… on a quiet day, I can hear her breathing

Tag: Benjamin Netanyahu

  • Turkey, Malaysia Back South Africa’s ICJ Genocide Case Against Israel

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

    A man holds both Palestinian and Turkish flags at a rally in Istanbul on January 1, 2024.  (Photo: Ilker Eray/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images)

    “Israel’s murder of more than 22,000 Palestinian civilians, the majority of whom were women and children, in Gaza for nearly three months should not go unpunished in any way,” said a Turkish spokesperson.

    South Africa is no longer alone in bringing its claim of genocide by the Israeli government to the International Court of Justice, following announcements from the Turkish Foreign Ministry and the Malaysian Ministry of Foreign Affairs that they support the case.

    Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesperson Oncu Keceli said Wednesday that those responsible for the killing of tens of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza since October 7 “must be held accountable before international law.”

    “Israel’s murder of more than 22,000 Palestinian civilians, the majority of whom were women and children, in Gaza for nearly three months should not go unpunished in any way,” Keceli said. “We hope that the process will be completed as soon as possible.”

    The ICJ is scheduled to hear the case on January 11-12. Israeli representatives are expected to appear at the hearing.

    International rights groups issued a call on Wednesday for other countries to file Declarations of Intervention at the court, whose authority Israel recognizes, to bolster South Africa’s case.

    The Turkish Foreign Ministry said it expects “that within the framework of this application, the ICJ will decide on provisional measures involving those to stop Israel’s attacks on Gaza.”

    The Malaysia Ministry of Foreign Affairs said late Tuesday that it “welcomes the application by South Africa instituting proceedings against Israel… concerning the violations by Israel of its obligations under the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in relation to Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.”

    A spokesperson for the South African Foreign Ministry told The Jerusalem Post that it expects other countries to soon follow Turkey and Malaysia’s lead and back its case.

    In its 84-page complaint, South Africa detailed the genocidal intent that’s been displayed in numerous public statements by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Isaac Herzog, and other top officials, as well as Israel’s bombardment of civilian targets and forced displacement of civilians.

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

  • Morning Star: Today ‘Peace on Earth’ must be a demand, not just a seasonal piety

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    https://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/article/today-peace-earth-must-be-demand-not-just-seasonal-piety

    A Palestinian man carries the body of his grandson who was killed in the Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip, at the hospital Rafah, southern Gaza, December 22, 2023

    NO EVENTUAL US green light to allow aid into Gaza — where a quarter of the population are starving — can disguise its wrecking role throughout the UN process.

    The urgency of getting food, water and fuel to more than a million displaced Palestinians has not deterred Washington from delaying a UN resolution repeatedly, insisting on the removal of calls for a ceasefire, watering down the demand that Israel open air, land and sea routes for humanitarian assistance and blocking a proposal for the UN rather than the Israeli military to approve deliveries.

    As with the security council ceasefire vote a fortnight ago — which the US alone opposed, with Britain alone abstaining — the mask has slipped.

    Everyone in the world can see who facilitates Israel’s murderous assault on Gaza even while crying crocodile tears about civilian victims.

    We know that Joe Biden’s reproaches to Benjamin Netanyahu for bombing hospitals and unleashing a wave of settler terror in the West Bank are accompanied by a steady flow of munitions to ensure the Israeli Defence Forces can keep killing.

    We know too that the copycat expressions of regret from British leaders are meaningless while we permit the US to resupply Israel from the RAF’s Akrotiri airfield on Cyprus, which we can assume it is doing since ministers won’t answer questions on the flurry of US flights to Israel from that base.

    Britain and the US stand isolated and exposed. There will be geopolitical consequences.

    The brazen hypocrisy of supporting Israeli war crimes while condemning Russian ones in Ukraine has not gone unnoticed, and will further undermine efforts to convince the global South to abide by US and EU sanctions against Moscow, as European diplomats admit.

    Normalisation of Israel’s relations with Arab states, a priority aim of US diplomacy in recent years, lies in tatters. Following the China-brokered Saudi-Iranian rapprochement and the invitation to five Middle East and north African states to join the Brics bloc of developing countries in 2024, this war could be catastrophic for US power in the region, accelerating a shift to Beijing already under way.

    We have little influence over such developments. Not so the domestic political fallout. The medics’ vigils for Gaza, the hundreds of local demonstrations and fundraisers, the gigantic national peace marches, have changed British politics.

    The British and US governments are not just exposed in the eyes of the world, but before their own peoples. In Britain, the Palestine movement has thrown open doors our whole Establishment have spent the last four years nailing shut — it is again possible to question Britain’s role in the world, its uniquely close alliance with the United States and the sinister character of our military operations and armaments industry.

    As we learned in 2017, when Jeremy Corbyn pointed to the links between British foreign policy and terrorism and found a majority agreed with him, there is mass scepticism about our rulers’ claims about the world and an openness to building a different kind of Britain, one that promotes peace and co-operation instead of war and plunder.

    The ruling-class response to Corbyn’s popularity was ferocious. The response on Palestine will be no less so.

    Human Rights Watch has already pointed to Facebook parent company Meta’s complicity in a global censorship operation targeting Palestine solidarity work.

    In Britain, we have seen off one home secretary trying to ban peace marches, but should the movement falter or the numbers dwindle the government will be tempted to revisit this.

    Our movement must go on the offensive, ensuring politicians who will not back a ceasefire fear for their seats, and demanding a reversal of all the attacks on Palestine activism of recent years, including the bids to ban the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement.

    This Christmas the traditional call for peace on Earth must be turned from an abstract seasonal aspiration to a practical mobilising demand.

    https://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/article/today-peace-earth-must-be-demand-not-just-seasonal-piety

    dizzy: I hope that Morning Star will excuse me reproducing this article fully.

    Shine a light on Gaza’s suffering

    More than half a million people in Gaza are starving, UN warns

    Normalization with Israel has been ended by its brutal war on Gaza

    HRW: Meta Adds ‘Insult to Injury’ by Censoring Pro-Palestinian Voices

    NYC Workers March for Gaza: ‘Stop the Bombs! Cease-Fire Now!’

    US Quietly Working to Prevent Conference on Geneva Convention Violations

  • Warren Leads Letter Pressing Biden on Israel’s Use of US Arms

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

    An Israeli soldier carries a 155mm artillery shell near a self-propelled howitzer deployed at a position near the border with Lebanon in the upper Galilee region of northern Israel on October 18, 2023. (Photo: Jalaa Marey/AFP via Getty Images)

    The senators—who are seeking improved oversight—sounded the alarm on the “staggering number of civilian deaths” caused by Israeli bombing with U.S.-supplied ordnance.

    As the number of Gazans killed, maimed, or left missing by Israeli bombs and bullets—many of them manufactured in the United States— tops 60,000, a group of U.S. senators on Tuesday urged President Joe Biden to boost oversight of how American arms are used against Palestinian civilians.

    Noting that Israel’s response to the Hamas-led attacks of October 7 “has killed over 15,000 Palestinians in Gaza, the vast majority of whom are civilians,” Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Tim Kaine (D-Va.), and Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) asked the White House for “information on the accountability and oversight measures that ensure any use of U.S. weapons is in accordance with U.S. policy and international law.”

    “U.S. allies and human rights groups have argued many of these deaths were preventable,” the senators wrote in their letter. “In its campaign, Israel has also repeatedly targeted areas it previously designated as ‘safe zones,’ after telling Palestinians to move to these locations for safety.”

    “[Israel Defense Forces] airstrikes have also hit the densely populated Jabalia refugee camp multiple times,” the lawmakers noted. “The first strike killed ‘more than 100 people’ and injured ‘hundreds’ more. The second strike left dozens wounded and rescuers said those killed included ‘whole families’… Other strikes and operations have targeted hospitals.”

    A growing number of legal, human rights, and other experts have called Israel’s war on Gaza a genocide.

    The senators’ letter continues:

    While these strikes were aimed at Hamas, we have concerns that strikes on civilian infrastructure have not been proportional, particularly given the predictable harm to civilians. The United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has said these strikes are ‘clear violations of international humanitarian law.’ Even Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has admitted that his government’s efforts to minimize civilian casualties to date are ‘not successful.’

    The letter singles out 155mm artillery shells, unguided explosive rounds with a “kill radius” of about 50 meters, with shrapnel able to kill and wound people hundreds of meters away.

    “The IDF requires its ground forces to stay 250 meters away to protect its own forces,” the letter states. “The IDF has previously used these shells to ‘hit populated areas including neighborhoods, hospitals, schools, shelters, and safe zones,’ causing a staggering number of civilian deaths.”

    “Over 30 U.S.-based civil society organizations warned against providing Israel 155mm shells in an open letter to [U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd] Austin calling the shells ‘inherently indiscriminate’ and ‘a grave risk to civilians,’” the lawmakers added.

    Claiming that “civilian harm prevention is a cornerstone of American foreign policy”—a curious assertion given that the United States has killed more foreign civilians by far than any other armed force on the planet since the end of World War II—the senators argued that “we must ensure accountability for the use of U.S. weapons we provided to our ally.”

    “As you have acknowledged, Israel’s military campaign has included ‘indiscriminate bombing,’” they wrote. “Your administration must ensure that existing guidance and standards are being used to evaluate the reports of Israel using U.S. weapons in attacks that harm civilians in order to more rigorously protect civilian safety during Israel’s operations in Gaza.”

    To that end, the senators ask Biden to answer 13 questions, including:

    • Are U.S. officials aware of the IDF’s current policy on preventing civilian harm?
    • What insights does the U.S. government have into how the Israeli military assesses issues of proportionality?
    • What systems does the Israeli government have in place to investigate allegations of civilian harm?
    • Does the U.S. Defense Department or State Department plan to provide Israel with guidance on how 155mm shells should be
      used when civilians are nearby?
    • Are you aware of any requests for inspector general reviews or audits of U.S. military assistance provided to Israel?

    The senators’ letter came ahead of Wednesday’s procedural vote on whether to begin debating a $106 billion “national security” spending package requested by Biden, which includes more than $10 billion in additional U.S. military aid to Israel atop the nearly $4 billion it receives each year from Washington.

    On Tuesday, Sanders—who has angered progressives by failing to demand a Gaza cease-fire—said he opposes sending billions of dollars in unconditional U.S. armed aid to the “right-wing, extremist” Israeli government led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

    “Israel must dramatically change its approach to minimize civilian harm,” he said, “and lay out a wider political process that can secure lasting peace.”

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

    Human Rights Monitor Says 90% Killed by Israel in Gaza Were Civilians

    US Official Won’t Call Forced Abandonment of Gaza Newborns a War Crime

    ‘Apocalyptic’ Horror in Gaza Called ‘Total Failure of Our Shared Humanity’

  • ‘Nightmarish Situation’ as Israel Resumes Assault on Gaza

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

    Search and rescue teams and civilians gather among the rubble of buildings in Deir Al Balah, Gaza on December 1, 2023. (Photo: Ashraf Amra/Anadolu via Getty Images)

    “Anything other than sustained peace and at-scale emergency aid will mean catastrophe for the children of Gaza,” said a UNICEF spokesperson.

    Israel resumed its assault on the Gaza Strip Friday morning just minutes after the pause with Hamas officially expired, ending a fragile seven-day truce that created conditions for the release of hundreds of Israeli and Palestinian captives and allowed additional—but still inadequate—humanitarian aid to enter the besieged territory.

    Gaza’s health ministry said that Israel’s post-pause airstrikes killed more than 30 people and wounded dozens more, hitting a multi-story residential building and other civilian infrastructure in the southern part of the strip, where many Gazans sought refuge as Israeli forces targeted the north in earlier stages of its attack.

    The Associated Press reported that Israeli forces “dropped leaflets over parts of southern Gaza urging people to leave their homes, suggesting it was preparing to widen its offensive.”

    “The Israeli military also released a map carving up the Gaza Strip into hundreds of numbered parcels, and asked residents to learn the number associated with their location in case of an eventual evacuation,” AP added. “It said the map would eventually be interactive, but it was not immediately clear how Palestinians would be updated on their designated parcel numbers and calls for evacuation.”

    Robert Mardini, director general of the International Committee of the Red Cross, toldAgence France-Presse that the resumption of bombing drags Gazans “back to the nightmarish situation they were in before the truce took place,” with millions of people in desperate need of food, medicine, clean water, and sanitary living conditions.

    “People are at a breaking point, hospitals are at a breaking point, the whole Gaza Strip is in a very precarious state,” said Mardini. “There is nowhere safe to go for civilians. We have seen in the hospitals where our teams have been working, that over the past days, hundreds of severely injured people have arrived. The influx of severely wounded outpaced the real capacity of hospitals to absorb and treat the wounded, so there is a massive challenge.”

    James Elder, spokesperson for the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF), warned Friday that “the humanitarian situation in Gaza is so perilous that anything other than sustained peace and at-scale emergency aid will mean catastrophe for the children of Gaza.”

    “To accept the sacrifice of the children in Gaza is humanity giving up,” said Elder. “This is our last chance, before we delve into seeking to explain yet another utterly avoidable tragedy.”

    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is clinging to his job amid plummeting approval ratings, had pledged to continue assailing Gaza following the end of the truce, which marked the first pause in fighting since the war began in the wake of a Hamas-led attack on southern Israel in early October.

    The Financial Times reported Friday that Israel’s government is preparing for a war that “will stretch for a year or more, with the most intensive phase of the ground offensive continuing into early 2024.”

    “The multi-phase strategy envisages Israeli forces, who are garrisoned inside north Gaza, making an imminent push deep into the south of the besieged Palestinian enclave,” FT reported, citing unnamed sources familiar with the planning. “The goals include killing the three top Hamas leaders—Yahya Sinwar, Mohammed Deif, and Marwan Issa—while securing ‘a decisive’ military victory against the group’s 24 battalions and underground tunnel network and destroying its ‘governing capability in Gaza.’”

    An investigation published Thursday by +972 Magazine and Local Call found that Israeli forces have used “expanded authorization for bombing non-military targets” and “the loosening of constraints regarding expected civilian casualties,” as well as “an artificial intelligence system to generate more potential targets than ever,” to wage its devastating war on Gaza, killing more than 14,500 people in less than two months and displacing 70% of the territory’s population.

    In one case that anonymous Israeli sources described to the two outlets, Israel’s military command “knowingly approved the killing of hundreds of Palestinian civilians in an attempt to assassinate a single top Hamas military commander.”

    “Another reason for the large number of targets, and the extensive harm to civilian life in Gaza, is the widespread use of a system called ‘Habsora’ (‘The Gospel’), which is largely built on artificial intelligence and can ‘generate’ targets almost automatically at a rate that far exceeds what was previously possible,” +972 and Local Call found. “This AI system, as described by a former intelligence officer, essentially facilitates a ‘mass assassination factory.’”

    U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken reportedly urged Israel to do more to protect civilians in Gaza during a meeting with the nation’s leaders on Thursday, but the Israeli government has repeatedly brushed aside public and private concerns expressed by the Biden administration, which continues to provide unconditional support for the assault.

    “Blinken suggested that his call for protecting Palestinian civilians had reached receptive ears, at least in general terms,” The New York Times reported. “He did not cite any specific commitments by Israel, however.”

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

  • Hundreds of Thousands Join London March to Demand ‘Cease-Fire Now’ in Gaza

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

    People take part in the National March for Palestine in London on Saturday November 11, 2023.  (Photo: Victoria Jones/PA Images via Getty Images)

    “In our thousands, in our millions, we are all Palestinians,” demonstrators chanted at Saturday’s march, described as one of the largest political protests in U.K. history.

    Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets of London on Saturday to demand an immediate cease-fire in Gaza as Israeli forces ramped up their aerial and ground assault on the Palestinian enclave’s hospitals and other civilian infrastructure, intensifying the territory’s humanitarian crisis.

    Described as one of the largest political demonstrations in U.K. history, the march moved ahead despite criticism from British Home Secretary Suella Braverman and Tory Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who suggested earlier in the week that the protest should have been banned by London police given that it coincided with Armistice Day. Braverman accused the police of giving favorable treatment to “pro-Palestinian mobs.”

    “I am horrified by the tone, language, and incitement our own government is using to whip up hatred against its own citizens—citizens who are standing up in solidarity with the besieged and bombed citizens of Gaza,” British Army veteran and march participant Nadia Mitchell wrote for OpenDemocracy. “Personally, I cannot think of a more appropriate day to demand a cease-fire than on the day we remember the mother of all cease-fires, to remember and honor those who sacrificed their lives in pursuit of peace and an end to war.”

    Some U.K. lawmakers, including former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and Labour MP John McDonnell, joined Saturday’s march alongside hundreds of thousands of peace activists, union members, and people of all faiths.

    “In our thousands, in our millions, we are all Palestinians,” demonstrators chanted.

    (Photo: Henry Nicholls/AFP via Getty Images)

    Reuters reported that “police said far-right groups opposing the march were present in central London in ‘significant numbers,’ leading to skirmishes with officers near the Cenotaph war memorial, close to the Houses of Parliament and in Westminster.”

    “Officers in riot gear sought to contain the far-right protesters, some of whom threw bottles at them, and police vehicles sped around the city to respond to reports of tensions in the streets,” the outlet added.

    Participants in the mass demonstration, meanwhile, marched from London’s Hyde Park to the U.S. Embassy to protest the Biden administration’s unwavering military and political support for the Israeli government as the death toll in Gaza continues to climb.

    The head of the World Health Organization told the United Nations Security Council on Friday that Israel’s bombing and siege are killing one child on average every 10 minutes in Gaza.

    “Nowhere and no one is safe,” said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

    Mohammed Abu Mughaisib, deputy medical coordinator for Doctors Without Borders in Gaza, toldThe Washington Post on Saturday that hospitals in northern Gaza have become “a graveyard” due to mounting Israeli attacks.

    Medical workers at al-Nasr pediatric hospital were forced to leave babies in incubators behind as they evacuated south, Abu Mughaisib said.

    “The medical staff evacuated because of the shelling on the pediatric hospital, and they couldn’t save the babies to take them out, so they left five babies alone in the intensive care on the machines and the ventilators,” he told the newspaper. “That’s the situation: leaving babies now alone on the ventilators.”

    (Photo: Victoria Jones/PA Images via Getty Images)

    Saturday’s march was organized by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC), Stop the War Coalition, Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, and other advocacy groups.

    “We march to call for an end to the indiscriminate bombing of civilians and a #CeasefireNOW,” PSC director Ben Jamal wrote on social media. “We march in respect of the rights of all to live in freedom and with dignity.”

    The demonstration is part of a growing international movement supporting a cease-fire in the Gaza Strip as Western leaders, including Sunak and U.S. President Joe Biden, refuse to demand an end to Israel’s siege and relentless bombing campaign.

    Earlier this week, as Israeli forces encircled northern Gaza, Biden told reporters that there is “no possibility” of a cease-fire. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly rejected a proposed five-day cease-fire in exchange for the release of some of the hostages held by Hamas.

    (Photo: Henry Nicholls/AFP via Getty Images)

    Video footage of Saturday’s march shows the streets of central London packed with demonstrators expressing solidarity with the people of Gaza and demanding an end to Israel’s assault, which began after a deadly Hamas-led attack in southern Israel last month.

    An estimated 300,000 people took part in Saturday’s march, according to London authorities.

    “This footage shows the true will of the British people,” wrote Ahmed Alnaouq, a London-based Palestinian journalist and co-founder of the nonprofit We Are Not Numbers. “Hundreds of thousands are protesting peacefully despite rounds of vicious smear campaigns and intimidation. “All say in one word: CEASE-FIRE NOW!”

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