had submitted the bill along with a group of other MKs, said that the bill was meant “to protect Jerusalem, the eternal capital of the Israeli People.”
“The State of Israel will not allow the establishment of a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital. Get it into your heads that Jerusalem will remain the capital of the Jewish People for eternity; 3,000 years after King David established Jerusalem as the capital of the [Jewish] People, we returned to it,” she added.
The fate of Jerusalem has been a focal point of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for decades, with numerous tensions arising over Israeli threats regarding the status of non-Jewish religious sites in the city, and the “Judaization” of East Jerusalem through settlement construction and mass demolitions of Palestinian homes.
Right-wing Israeli leaders routinely claim that Jerusalem is the “eternal capital” of Israel. However, this claim is not supported by the international community, which still largely considers occupied East Jerusalem to be an integral part of a future Palestinian state.
Meanwhile, MK Tzipi Livni from the centrist Zionist Camp noted that East Jerusalem includes “villages with hundreds of thousands of Palestinians. Police do not enter them, and neither does the education minister,” referring to right-wing MK Naftali Bennett who initially proposed the bill in June.
Livni also added that the bill would “prevent us from separating from the Palestinians.”
Bennett had said in June that the purpose of proposing the law was to “unify Jerusalem forever,” by making it “impossible” to divide Jerusalem.
While the PA and the international community do not recognize the legality of the occupation of East Jerusalem, Gaza, and the West Bank since 1967, many Palestinians consider that all historic Palestine has been occupied since the creation of the state of Israel in 1948.
Meanwhile, a growing number of activists have criticized a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as unsustainable and unlikely to bring durable peace given the existing political context, proposing instead a binational state with equal rights for Israelis and Palestinians.
A bill aimed at preventing any future divisions of Jerusalem, by requiring a two-third majority in Israel’s parliament, in order to do so, passed its preliminary reading in the Knesset, on Wednesday.
The bill, titled “Basic Law: Jerusalem, the Capital of Israel,” passed with 58 Members of Knesset (MKs) voting in favor, 48 voting against it, and one MK abstaining from the vote, according to a statement released by the Knesset.
According to Ma’an, the bill aims to mend Israel’s Basic Law on Jerusalem, to necessitate the approval of 80 of the 120 Knesset members to make any changes to the law, instead of the regular majority vote.
According to the statement, the proposal explains that the bill has a “security purpose.”
“Since the IDF’s withdrawal from Lebanon [in 2000] and the disengagement from the Gaza Strip [in 2005] proved that wherever Israel withdraws from, terrorist factors enter, threatening the security of citizens of Israel,” the bill reportedly states, insinuating that if Israel withdrew from occupied East Jerusalem, it would be taken over by “terrorist” factions.
MK Shuli Moalem-Refaeli from the ultra right Jewish Home party, who had submitted the bill along with a group of other MKs, said that the bill was meant “to protect Jerusalem, the eternal capital of the Israeli People.”
“The State of Israel will not allow the establishment of a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital. Get it into your heads that Jerusalem will remain the capital of the Jewish People for eternity; 3,000 years after King David established Jerusalem as the capital of the [Jewish] People, we returned to it,” she added.
The fate of Jerusalem has been a focal point of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for decades, with numerous tensions arising over Israeli threats regarding the status of non-Jewish religious sites in the city, and the “Judaization” of East Jerusalem through settlement construction and mass demolitions of Palestinian homes.
Right-wing Israeli leaders routinely claim that Jerusalem is the “eternal capital” of Israel. However, this claim is not supported by the international community, which still largely considers occupied East Jerusalem to be an integral part of a future Palestinian state.
Meanwhile, MK Tzipi Livni from the centrist Zionist Camp noted that East Jerusalem includes “villages with hundreds of thousands of Palestinians. Police do not enter them, and neither does the education minister,” referring to right-wing MK Naftali Bennett who initially proposed the bill in June.
Livni also added that the bill would “prevent us from separating from the Palestinians.”
Bennett had said in June that the purpose of proposing the law was to “unify Jerusalem forever,” by making it “impossible” to divide Jerusalem.
While the PA and the international community do not recognize the legality of the occupation of East Jerusalem, Gaza, and the West Bank since 1967, many Palestinians consider that all historic Palestine has been occupied since the creation of the state of Israel in 1948.
Meanwhile, a growing number of activists have criticized a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as unsustainable and unlikely to bring durable peace given the existing political context, proposing instead a binational state with equal rights for Israelis and Palestinians.
13 july 2017
by Jonathan Cook
When Israel passed a new counter-terrorism law last year, Ayman Odeh, a leader of the country’s large minority of Palestinian citizens, described its draconian measures as colonialism’s “last gasp”. He said: “I see … the panic of the French at the end of the occupation of Algeria.”
The panic and cruelty plumbed new depths last week, when Israeli officials launched a $2.3 million lawsuit against the family of Fadi Qanbar, who crashed a truck into soldiers in Jerusalem in January, killing four. He was shot dead at the scene.
The suit demands that his widow, Tahani, reimburse the state for the compensation it awarded the soldiers’ families. If she cannot raise the astronomic sum, the debt will pass to her four children, the oldest of whom is currently only seven.
Israel is reported to be preparing many similar cases.
Like other families of Palestinians who commit attacks, the Qanbars are homeless, after Israel sealed their East Jerusalem home with cement. Twelve relatives were also stripped of their residency papers as a prelude to expelling them to the West Bank.
None has done anything wrong – their crime is simply to be related to someone Israel defines as a “terrorist”.
This trend is intensifying. Israel has demanded that the Palestinian Authority stop paying a small monthly stipend to families like the Qanbars, whose breadwinner was killed or jailed. Conviction rates among Palestinians in Israel’s military legal system stand at more than 99 per cent, and hundreds of prisoners are incarcerated without charge.
Israeli legislation is set to seize $280 million – a sum equivalent to the total stipends – from taxes Israel collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority, potentially bankrupting it.
On Wednesday Israel loyalists will introduce in the US Senate a bill to similarly deny the PA aid unless it stops “funding terror”. Issa Karaka, a Palestinian official, said it would be impossible for the PA to comply: “Almost every other household … is the family of a prisoner or martyr.”
Israel has taken collective punishment – a serious violation of international law – to new extremes, stretching the notion to realms once imaginable only in a dystopian fable like George Orwell’s 1984.
Israel argues that a potential attacker can only be dissuaded by knowing his loved ones will suffer harsh retribution. Or put another way, Israel is prepared to use any means to crush the motivation of Palestinians to resist its brutal, five-decade occupation.
All evidence, however, indicates that when people reach breaking-point, and are willing to die in the fight against their oppressors, they give little thought to the consequences for their families. That was the conclusion of an investigation by the Israeli army more than a decade ago.
In truth, Israel knows its policy is futile. It is not deterring attacks, but instead engaging in complex displacement activity. Ever-more sadistic forms of revenge shore up a collective and historic sense of Jewish victimhood while deflecting Israelis’ attention from the reality that their country is a brutal colonial settler state.
If that verdict seems harsh, consider a newly published study into the effects on operators of using drones to carry out extrajudicial executions, in which civilians are often killed as “collateral damage”.
A US survey found pilots who remotely fly drones soon develop symptoms of post-traumatic stress from inflicting so much death and destruction. The Israeli army replicated the study after its pilots operated drones over Gaza during Israel’s 2014 attack – the ultimate act of collective punishment. Some 500 Palestinian children were killed as the tiny enclave was bombarded for nearly two months.
Doctors were surprised, however, that the pilots showed no signs of depression or anxiety. The researchers speculate that Israeli pilots may feel more justified in their actions, because they are closer to Gaza than US pilots are to Afghanistan, Iraq or Yemen. They are more confident that they are the ones under threat, even as they rain down death unseen on Palestinians.
The determination to maintain this exclusive self-image as the victim leads to outrageous double standards.
Last week the Israeli supreme court backed the refusal by officials to seal up the homes of three Jews who kidnapped Mohammed Abu Khdeir, a 16-year-old from Jerusalem, in 2014 and burnt him alive.
In May the Israeli government revealed that it had denied compensation to six-year-old Ahmed Dawabsheh, the badly scarred, sole survivor of an arson attack by Jewish extremists that killed his entire family two years ago.
Human rights group B’Tselem recently warned that Israel has given itself immunity from paying compensation to all Palestinians under occupation killed or disabled by the Israeli army – even in cases of criminal wrongdoing.
This endless heaping of insult upon injury for Palestinians is possible only because the west has indulged Israel’s wallowing in victimhood so long. It is time to prick this bubble of self-delusion and remind Israel that it, not the Palestinians, is the oppressor.
(A version of this article first appeared in the National, Abu Dhabi.)
– Jonathan Cook won the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His article was published in the Palestine Chronicle website.
When Israel passed a new counter-terrorism law last year, Ayman Odeh, a leader of the country’s large minority of Palestinian citizens, described its draconian measures as colonialism’s “last gasp”. He said: “I see … the panic of the French at the end of the occupation of Algeria.”
The panic and cruelty plumbed new depths last week, when Israeli officials launched a $2.3 million lawsuit against the family of Fadi Qanbar, who crashed a truck into soldiers in Jerusalem in January, killing four. He was shot dead at the scene.
The suit demands that his widow, Tahani, reimburse the state for the compensation it awarded the soldiers’ families. If she cannot raise the astronomic sum, the debt will pass to her four children, the oldest of whom is currently only seven.
Israel is reported to be preparing many similar cases.
Like other families of Palestinians who commit attacks, the Qanbars are homeless, after Israel sealed their East Jerusalem home with cement. Twelve relatives were also stripped of their residency papers as a prelude to expelling them to the West Bank.
None has done anything wrong – their crime is simply to be related to someone Israel defines as a “terrorist”.
This trend is intensifying. Israel has demanded that the Palestinian Authority stop paying a small monthly stipend to families like the Qanbars, whose breadwinner was killed or jailed. Conviction rates among Palestinians in Israel’s military legal system stand at more than 99 per cent, and hundreds of prisoners are incarcerated without charge.
Israeli legislation is set to seize $280 million – a sum equivalent to the total stipends – from taxes Israel collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority, potentially bankrupting it.
On Wednesday Israel loyalists will introduce in the US Senate a bill to similarly deny the PA aid unless it stops “funding terror”. Issa Karaka, a Palestinian official, said it would be impossible for the PA to comply: “Almost every other household … is the family of a prisoner or martyr.”
Israel has taken collective punishment – a serious violation of international law – to new extremes, stretching the notion to realms once imaginable only in a dystopian fable like George Orwell’s 1984.
Israel argues that a potential attacker can only be dissuaded by knowing his loved ones will suffer harsh retribution. Or put another way, Israel is prepared to use any means to crush the motivation of Palestinians to resist its brutal, five-decade occupation.
All evidence, however, indicates that when people reach breaking-point, and are willing to die in the fight against their oppressors, they give little thought to the consequences for their families. That was the conclusion of an investigation by the Israeli army more than a decade ago.
In truth, Israel knows its policy is futile. It is not deterring attacks, but instead engaging in complex displacement activity. Ever-more sadistic forms of revenge shore up a collective and historic sense of Jewish victimhood while deflecting Israelis’ attention from the reality that their country is a brutal colonial settler state.
If that verdict seems harsh, consider a newly published study into the effects on operators of using drones to carry out extrajudicial executions, in which civilians are often killed as “collateral damage”.
A US survey found pilots who remotely fly drones soon develop symptoms of post-traumatic stress from inflicting so much death and destruction. The Israeli army replicated the study after its pilots operated drones over Gaza during Israel’s 2014 attack – the ultimate act of collective punishment. Some 500 Palestinian children were killed as the tiny enclave was bombarded for nearly two months.
Doctors were surprised, however, that the pilots showed no signs of depression or anxiety. The researchers speculate that Israeli pilots may feel more justified in their actions, because they are closer to Gaza than US pilots are to Afghanistan, Iraq or Yemen. They are more confident that they are the ones under threat, even as they rain down death unseen on Palestinians.
The determination to maintain this exclusive self-image as the victim leads to outrageous double standards.
Last week the Israeli supreme court backed the refusal by officials to seal up the homes of three Jews who kidnapped Mohammed Abu Khdeir, a 16-year-old from Jerusalem, in 2014 and burnt him alive.
In May the Israeli government revealed that it had denied compensation to six-year-old Ahmed Dawabsheh, the badly scarred, sole survivor of an arson attack by Jewish extremists that killed his entire family two years ago.
Human rights group B’Tselem recently warned that Israel has given itself immunity from paying compensation to all Palestinians under occupation killed or disabled by the Israeli army – even in cases of criminal wrongdoing.
This endless heaping of insult upon injury for Palestinians is possible only because the west has indulged Israel’s wallowing in victimhood so long. It is time to prick this bubble of self-delusion and remind Israel that it, not the Palestinians, is the oppressor.
(A version of this article first appeared in the National, Abu Dhabi.)
– Jonathan Cook won the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His article was published in the Palestine Chronicle website.
