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Writers Articles And Opinions |
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25 May 2010
By Stephen
Lendman
The Palestinian
Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) provides weekly
snapshots of Israeli killings, targeted
assassinations, arrests, home demolitions, destroyed
farmland, assaults on peaceful protesters, community
incursions, home invasions, and more besides
full-scale attacks at its discretion - a decades-long
onslaught against 1.5 million Gazans and over 2.5
million West Bank and East Jerusalem Palestinians.
On May 11, a
recent assault occurred in the West Bank's Lubban Al-Sharqiya
village when settlers attacked a local mosque, set it
ablaze and gutted it. Israeli fire-fighters blamed it
on an electrical short-circuit, later investigations
showing arson was responsible, what Palestinians knew
all along.
A village
spokesperson said the mosque was undergoing
renovations, its electricity turned off in the section
where the fire broke out. Other villagers heard cars
arrive around 3AM and saw settlers entering the
mosque. They tore down curtains to start the blaze,
stacked Qurans next to a bathroom, and arranged shoes
on the pile in the shape of a Star of David to
desecrate them and the mosque.
Besides security
force assaults, attacks like this happen often against
Palestinian homes, businesses, vehicles, farmland, and
livestock - even children on their way to school.
Rarely are charges ever brought, giving settlers
license to commit crimes with impunity, including cold
blooded murder.
Other Recent
Attacks
On April 1,
Israeli jets struck Gaza's Maghazi refugee camp and
Palestinian businesses, including two cheese
factories, claiming they were making weapons - the
same justification Israel uses for other aggression,
including saying it's in retaliation for homemade
rockets fired, done only in response to repeated
Israeli attacks, mostly against civilians, including
farmers in their fields and fishermen in their own
waters.
A May 5 PCHR
report titled, "Israeli Attacks on Palestinian
Fishermen in Gaza" documented the January through
April toll, the result of 19 IDF attacks on them
during the period - nine in February, six in March,
and four in April, all unprovoked against civilians.
They occurred as follows, similar to others:
On March 25 at
9:30AM, IDF gunboats fired on Palestinian boats about
800 meters off Gaza's northern coast near Beit Lahia.
Hazen Ahmed Juma'a al-Qur'an was wounded by shrapnel
in his head, his boat heavily damaged; when treated at
Kamal 'Edwan Hospital, his condition was described as
"moderate to serious."
A nearby
fisherman, Jamil al-Aqra'a, described what he saw,
saying:
"The gunboats
opened fire at Palestinian fishing boats directly. Al-Qur'an,
who was on his boat with another two fishermen, was
wounded in the head as a result. They left their
fishing nets in the water and rushed to rescue him."
On April 21, IDF
gunboats fired at Gazan fishermen off the Rafah coast.
Yousel Husam al-Habbash, 15 years old, was wounded in
his right hand. In three other attacks, the Israeli
navy arrested 11 fishermen. In four others, fishing
boats were confiscated. In two more, the IDF destroyed
fishing tools and equipment at sea. In all cases,
Gazans were fishing in their own waters. Israeli
forces entered them illegally and opened fire, a clear
crime against humanity against defenseless civilians,
Israel's specialty.
Earlier on
January 7, Haaretz Service reported that "Israel
struck Gaza for the second time in 24 hours," saying:
"The Israeli
Defense Forces launched a series of air strikes
overnight....after a Qassam rocket fired from the
Strip hit southern Israel" harming no one nor causing
damage. Medics said three Palestinians were killed,
including a 15-year old boy. Two others were wounded,
and several others were feared trapped inside building
ruins.
During the same
week, various attacks killed three Palestinians,
including one child, and wounded several others. Five
air strikes caused no casualties, but during the same
period, Israeli tanks entered Gaza, destroying
farmland. On January 15, IDF tanks and artillery fire
attacked civilian targets near Beit Hanoun. Homes were
destroyed, but no injuries were reported.
In early May,
Israeli snipers killed one Palestinian, wounding two
women and a teenager in Gaza. Collaborating Egyptian
forces sprayed disbursal gas into a tunnel, killing
four Palestinians and injuring six others. In late
April, other tunnel workers were targeted by the
Egyptians and killed, six others at the same time
injured.
On May 10,
Israeli jets attacked tunnels southeast of Rafah,
Israel's military spokesperson calling them "terror
sites." No casualties were reported, but dozens of
Palestinians have died in them, bringing food, fuel
and other vital supplies to the Territory under siege.
These type attacks occur regularly, including:
-- on March 22,
against tunnels and a metal workshop, demolished by
IDF missiles; no injuries were reported; during the
same period, Israeli forces killed four West Bank
Palestinians, two from Awarta village near Nablus and
two others (including a child) in Iraq Bourin village,
also near Nablus; reports said they were working on
their land when shot at close range in cold blood; on
the same day, warplanes struck al-Shouka village near
Rafah, allegedly to destroy tunnels; no casualties
were reported;
-- from March 19
- 22, Israeli jets bombed the Mahdi al-Daia and Sons
Company, completely destroying its building; no
casualties were reported; other jets attacked Saladin
Gate, Yebna refugee camp and Block J, located south of
Rafah, allegedly to destroy tunnels; two injuries were
reported; a farm east of Abasan village near Khan
Younis was also bombed; no casualties were reported;
on the same day, Gaza's closed international airport
was attacked, wounding 11 Palestinians, including two
children who were gathering the destroyed runway's raw
aggregate;
-- on March 13,
IDF jets bombed Rafah area tunnels and a factory
claimed to be making weapons;
-- on January
28, tunnels again allegedly were attacked, ahead of US
peace envoy George Mitchell's arrival in Israel; no
casualties were reported;
-- on February
3, against tunnels in southern Gaza, Israel claiming
were used to smuggle weapons and infiltrate
"terrorists;" three Palestinians were injured;
-- on April 2,
BBC reported "Thirteen Israeli air strikes hit Gaza
Strip," Hamas officials saying they targeted metal
workshops, farms, a milk factory, and other small
sites; Israel called them "weapons factories;" medical
personnel reported several injuries, including three
children and an infant hit by flying debris;
-- on April 29,
complicit Egyptian forces blew up four tunnels,
killing four Palestinians and injuring 10 others;
witnesses said an explosion on the Egyptian side
caused the tunnel to collapse; Egypt is building an
underground wall, 100 feet deep and 10 - 13 km long
along its Rafah border, to destroy numerous tunnels
and deter more; and
-- on April 30,
Israeli warplanes struck two "terror sites,"
destroying two tunnels; no injuries were reported.
On April 22,
Gazan farmland, not tunnels, was targeted when Israeli
tanks and bulldozers entered Al Faraheen in an
Israeli-declared "buffer zone," hundreds of meters
into the Territory putting around 30% of its arable
land off limits. Jaber Abu Rjila's home and chicken
farm were attacked, his barn destroyed, killing 3,000
birds. His farmland was also razed, destroying fruit
and olive trees, and other crops as well as farm
equipment, water pumps, and a cistern.
He's a farmer,
not a fighter, like many others attacked, at times
killed, and always losing their livelihoods -
willfully, maliciously, and illegally.
In its first
four-month 2010 report, the Al Mezan Center for Human
Rights documented "Continuous Israeli Violations
against Palestinians," killing 13 and injuring 62,
including 11 children. IDF forces also arrested 45
Palestinians, including 21 fishermen, some collecting
rubble from destroyed Gaza structures.
In addition:
-- 13 Gaza
incursions occurred;
-- dozens of
dunams of farmland were razed;
-- 14 houses
destroyed; and
-- Palestinians
were repeatedly fired on near Israel's declared
"buffer zone," some as distant as a kilometer away.
Israel's year
ago Gaza war never ended. It continues with regular
air and ground assaults, killing and destroying
ruthlessly and regularly as part of its slow motion
genocide agenda - what Israeli historian Ilan Pappe
wrote about Gaza before Cast Lead in a September 2006
Electronic Intifada article, saying:
"A genocide is
taking place in Gaza....An average of eight
Palestinians die daily in the Israeli attacks on the
Strip. (Many) of them are children. Hundreds are
maimed, wounded and paralyzed. (It's become) a daily
business, now reported (only) in the internal pages of
the local press, quite often in microscopic fonts. The
chief culprits are the Israeli pilots who have a field
day" killing Muslims, so who'll care or notice,
especially ones called "terrorists."
International
law expert Francis Boyle agrees, earlier accusing
Israel of violating the Genocide Convention, saying:
"Israel has
indeed perpetrated the international crime of genocide
against the Palestinian people." It's an "undeniable
fact."
A Final Comment
With Gaza under
siege three years this June, various aid missions
challenged it, some successful, others not. The latest
is comprised of eight vessels, including the MV Rachel
Corrie (1979 - 2003) in honor of the 23-year old
American peace activist, murdered in Gaza on March 16,
2003 by an Israeli bulldozer operator when she tried
to stop it from demolishing a Rafah refugee camp home.
According to
witnesses, she climbed up on it, spoke to the driver,
climbed down, knelt 10 - 20 meters in front in clear
view, blocking its path with her body. With activists
there screaming for it to stop, the soldier-operator
crushed her to death deliberately by running her over
twice to be sure.
On May 14, the
MV Rachael Corrie set sail from Europe to Gaza. Other
vessels, nine in all, will attempt to break the siege
and deliver vitally needed aid, including over 10,000
tons of food, medicines, educational and construction
materials.
On May 17,
Haaretz writers Jack Khoury and Barak Ravid headlined,
"Israel to Europe: Stop your citizens from sailing to
Gaza with aid," saying:
"Israel warned a
number of European states that it would not permit
leftist-organizations planning to sail to the Gaza
Strip with international aid to complete their
mission."
Israel's Foreign
Ministry European affairs director, Naor Gilon, met
with Turkish, Greek, Irish and Swedish envoys saying
their citizens would be stopped at sea and prevented
from entering Gaza.
On the same day,
Israeli security forces released Izzet Shahin, a
Turkish Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms and
Humanitarian Relief (IHH) volunteer, arrested earlier
in the West Bank for helping to organize the relief
effort.
According to its
web site, IHH was organizing a "major initiative....to
deliver aid via the sea to the Gaza Strip. Hundreds of
concerned people will set out on 10 ships in May to
take over 5,000 tons of relief aid and materials to
Gaza."
Unspecified
countermeasures are likely, including sea
interdictions, arrests, cargo seizures, and perhaps
violence in open waters against peaceful humanitarian
activists v. a rogue state perpetrator of decades of
crimes of war and against humanity intending more -
its specialty against civilians.
Stephen
Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at
lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. Also visit his blog site
at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge
discussions with distinguished guests on the
Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio
Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and
Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are
archived for easy listening.
http://www.progressiveradionetwork.com/the-progressive-news-hour/.
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