Yearly Archives: 2024

West Bank Pogrom ‘Underscores Urgent Need to Dismantle Apartheid’: Amnesty

Spread the love

Original article by BRETT WILKINS republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Mourners carry the body of one of the Palestinian men killed during an Israeli settlers’ attack on the village of Aqraba in the illegally occupied West Bank on April 19, 2024. (Photo: Jaafar Ashtiyeh/AFP via Getty Images)

“The appalling spike in settler violence against Palestinians in recent days is part of a decadeslong state-backed campaign to dispossess, displace, and oppress Palestinians in the occupied West Bank,” said one Amnesty official.

Amnesty International said Monday that the ongoing surge in deadly violence by Israeli settlers and soldiers in the West Bank “underscores [the] urgent need to dismantle apartheid” in the illegally occupied Palestinian territories.

For more than a week now, Israeli settlers have been attacking West Bank Palestinians in towns and villages including Al-Mughayir, Duma, Deir Dibwan, Beitin, and Aqraba, killing at least four people including a child; wounding dozens of others; and destroying homes, vehicles, and other property.

Israel Defense Forces (IDF) troops have either stood and watched or participated in the settler attacks, which the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem and others are calling a “pogrom.”

Amnesty said the “alarming spike in violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinians across the occupied West Bank in recent days highlights the urgent need to dismantle illegal settlements, end Israel’s occupation of the occupied Palestinian territories, and its longstanding system of apartheid.

“The appalling spike in settler violence against Palestinians in recent days is part of a decadeslong state-backed campaign to dispossess, displace, and oppress Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, under Israel’s system of apartheid,” Amnesty Middle East and North Africa regional director Heba Morayef said. “Israeli forces have a track record of enabling settler violence and it is outrageous that once again Israeli forces stood by and in some cases took part in these brutal attacks.”

“Establishing Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories flagrantly violates international law and constitutes a war crime,” Morayef added. “Violence is integral to the establishment and expansion of these settlements and to sustaining apartheid. It’s time for the world to recognize this and pressure Israeli authorities to abide by international law by immediately halting settlement expansion and removing all existing settlements.”

The latest wave of settler violence was sparked by the disappearance of Binyamin Achimair, a 14-year-old Israeli from the illegal settler outpost of Mal’achei Hashalom who went missing on April 12 while herding sheep near the village of Al-Mughayir east of Ramallah. As Israelis searched for Achimair, settlers began attacking Al-Mughayir’s residents and property.

Achimair’s body was found the following day. Israeli officials said he was killed in a “terrorist attack.” However, no Palestinian resistance group has claimed responsibility for the incident. A 21-year-old Palestinian man was arrested Monday in alleged connection with the boy’s death.

Late Friday, IDF troops and armored vehicles surrounded the Nur Shams refugee camp east of Tulkarem and besieged the community of more than 6,000 Palestinians during a 50-hour raid in which residents were shot, homes were destroyed, and scores of people were arrested.

By Saturday, IDF soldiers had killed 14 people in the camp, including at least one child. More than 40 other Palestinians were wounded.

“I saw one of my relatives, Jihad Zandiq, put his hands in the air to the soldiers but then they shot him anyway from point-blank range and killed him. Half of his skull exploded,” eyewitness Mahmoud Qazmouz told Middle East Eye on Sunday.

Palestinian officials said Israeli troops attacked first responders attempting to rescue victims, including a volunteer paramedic who was shot in the leg.

Meanwhile, a funeral was held Sunday for Mohammed Awad Allah Musa, a 50-year-old Palestinian Red Crescent Society volunteer paramedic who was shot dead Saturday by Israeli settler-colonists while trying to reach Palestinians wounded by rampaging settlers in the town of Sa’wiyah south of Nablus.

The Nur Shams raid and ongoing settler attacks came as the U.S. State Department on Friday announced new sanctions targeting far-right Israeli settler leaders including Ben Zion Gopstein, the founder and head of the Jewish supremacist group Lehava.

The Biden administration—which backs Israel with billions of dollars in military aid and diplomatic support—is also reportedly considering imposing sanctions on the IDF’s Netzah Yehuda battalion over war crimes committed in the West Bank before the current Israeli war on Gaza, including the January 2022 death of Omar Assad, a 78-year-old Palestinian American man.

Responding to the prospect of the first-ever U.S. sanctions on his country’s military, far-right Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that “I will fight it with all my strength.”

According to the Palestinian Health Ministry, at least 485 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli soldiers and settlers in the West Bank since October 7, when Gaza-based militants attacked Israel. More than 1,100 people were killed in the attack—some by responding Israeli forces—and over 240 Israelis and others were kidnapped by Hamas and other militants.

Israel’s 199-day retaliatory assault on Gaza—which critics including Israelis have called genocidal—has killed at least 34,151 Palestinians, mostly women and children, while wounding over 77,000 others, according to Palestinian and international officials. At least 11,000 Gazans are missing, presumed dead and buried beneath the rubble of the hundreds of thousands of homes and other buildings that have been destroyed or damaged by Israeli bombardment. Around 90% of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been forcibly displaced, and Israel’s continued obstruction of humanitarian aid delivery has fueled a burgeoning famine in which dozens of people, mostly children, have perished.

Original article by BRETT WILKINS republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Continue ReadingWest Bank Pogrom ‘Underscores Urgent Need to Dismantle Apartheid’: Amnesty

Students launch encampments in solidarity with Gaza across the US

Spread the love

Original article republished from peoples dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.

Students set up an encampment at the University of Michigan in solidarity with Gaza (Photo via Jewish Voice for Peace UMich)

Police launch new wave of repression as student movement for Palestine grows

Almost a week after Columbia students launched their Gaza Solidarity Encampment, students across the country have taken from their example and began encampments in public spaces in their own universities in solidarity with Palestine.

In the early hours of the morning of April 22, students at New York University began an encampment on Gould Plaza, joining their New York City counterparts at the New School, which had launched an encampment the previous day.

In the Greater Boston Area students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Emerson College, and Tufts University set up encampments at their own universities. Students at the University of Michigan also launched an encampment on April 22, pitching tents outdoors with ice still visibly on the ground.

Also on the morning of April 22, New Haven police repressed the Gaza Solidarity Encampment at Yale University, which had been established on April 20, making 47 arrests. In response, students took over the street outside of campus, shutting down an intersection with hundreds of demonstrators.

Students are broadly demanding that their universities divest from Israel, and have pledged to maintain their encampments until their demands are met. The intensification of the student action began when Columbia students launched their encampment at 4 am on April 17. Despite a severe crackdown by the University and the NYPD, resulting in 122 arrests, students have been able to sustain the encampment on the Butler Lawn for almost a week, inspiring others across the country to do the same and put pressure on their own universities to divest from Israel. 

On the afternoon of April 22, a new wave of repression began outside of Columbia’s campus as several demonstrators were arrested outside the campus gates, who were picketing outside of the encampment. 

Original article republished from peoples dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.

Continue ReadingStudents launch encampments in solidarity with Gaza across the US

Met police chief praises ‘professional’ conduct of officer in antisemitism row

Spread the love

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/apr/22/met-police-chief-praises-professional-conduct-officer-antisemitism-row

Mark Rowley said ‘the wider actions and intent of the officer were professional and in the best tradition of British police trying to prevent disorder’. Photograph: PA Images/Alamy

Exclusive: Mark Rowley says sergeant will not be disciplined and warns of ‘fakery’ by activists at other protests

The commissioner of the Metropolitan police has praised the “professional” conduct of the sergeant who stopped an antisemitism campaigner at a pro-Palestinian march and warned that officers at other protests had been “set up” by activists using “fakery” to undermine the force.

In an interview with the Guardian, Mark Rowley said the sergeant involved in the incident with Gideon Falter would not be disciplined and vigorously defended the Met’s handling of the six months of protests since the 7 October attacks on Israel.

Defying calls for his resignation, Rowley faced a series of crisis meetings on Monday with the two people who could oust him – the home secretary, James Cleverly, and the London mayor, Sadiq Khan – as well as British Jewish groups.

It followed footage emerging of a Met officer telling Falter, of the Campaign Against Antisemitism, that because he was “openly Jewish” he would not be allowed to walk across a pro-Palestinian protest march through central London on 13 April.

A 13-minute video of the exchange shows the officer offering to escort Falter away from the demonstration, and saying he was being disingenuous about his motives for wanting to cross the road at that point.

Speaking just before he went to see the home secretary, Rowley, Britain’s top police officer, said: “The sergeant at the scene clearly assessed that there was a risk of confrontation and was trying to help Mr Falter find a different route. I completely understand why the sergeant made this assessment. A couple of turns of phrase were clumsy and offensive … and we’ve apologised for that.

“The wider actions and intent of the officer were professional and in the best tradition of British police trying to prevent disorder.”

…

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/apr/22/met-police-chief-praises-professional-conduct-officer-antisemitism-row

Continue ReadingMet police chief praises ‘professional’ conduct of officer in antisemitism row

Millions living in ‘dangerous’ homes that put people’s health at risk, charities say

Spread the love

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/millions-living-dangerous-homes-putting-peoples-health-risk-charities-say

Houses, August 19, 2014

EIGHT million people are at risk of ill-health caused by substandard housing that is putting “enormous strain” on an overstretched NHS, a coalition of charities warned today.

Nine charities are backing a national Safe Homes Now campaign, demanding an end to the “scandal” of 3.7 million “dangerous” homes “that pose significant risk to inhabitants’ health” in both the private rented and owner-occupied sectors.

The charities said the “hidden housing crisis” included shocking conditions such as rat infestation, damp, leaks and mould on children’s bedding.

They said that grant support for home repairs has been slashed by more than £2 billion over the past decade, preventing the repair of 600,000 homes.

And they highlighted that 2.2 million owner-occupied homes were now defined as “unsafe” — double the number in the private rented sector.

A survey by campaign founder the Centre for Better Ageing revealed increasing problems with heating costs and home maintenance bills.

The nine charities, including St John Ambulance, Race Equality Foundation and children’s charity Barnardo’s, are calling for a “national strategy to tackle the poor quality of the country’s homes” that includes halving the number of unsafe homes within the next decade to improve the nation’s health.

…

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/millions-living-dangerous-homes-putting-peoples-health-risk-charities-say

Continue ReadingMillions living in ‘dangerous’ homes that put people’s health at risk, charities say

Yet another broken pledge from Rishi Sunak: PM ditches promise to get flights off to Rwanda by the Spring

Spread the love

https://leftfootforward.org/2024/04/yet-another-broken-pledge-from-rishi-sunak-pm-ditches-promise-to-get-flights-off-to-rwanda-by-the-spring/ Many articles from LeftFootForward today.

He now says that he expects deportation flights to take off to the east African country in 10-12 weeks’ time.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is facing yet more humiliation after breaking yet another pledge, which he insisted he was on track to meet just two weeks ago.

Rishi Sunak had promised that flights removing asylum seekers to Rwanda, who had arrived via illegal routes, would be taking off in the Spring, despite the legislation being hit by a number of delays and setbacks.

He now says that he expects deportation flights to take off to the east African country in 10-12 weeks’ time.

Sunak’s press conference at Downing Street this morning came as his flagship Rwanda bill undergoes the Parliamentary ‘ping-pong’ stage between the Lords and the Commons, with both Houses of Parliament scheduled to sit late into the night today to get the bill passed.

…

https://leftfootforward.org/2024/04/yet-another-broken-pledge-from-rishi-sunak-pm-ditches-promise-to-get-flights-off-to-rwanda-by-the-spring/ Many articles from LeftFootForward today.

Continue ReadingYet another broken pledge from Rishi Sunak: PM ditches promise to get flights off to Rwanda by the Spring