progressiveissuesblog

Jewish and Israel are not the Same

Updated 2024-01-05

2023-12-19 Jewish Groups Line Up In Support Of Biden’s Muslim Court Pick Assailed By GOP    Fifteen Jewish organizations on Tuesday pledged their “strong support” for President Joe Biden’s historic Muslim court pick Adeel Mangi ― days after Republican senators subjected him to hostile and Islamophobic questioning in his confirmation hearing.   GOP Sens. Ted Cruz (Texas), Tom Cotton (Ark.) and Josh Hawley (Mo.) yelled at and interrupted Mangi throughout his hearing. They demanded that he share his personal views on the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the Oct. 7 attack in Israel and the Israeli-Hamas conflict in general. They also repeatedly tried to tie him to pro-Palestinian comments made by people he didn’t know, and to events he didn’t know about

“Having ethical and unbiased judges is ingrained in our Jewish teachings in which we are taught that ‘judges need to be people of strength through good deeds,’” reads the groups’ letter to all 100 senators, obtained by HuffPost. “It is clear to us that Adeel A. Mangi is a person of strength and good deeds, as evidenced by his career, devotion to his community, and commitment to religious freedom and civil rights.”   The letter is signed by the National Council of Jewish Women, Bend the Arc: Jewish Action, Carolina Jews for Justice, The Shalom Center, and others. The groups collectively represent more than a million people nationwide.  The Jewish groups’ letter comes after Mangi, who is a partner at Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler LLP, endured a series of offensive and irrelevant questions from Republicans in the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday.   https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/jewish-groups-line-up-in-support-of-biden-s-muslim-court-pick-assailed-by-gop/ar-AA1lLelV

2023-11-06 Conflating Jewish and Pro-Israel Is Wrong and Misleading     As protests erupt worldwide against Israel’s ferocious bombardment and ground invasion of Gaza, which has claimed the lives of more than 10,000 Palestinians (Reuters, 11/6/23), US media ponder how all of this impacts Jewish people. Sadly, the way this is often framed completely mischaracterizes Jewish opinion and the pro-Israel movement, falsely acting as if Jewish opinion is unquestionably unified in support of Israeli military attacks and in opposition to Palestinian rights.      https://fair.org/home/conflating-jewish-and-pro-israel-is-wrong-and-misleading/

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Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

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Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Israeli Outposts

Updated 2023-11-13

Israeli outpost (wiipedia)     In Israeli law, an outpost is an unauthorized or illegal Israeli settlement within the West Bank, constructed without the required authorization from the Israeli government in contravention of Israeli statutes regulating planning and construction. In Israeli law, outposts are distinguished from settlements authorized by the Israeli government. This distinction between illegal outposts and “legal” settlements is not endorsed by international law, which considers both a violation of the norms, governing belligerent occupations, applicable to the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Outposts appeared after the 1993 Oslo I Accord, when the Israeli government made commitments to freeze the building of new settlements Although outposts were not officially supported by the government, Israeli public authorities and other government bodies played a major role in establishing and developing them, according to the 2005 Sasson Report, commissioned by then Prime Minister Ariel Sharon Outposts differ from neighborhoods in that they are built at a substantial distance from authorized settlements, while neighborhoods are attached to an existing settlement.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_outpost

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Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

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Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Israel’s Worldwide Oppression

Updated 2023-11-13

Israel’s Worldwide Role in Repression   From South America to South Africa, and all over the world, Israel, often acting together with the United States, has undermined popular movements by supplying weapons, technology and training to repressive governments.

This website seeks to gather testimony and expose Israel’s historic and ongoing role in transforming its colonization of Palestine into profit through exporting repression around the world.   https://israelglobalrepression.wordpress.com/

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Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

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Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Israel Oppression of Palestinian People

Updated 2024-04-03

A 101 Course to Understanding Israel’s Oppression of the Palestinian People – USCPR   Many people are held back from taking a stand on the issue of Palestine/Israel by the common misconception that it is “complicated.” Here, we explain the steady continuation of the more than 100-year-old settler colonial project that is Zionism. Palestine 101: Not That Complicated can help folks both familiar and unfamiliar with the issue understand the ongoing process of Israel’s ethnic cleansing of Palestine, and the legacy of Palestinian resistance to the colonization of their homeland. Make sure to explore the other tracks of the curriculum:    https://uscpr.org/activist-resource/palestine-101/

Why does the world think that ᑭᗩᒪᗴSTIᑎᗴ is different ⁉️   https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=10161059104061100&set=a.10151463016161100

2023-11-21 Palestinian Poet Mosab Abu Toha Freed After Being Abducted in Gaza & Beaten by Israeli Forces in Jail     Israeli troops detained and reportedly beat the acclaimed Palestinian poet and author Mosab Abu Toha after he was stopped at an Israeli military checkpoint Sunday while heading toward the Rafah border crossing with his family in Gaza. His whereabouts had been unknown until today, when news emerged that he had been released. According to the Palestinian lawyer Diana Buttu, Abu Toha was taken to an Israeli prison in the Naqab, where he was interrogated and beaten along with more than 200 other Palestinians who remain in detention. We play excerpts from Abu Toha’s recent appearance on Democracy Now! and speak to Buttu, who says, “Mosab’s story is like that of so many Palestinians in Gaza.”  https://www.democracynow.org/2023/11/21/gaza_mosab_abu_toha_kidnapping

2023-11-17 DIFFERENT TACTICS, SAME WAR: THE PERILS OF TREATING ISRAEL’S WEST BANK OFFENSIVE AS SEPARATE FROM GAZA    The horrors in Gaza are just one part of Israel’s unified system of controlling Palestinians from the river to the sea.  Violence by Israeli forces and settlers has escalated sharply over the last six weeks, in a year that is already the deadliest for Palestinians and Israelis in the West Bank in 20 years. With all eyes on Gaza, where Israel has killed well over 11,000 Palestinians, about half of them children, the West Bank is treated by journalists, policymakers, analysts, and Israel itself as a separate, distinct front, as if compartmentalized. Israel’s head of the Shin Bet, the country’s internal security service, has warned that settler violence could contribute to the West Bank “erupting,” hurting Israel’s war in Gaza. The U.S. has been urging Israel repeatedly to rein in settler violence in the West Bank, warning that it could become another front in this war. “They’re attacking Palestinians in places they’re entitled to be,” President Joe Biden said.   But the West Bank already is a front; it is part of the same war.   https://theintercept.com/2023/11/17/gaza-west-bank-israel-war/

2023-10-17 The Israeli War on the Palestinian People   The U.S. and European allies have lined up behind the Israeli assault on Gaza. But uncertainty remains around Prime Minister Netanyahu’s future, “normalization” with Arab states, and the fate of apartheid.   

Hundreds of thousands of people are trying to flee northern Gaza, in dilapidated cars and trucks overflowing with makeshift packages, children, and families, even on foot or in donkey carts. The rubble of buildings destroyed by bombing can be seen all around, buildings that were once hospitals, shelters, and housing. The Dantesque image replicated by the media is of the northern Gaza Strip on October 14, when the 24-hour deadline given by the Israeli military for the evacuation of more than 1 million Palestinians expired. Such a task is considered impossible even by the United Nations, which warned of the ongoing humanitarian catastrophe. The Gaza Strip is an open-air prison of only about 140 square miles, with a higher population density than London, from which it is practically impossible to leave, even if Egypt agreed to open the Rafah border crossing.

As has been demonstrated by organizations such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the Israeli NGO B’Tselem, what exists in Israel is an apartheid regime, which subjects the Palestinian people to various types of oppression in Gaza, the West Bank, and in the state of Israel, where the so-called Israeli Arabs make up about 20 percent of the population. Therefore, Israel cannot be considered a “democracy” for some and a regime of colonial oppression for others.

The Israeli regime resembles the South African regime of apartheid in several ways. For example, the Palestinian people are deprived of their basic democratic rights, starting with national self-determination; they live under military occupation, and within Israel they have citizenship but no nationality. The state of Israel has declared by law its exclusively Jewish character, which discriminates against Arabs and other minorities. It would be the equivalent of postulating, for example, that the United States is an exclusively white Christian state.    https://www.leftvoice.org/the-israeli-war-on-the-palestinian-people/

2023-10-07 Hamas’ War on Israel Offers Sobering Clarity in the Fight Against Evil | Opinion    It is already clear that Palestinian terrorists have crossed a line as never before. Many nations have quickly declared that the brutality perpetrated by Palestinian terrorists is unconscionable. Yet unsurprisingly, many more nations have remained silent or, worse, sought to explain away the brutality to fit their own political perspectives and world views. They are deeply wrong.  

Hamas has sunk to a depth of savagery that should shock us to the core. The terror group infiltrated Israel by land, air, and sea, and attacked nearby communities. They slaughtered the elderly, gunned down civilians in their homes, kidnapped mothers with babies in their arms, mutilated the bodies of men and women, and paraded their victims through the streets of Gaza in a show of celebration. 

Through these and many other inhumane acts, Palestinian terrorists have shown their fight is not about settlements, checkpoints, or the myriad other policies that Israelis and Palestinians squabble over. This weekend, we saw what militant Palestinians and their supporters mean when they tell us they want the land ‘From the River to the Sea.’ They want every inch of land – every city, town, kibbutz, settlement, and village—between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and they want it cleansed of every single Jew.   https://www.newsweek.com/hamas-war-israel-offers-sobering-clarity-fight-against-evil-opinion-1832902

Israel Oppression of Palestinian People – Pre Oct 7,2023

2024-03-28 Norman Finkelstein and Chris Hedges discuss Israel, Gaza, Oct. 7 at Princeton    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eEz22kyukY&t=172s

2024-02-16 ICJ Hearings to Examine 57 Years of Israeli Occupation of Palestine    More than 50 countries are set to participate in next week’s hearings at the International Court of Justice focusing on Israel’s illegal 57-year occupation of Palestine, a forum that follows the Hague tribunal’s finding last month that Israel is “plausibly” committing genocide in occupied Gaza.

The ICJ—also known as the World Court—will hold a week of hearings on the legal consequences of Israel’s occupation of Palestine, which dates to the Israeli conquest of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, Gaza Strip, Syrian Golan Heights, and Egyptian Sinai Peninsula during the 1967 Six-Day War.

“The International Court of Justice is set for the first time to broadly consider the legal consequences of Israel’s nearly six-decades-long occupation and mistreatment of the Palestinian people,” Human Rights Watch senior legal adviser Clive Baldwin said in a statement. “Governments that are presenting their arguments to the court should seize these landmark hearings to highlight the grave abuses Israeli authorities are committing against Palestinians, including the crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution.”  

The West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Golan Heights remain under Israeli military occupation six decades after their conquest. The United Nations—to which the ICJ belongs—and many international NGOs contend that, despite removing its troops and settlers from Gaza two decades ago, Israel continues to occupy Gaza by controlling the besieged enclave’s airspace, territorial waters, and the entry and exit of people and goods.

Since the October 7 Hamas-led attacks on Israel, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) have killed or wounded more than 100,000 Palestinians in Gaza while forcibly displacing around 90% of the population. Numerous Israeli leaders have called for the renewed physical occupation, Jewish resettlement, and ethnic cleansing of the strip.   During the current assault on Gaza, occupation forces have also killed at least 388 Palestinians, including 99 children, in the West Bank, according to U.N. human rights officials.   Israeli settlers have for decades been steadily colonizing the occupied territories under the protection of the IDF, while ethnically cleansing Palestinians whose lands and homes they steal.  https://www.commondreams.org/news/israeli-occupation

2022-08-22 CIA unable to corroborate Israel’s ‘terror’ label for Palestinian rights groups     Exclusive: sources say report shows CIA unable to find evidence to support Israeli claim, but finding does not prompt US rebuttal.    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/aug/22/cia-report-israel-palestinian-rights-groups

2022-08-21 Palestinian rights group chief arrested by Israeli intelligence    Khaled Quzmar, general director of Defense of Children International – Palestine (DCIPalestine), was taken into custody on Sunday by the Shin Bet intelligence agency, according to a tweet from the organization.   Quzmar was not allowed to have legal counsel accompany him.”  It later said that, after two hours in custody, Quzmar was released.

The arrest is just the latest move in a campaign being waged by Israel against a number of Palestinian human rights organizations in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Six rights groups – Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association, Al-Haq, Bisan Center for Research and Development, the Union of Agricultural Work Committees and the Union of Palestinian Women Committees as well as DCIPalestine – were designated as “terrorist organisations” by Israel in October 2021 and since then they have been subjected to increasing scrutiny.  Many of the organisations have received funding from EU countries.

Earlier on Sunday, Al-Haq tweeted that its director had received a threatening phone call from an Israeli intelligence official over its work.  According to Al-Haq, Shawan Jabarin was summoned by the Shin Bet for “interrogation” while the caller made “threats of imprisonment and other measures if Al-Haq continues its work”.   On Friday, Israel raided and forcibly shuttered the rights groups’ offices in the West Bank, with soldiers confiscating items. The offices of the Union of Health Workers Committees, which has not been designated a terrorist organisation, were also raided.

The six groups that have been so designated have denied allegations of “terrorism” and their closure has met with criticism from both the United Nations and human rights organisations.

The foreign ministries of Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden have all said Israel has failed to provide them “substantial information” on the accusations and pledged to continue cooperating with the groups in the absence of any evidence. https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-palestine-rights-group-chief-arrested

2014-07-17 Pounding Gaza – World’s Largest Open-Air Prison   An already troubling humanitarian crisis has intensified with the Israeli bombardment of Gaza, an area about twice the size of the District of Columbia that has about three times as many residents (1.8 million). Israel has been using its highly touted precise missiles to hit numerous targets. This collective punishment, a war crime per se, wreaks havoc on civilians and their life-sustaining infrastructure.

With over 1,700 explosive strikes so far, the Israeli military has pounded homes, schools, mosques, electric and water facilities, municipal buildings, health clinics, moving vehicles, a home for the seriously disabled and even tiny agriculture areas. As a result of these attacks, over two hundred and thirty Gazans have died and over seventeen hundred have been injured so far, about eighty percent are civilians, a majority of whom are women and children, according to UN observers.

That is only part of the continuing war against Gaza. For years, Israel has maintained a siege/blockade, restricting the importation of adequate food, medicine, water, electricity, construction materials and other necessities needed by the refugees in the world’s largest open-air prison. These daily deprivations have taken a deadly toll. Fatalities, sicknesses, untreated cancers have resulted. Half of the children are seriously malnourished due to the dire poverty associated with the Israeli air, land and sea encirclement. (There are even harsh restrictions on Gazan fishermen.)   https://nader.org/2014/07/17/pounding-gaza-worlds-largest-open-air-prison/

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Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

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Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Israel Intelligence Failure

Updated 2023-11-13

2023-10-16 Gaza is Burning in Lockstep with the Great Reset   The latest Israel-Hamas conflict was either deliberately engineered or it was the result of a remarkable concatenation of security lapses. Current affairs commentator Efrat Fenigson, a former Israel Defense Force (IDF) reservist, was among the first to concisely unpack the sheer improbability of a Hamas sneak attack on an ultra-secure Israeli border complex.   https://www.activistpost.com/2023/10/gaza-is-burning-in-lockstep-with-the-great-reset.html

2023-10-12 Israel had intel on Hamas activity but didn’t put Gaza border on high alert    Why it matters: Israeli leaders are facing growing criticism — and questions — over how they failed to prevent or quickly stop the deadliest attacks on its territory in decades.  

Behind the scenes: The Israeli officials said that on Friday — the day before the attack — Israeli intelligence saw signs of Hamas activity in Gaza that suggested the militant group could have been preparing for an attack.  As a result, several high-level consultations took place on Friday night to try to understand what the new intelligence meant, the officials said.   IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi, Shin Bet director Ronen Bar and Aharon Haliva, head of military intelligence, participated in some of these consultations, which discussed whether the irregular activity was a Hamas exercise or initial preparation for an attack.   Israeli officials said that one of the possibilities that was raised in the consultation was to put IDF forces around Gaza on high alert because of a possible attack.   But after the consultations, the leaders decided to wait for more intelligence to come in. Several hours later, Hamas attacked.    https://www.axios.com/2023/10/12/hamas-attack-israel-intelligence-failure-high-alert-shen-bet

2023-10-11 While Israeli Media Examine Government Failure, US Papers Push ‘National Unity’   How could Israel—so famous for its military might and advanced intelligence capabilities—have missed the warnings of such an attack? The coordinated nature of the rocket attacks and assaults on nearby towns make clear that this was a huge operation that took time and planning; paragliding attacks require practice runs that are not easy to hide (L’Orient Today, 10/9/23), for instance. Already, Israeli media have begun looking closely at the Israeli government’s actions to understand how and why this happened—in sharp contrast to US broadsheet opinion, which has largely rallied unquestioningly behind Israeli “national unity.” 

 An Israeli military veteran in the New York Post (10/9/23), hardly considered a pro-Palestine publication, blamed Israel for ignoring warnings from Egyptian intelligence about “something big.”

An editorial at Ha’aretz (10/8/23) put the blame squarely on Netanyahu, saying “he is the ultimate arbiter of Israeli foreign and security affairs.” It also pointed the finger at his right-wing policies on settlement expansion and allies with far-right extremist parties. “As expected, signs of an outbreak of hostilities began in the West Bank, where Palestinians started feeling the heavier hand of the Israeli occupier,” the editorial said, noting that “Hamas exploited the opportunity in order to launch its surprise attack.”

At the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (10/7/23), David Halperin, chief executive officer of the Israel Policy Forum, wrote that for the last year, “my colleagues and I…have joined with others in expressing concern about the nature of Israel’s far-right government.” The article—which questioned why Netanyahu’s government, famously hard-nosed on security, failed to protect the people—was reprinted in the Jerusalem Post (10/7/23).

Alon Pinkas (Ha’aretz, 10/9/23) wrote more directly: “Netanyahu should be removed as prime minister immediately—not ‘after the war,’ not after a plea bargain in his corruption trial, not after an election. Now.”   https://fair.org/home/while-israeli-media-examine-government-failure-us-papers-push-national-unity/

2023-10-08 SCOTT RITTER: Israel’s Massive Intelligence Failure     The origins of Israel’s intelligence failure on the Hamas attacks can be traced to the decision to rely on AI instead of the contrarian analysis born of the earlier intelligence failure of the 1973 Yom Kippur War.  How did such a massive, complex undertaking escape the notice of Israel’s vaunted intelligence service?  An equally important question is why wasn’t this attack detected by the U.S. intelligence community as well, given the massive expenditures made in countering terrorism since the terrorist attacks on the U.S. homeland of September 11, 2001?

The answers lie in the history of success Israel has enjoyed in identifying and responding to Hamas operations in the past, success which manifested itself into a culture of complacency, resulting in the deaths of hundreds of Israeli citizens — the very people the intelligence services were dedicated to protect.   The fact that this attack took place 50 years and a day from when Israel suffered what had been — up until this moment — Israel’s greatest intelligence failure, the 1973 Yom Kippur War, only reinforces the depth of the failure that transpired.

Israel’s fatal mistake was to openly brag about the role AI played in Operation Guardian of the Walls. Hamas was apparently able to take control of the flow of information being collected by Israel.

There has been much speculation about Hamas “going dark” regarding cell phone and computer usage to deny Israel the data that is contained in those means of communication. But “going dark” would have, by itself, been an intelligence indicator, one that AI would have certainly picked up.    Instead, it’s highly probable that Hamas maintained an elaborate communications deception plan, maintaining a level of communications sufficient in quantity and quality to avoid being singled out by AI — and by Israeli analysts deviating from the norm.   In the same way, Hamas would likely have maintained its physical profile of movement and activity to keep the Israeli AI algorithms satisfied that nothing strange was afoot.   This also meant any activity — such as training related to paragliding or amphibious operations — that might be detected and flagged by Israeli AI was done to avoid detection.

The Israelis had become prisoners of their own successes in intelligence collection.  https://consortiumnews.com/2023/10/08/scott-ritter-israels-massive-intelligence-failure/

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Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

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Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Hospital Attacks

Updated 2024-04-03

2024-03-12 As Starvation Death Toll Grows in Gaza, Israel Blocks Aid Over Scissors in Child Medical Kits     With the level of humanitarian aid reaching Gaza residents perilously low and creating what one group last week called “famine-like conditions” throughout the enclave, the United Nations’ top official overseeing relief for Palestinians on Tuesday condemned Israel’s latest reason for blocking a shipment: It included medical scissors for caring for children.

Israel flagged the scissors as a so-called “dual-use” item, suggesting the government feared medical workers in Gaza—where more than 600 attacks on hospitals have pushed the healthcare system toward collapse—would use the scissors as weapons instead of to care for people who have been injured in relentless bombings.

“Medical scissors are now added to a long list of banned items the Israeli authorities classify as ‘for dual use,'” said Philippe Lazzarini, commissioner-general of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). “The list includes basic and lifesaving items: from anesthetics, solar lights, oxygen cylinders, and ventilators, to water cleaning tablets, cancer medicines, and maternity kits.”   https://www.commondreams.org/news/israel-gaza-aid-scissors  

2024-02-07 Chris Hedges: The Silence of the Damned   Leading humanitarian and civic institutions, including major medical institutions, refuse to denounce Israel’s genocide in Gaza. This exposes their hypocrisy and complicity.

But these institutions — with a few notable exceptions such as The American Public Health Association that has called for a ceasefire — have either remained silent or, as with Dr. Matthew K. Wynia, the director of the Center for Bioethics and Humanities at the University of Colorado, attempted to justify Israeli war crimes.  These doctors — who somehow find it acceptable that in Gaza a child is killed every 10 minutes on average — are accomplices to genocide and stand in violation of the Geneva Convention. They embrace death as a solution, not life. The deans of U.S. medical schools and leading medical organizations, especially the American Medical Association (AMA) have joined the ranks of universities, law schools, churches and the media to turn their backs on the Palestinians.  

Robert Jay Lifton in his book The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide writes that “genocidal projects require the active participation of educated professionals — physicians, scientists, engineers, military leaders, lawyers, clergy, university professors and other teachers — who combine to create not only the technology of genocide but much of its ideological rationale, moral climate, and organizational process.”

A group of 100 Israeli doctors in November 2023 defended the bombing of hospitals in Gaza, claiming they were used as Hamas command centers, a charge Israel has been unable to verify.   https://consortiumnews.com/2024/02/07/chris-hedges-the-silence-of-the-damned/

2024-01-30 Israel’s war on Gaza updates: Israeli troops storm Al-Amal Hospital       Israeli troops have stormed Al-Amal Hospital in Khan Younis and are demanding doctors and displaced Palestinians evacuate, the Palestine Red Crescent says.https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/1/30/israels-war-on-gaza-live-israeli-forces-detain-dozens-in-un-shelter-raid

2023-12-20 SHOCKING VIDEO Shows Moment Gaza Hospital OBLITERATED by Israeli Missiles Live on Al Jazeera’s Air  Briahna Joy Gray and Robby Soave discuss the ceasefire protests over the Israel-Hamas War that took place at the Capitol yesterday.    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HFdf03JpnwE

2023-11-21 Israel’s War on Hospitals    Israel is carrying out a campaign to make Gaza uninhabitable. This campaign includes destroying all of Gaza’s hospitals. The message Israel is sending is clear – Nowhere is safe. If you stay you die.  

Israel is not attacking hospitals in Gaza because they are “Hamas command centers.” Israel is systematically and deliberately destroying Gaza’s medical infrastructure as part of a scorched earth campaign to make Gaza uninhabitable and escalate a humanitarian crisis. It intends to force 2.3 million Palestinians over the border into Egypt where they will never return.

Israel has destroyed and nearly emptied the Al Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. The Indonesian Hospital in Beit Lahia is next. Israel is deploying tanks and armored personnel carriers around the hospital and has fired rounds into the building, killing twelve people.

The playbook is familiar. Flyers are dropped by Israel over a hospital telling people to leave because the hospital is a base for “Hamas terrorist activities.” Tanks and artillery shells rip away parts of the hospital walls. Ambulances are blown up by Israeli missiles. Power and water is cut. Medical supplies are blocked. There are no painkillers, antibiotics and oxygen. The most vulnerable, premature babies in incubators and the gravely ill, die. Israeli soldiers raid the hospital and force everyone out at gunpoint.     https://countercurrents.org/2023/11/israels-war-on-hospitals/

2023-11-15 Biden admin justifies Israel’s assault on Gaza hospitals with recycled Israeli ‘intelligence’    As Israel assaults Gaza’s Shifa Hospital, the Biden administration claims that “Hamas does use hospitals” as military bases. Once again, Washington appears to be relying on dubious Israeli propaganda rather than independent analysis.        “I can confirm for you that we have information that Hamas, and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, used some hospitals in the Gaza Strip, including Al-Shifa, and tunnels underneath them, to conceal and to support their military operations and to hold hostages,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters Tuesday.

Kirby’s claim echoed the assertion by National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, who maintained that “open-source reporting” shows “Hamas does use hospitals, along with a lot of other civilian facilities, for command-and-control, for storing weapons, for housing its fighters.”

On November 14, Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh told reporters that US intelligence had no “boots on the ground,” nor any intelligence assets capable of independently gathering intelligence from or about Shifa. When asked if the declassified intel briefing spun out by Kirby and Sullivan arrived through Washington’s “Israeli counterparts,” she refused to answer. But she strongly suggested the intelligence dump was politically motivated.  https://thegrayzone.com/2023/11/15/biden-israels-gaza-hospitals-intelligence/

2023-11-13 “Beacon of Light”: Fellow Doctors Recall Dr. Hammam Alloh, Gaza Doctor Killed by Israeli Airstrike      We speak with two physicians who knew Dr. Hammam Alloh, a Palestinian nephrologist at Gaza’s Al-Shifa Hospital who was killed Saturday in an Israeli airstrike. They recall him as a “committed physician, wonderful father” and “beacon of light.” He had refused to heed Israeli directives to evacuate in order to continue providing care to his patients. “He spent a decade learning how to serve his people,” says Dr. Tanya Haj-Hassan with Doctors Without Borders. “He wanted his children to be able to see a day when they had a free, just, durable, free life in Palestine, without occupation,” says Dr. Ben Thomson, a fellow nephrologist who worked with Dr. Alloh.   Democracy Now! is an independent global news hourhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvLS_zbVwGM

2023-11-13 Largest US Medical Lobbying Group Shuts Down Resolution to Back Cease-Fire in Gaza      The AMA has a responsibility to uphold the well-being of healthcare workers and minimize human suffering, and it is clear that these values are not being upheld,” said Healthcare Workers for Palestine.

“Shame on the American Medical Association.”   That was one American nurse’s response to the news on Sunday that the powerful medical lobbying organization had shut down members’ call for a public statement that would declare the AMA’s support for “a cease-fire in Israel and Palestine in order to protect civilian lives and healthcare personnel.”

Since the finalization of the statement and the meeting, MedPage Todayreported, at least 60 medical workers had been killed by Israel’s bombardment, which targeted at least six hospitals in that period.   In recent weeks, doctors and nurses who have refused to leave their posts despite the repeated airstrikes and Israel’s ground attacks have resorted to performing Caesarean sections on pregnant women and other major surgeries without anesthesia, have been unable to properly sterilize medical instruments, and have been buying laundry detergent and vinegar to clean wounds due to the lack of supplies and electricity.

Despite the fact that Israel’s onslaught has seriously endangered doctors and nurses and left them unable to perform their duties, the AMA’s Resolution Committee recommended the statement not be reconsidered and said it did not meet the organization’s criteria for speaking out about an issue affecting the healthcare community.    https://www.commondreams.org/news/ama-ceasefire-resolution   

2023-11-12 ‘We Are Being Killed Here, Please Do Something’: Nurses and Doctors Plead for Gaza Cease-Fire    “We are nearly sure that we are alone now,” said a Doctors Without Borders surgeon at Gaza’s largest hospital. “No one hears us.”    “We are being killed here, please do something,” the nurse wrote. “The shelling is so close, my kids are crying and screaming in fear.” 

Doctors and nurses in the Gaza Strip issued urgent pleas for a cease-fire as Israeli forces encircled and attacked the territory’s largest hospital, trapping thousands of displaced people and threatening the lives of medical workers and patients.   One Doctors Without Borders nurse texted his colleagues from the basement of al-Shifa Hospital early Saturday, writing that “four or five families”—including his own—were sheltering there amid heavy bombardment and fighting around the facility.   https://www.commondreams.org/news/doctors-nurses-gaza-cease-fire

2023-11-11 ‘Can You Hear the Screams?’ Physician Says Western Leaders Complicit in Israeli Attacks on Gaza Hospitals   “When are you going to stop this?” Dr. Mads Gilbert asked U.S. President Joe Biden and the leaders of European nations.   A Norwegian physician who has volunteered in Gaza for decades said Friday that Western leaders, including U.S. President Joe Biden, are complicit in Israel’s intensifying assault on the Palestinian enclave’s hospitals, which are overwhelmed with airstrike victims and displaced people seeking refuge.     In a video message posted to social media as Israeli forces bombarded al-Shifa—Gaza’s largest hospital—and other medical facilities, Dr. Mads Gilbert asked, “Can you hear the screams from innocent people, refugees sheltering, trying to find a safe place, being bombed by the Israeli attack forces this morning inside the hospital, hospitals that are the temples of humanity and protection?”      https://www.commondreams.org/news/physician-gaza-hospitals

2023-11-10 Global Cease-Fire Call Grows as Israel Wages ‘War Against Hospitals’ in Gaza    “Children in Gaza are hanging by a thread,” said a UNICEF director, calling for attacks on healthcare facilities to stop immediately and the urgent delivery of supplies to hospitals.    As Israeli forces waged what al-Shifa’s director described as a “war against hospitals” in Gaza on Friday, United Nations officials, human rights groups, and doctors demanded the protection of medical facilities and renewed calls for a cease-fire.

“Half of the Gaza Strip’s 36 hospitals and two-thirds of its primary healthcare centers are not functioning at all,” World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told the U.N. Security Council. “Those that are functioning are operating way beyond their capacities. The health system is on its knees, and yet somehow is continuing to deliver some lifesaving care.”

Since the Hamas-led attack on October 7 that killed around 1,200 Israelis, the Israel Defense Forces’ (IDF) assault of Gaza has devastated civilian infrastructure, displaced about 70% of the strip’s 2.3 million residents—about half of whom are children—and killed over 11,000 Palestinians, including more than 4,500 children. Tens of thousands more are injured or missing.    https://www.commondreams.org/news/israel-bombs-hospital-in-gaza

2023-11-10 Israeli Military Attacks Several Hospitals in Northern Gaza       Israeli forces on Friday launched attacks on several hospitals in the Gaza Strip, including the territory’s largest medical facility, where thousands of displaced people have sought refuge from Israel’s relentless bombing campaign.    “Israel is now launching a war on Gaza City hospitals,” Mohammad Abu Selmeyah, director of Gaza’s main hospital, al-Shifa, toldReuters.

The World Health Organization confirmed Friday that hospitals in northern Gaza are “coming under bombardment.”https://www.commondreams.org/news/israeli-military-accused-of-attacking-gaza-hospitals-where-thousands-are-sheltering

2023-11-10 Why the US must support an immediate ceasefire in Gaza      For the past month, Palestinian medics have risked their lives and safety to treat Gaza’s wounded. Despite widespread, indiscriminate, and incessant bombardment by Israeli forces, our colleagues have continued working under fire.   With limited access to food, water, electricity, essential medicines, and medical supplies, they have persevered. On the rare occasions when we are able to connect over the phone—between communications blackouts and frequent movements to avoid attacks—they recount scenes of horror in the hospitals: dead bodies everywhere, people with crushed limbs rescued from collapsed buildings, orphaned children with severe burns covering most of their tiny bodies. They describe patients screaming in pain because there’s not enough anesthesia. All the while, they’re worried about being killed themselves as hospitals and ambulances are hit by airstrikes. And every day, they stay for their patients.

They can’t go on like this. No one in Gaza can go on like this. We need an immediate ceasefire.https://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/latest/why-us-must-support-immediate-ceasefire-gaza

2023-11-09 Human Rights Watch Sounds Alarm as Israeli Forces Close In On Gaza’s Largest Hospital    “Hospitals must always be protected. No area is a free-fire zone,” said one HRW director. “World leaders should urgently act to prevent further mass atrocities.” 

Israel—which is now also conducting ground operations—has bombed homes, schools, religious buildings, medical facilities, and even an ambulance convoy outside Gaza City’s al-Shifa Hospital, where an estimated 50,000 to 60,000 people are sheltering.

As Israeli troops neared the hospital on Thursday, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on social media that “with ongoing strikes and fighting nearby, we are gravely concerned about the well-being of thousands of civilians there, many children among them, seeking medical care and shelter, including people on life support, those who lost limbs in air strikes, and burn victims.” https://www.commondreams.org/news/al-shifa-hospital-gaza

2023-10-31 Israeli rabbis tell Netanyahu that Israel has a right to bomb Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza     Yesterday, Israeli right-wing journalist Amit Segal shared a letter from 45 influential Israeli rabbis (initial list), addressed to “Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu May His Light Shine, the heads of state and security apparatus,” explicitly affirming the right of the state to bomb the Al-Shifa’ hospital in Gaza – the main hospital in the strip.

The Israeli military has made an allegation that Hamas is using both Shifa and Al Quds hospitals as bases and has warned both institutions to evacuate before an expected attack. The allegations cannot be verified, and regardless, an attack on healthcare facilities is prohibited under international law. If Israel does bomb Shifa it won’t be the first time. The hospital was attacked on July 28, 2014, and at the time, it was the fourth hospital Israel bombed during that onslaught.  https://mondoweiss.net/2023/10/israeli-rabbis-tell-netanyahu-that-israel-has-a-right-to-bomb-al-shifa-hospital-in-gaza/

2023-10-25 Gaza’s Al-Shifa: A hospital on the brink   On the verge of collapse, Gaza’s biggest hospital faces darkness as fuel, water and medicine are running out.   Gaza’s main hospital is overflowing with both the living and the dead. The morgues are at capacity, and the bodies spill onto the street outside Al-Shifa Hospital.

Inside, hundreds of seriously injured people fill the hallways as the doctors decide which lives they can save. Men, women and children are among the wounded, and doctors work under immense pressure, knowing all services will soon grind to a halt when the backup generators stop working.

Israel’s siege on Gaza has meant no food, no water, no electricity and no fuel. As these necessities deplete faster than the hospital can cope, Al-Shifa is on the brink on catastrophe. While the hospital struggles to cope with arrivals of the injured, its staff also worries for other patients – 70 people on ventilators, hundreds receiving dialysis and 118 babies in incubators. Without electricity, they will die. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) called the escalation of the conflict “abhorrent”.

“As Gaza loses power, hospitals lose power, putting newborns in incubators and elderly patients on oxygen at risk. Kidney dialysis stops, and X-rays can’t be taken. Without electricity, hospitals risk turning into morgues,” Fabrizio Carboni, the ICRC’s regional director for the Near and Middle East, said in a statement.

We visit Al-Shifa’s neonatal intensive care unit. Most of the babies in incubators there are connected to mechanical ventilation. As the generators fall silent, the incubators will stop working, and most of these babies will die. Dialysis patients face the same fate.   The dialysis department at Al-Shifa treats 1,800 patients who receive dialysis three times a week. We meet some of these patients whose lives are not only threatened by the bombardments but who are also vulnerable if they are unable to receive this life-saving treatment.

The hospitals of Gaza have also become a shelter to many Palestinians, and Al-Shifa is no different. It is now home to hundreds of displaced people with nowhere else to go. With basic services and necessities no longer available, we hear from several who had no choice but to come to the hospital for refuge.   With so many dead, the morgues are overwhelmed. Undertakers struggle to identify and bury the deceased. When the generators stop working, the morgues will no longer be able to function.

No one knows the reality of what is happening in Al-Shifa better than the medics. They may be doctors or nurses, but they are also residents of Gaza. We meet these medical teams who tell us about the daily horrors they have witnessed since Israel’s latest assault began.  https://www.aljazeera.com/program/featured-documentaries/2023/10/25/gazas-al-shifa-a-hospital-on-the-brink

2023-10-19 The Israeli military has not admitted it bombed a Gaza hospital, despite widespread claims online      https://apnews.com/article/fact-check-israel-hamas-gaza-hospital-blast-367673389958

2023-10-17 What we know about the deadly blast at a Gaza City hospital    In the dark of early evening in Gaza, reports emerged of an explosion at Gaza City’s al-Ahli hospital. Al-Ahli was crowded both with victims of 10 days of Israeli airstrikes and with families and others who have taken refuge on hospital grounds.    Video that The Associated Press confirmed as being from the hospital showed an orange ball of fire and flames engulfing the building and grounds.   https://apnews.com/article/hospital-airstrike-gaza-rocket-74ae3e38d9f771abd23d6d49c814b980

2023-10-11 ‘It’s like a nightmare’: families of Hamas hostages continue agonising wait for news       The families of the 150 people thought to have been seized by Hamas militants over the weekend and taken to Gaza to be held as hostages are enduring an agonising wait for news of their loved ones as retaliatory Israeli missile strikes continue to pound the enclave.  Four days after Saturday’s atrocities, the fate of the hostages, both Israeli and foreign, remains unclear. Their relatives’ fears are being exacerbated by Hamas’s threats to kill one hostage for each new Israeli airstrike on civilian targets without warning, and by the prospect of a possible ground offensive.

Hamas has said it is seeking the release of all Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails – approximately 4,500 detainees, according to Israeli human rights group B’Tselem – in exchange for the Israeli hostages. On Monday, the group said the airstrikes had killed four hostages and their captors. According to the health ministry in the Gaza Strip, Israeli attacks have so far killed 1,100 Palestinians and wounded 5,339.

On Wednesday, both the UN secretary general, António Guterres, and Pope Francis urged the immediate release of all the hostages held in Gaza. In the meantime, the families of the kidnapped men, women and children are continuing to hope and to hunt for information. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/11/its-like-a-nightmare-families-of-hamas-hostages-continue-agonising-wait-for-news-israel-gaza

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Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

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Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Holocaust Survivors

Updated 2024-07-25

2024-6-07 Western Leaders Are Exploiting Yesterday’s Genocide to Commit Another Today     U.S. political and media elites are—shrewdly, if cruelly—re-traumatizing Jews for the most cynical reason imaginable: to help them aid and abet the unconscionable actions of a foreign country.  

It takes a lot of people to mount a genocide: planners, funders, pathologically uncaring politicians, and big-money donors who have corrupted the political process. It also requires an armada of social-media sociopaths willing to call for slaughter from the comfort of their homes.

But the ongoing murder in Gaza wouldn’t be possible if a lot of ordinarily reasonable and empathetic people hadn’t been manipulated by cynics who prey on their collective trauma. The ghosts of past horrors have been summoned, not to end genocide but to perpetrate it in a new context.

There are many Jews in the West, including the children or grandchildren of Holocaust survivors, whose inherited pain is being exploited in service of a ruthless military agenda.  https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/western-leaders-exploit-genocide

2023-12-21 Understanding Jewish Disillusionment with Israel (w/ Gabor Maté)      Author, physician & trauma expert Gabor Maté joins Bad Faith to discuss how left disillusionment with Bernie Sanders style electoral movements, and Jewish disillusionment with Israel, are part of a painful yet positive progressive shift. He weighs in on 2024, Marianne & RFK Jr, holocaust trauma, and more.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dB3G5HtHbJ0

2023-12-18 Auschwitz Museum Decries Israeli Mayor’s ‘Sick’ Call to ‘Empty’ Gaza       The Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Poland on Sunday decried what critics called genocidal remarks by the mayor of an Israeli town who said all of Gaza should be ethnically cleansed of Palestinians and turned into a museum like the notorious Nazi death camp.

“The whole Gaza Strip needs to be empty. Flattened. Just like in Auschwitz,” Metula Mayor David Azoulai said in a radio interview on Sunday, according toThe Times of Israel. “Let it be a museum for all the world to see what Israel can do. Let no one reside in the Gaza Strip for all the world to see, because October 7 was in a way a second Holocaust.”

In response, the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Oświęcim, southern Poland wrote on social media that “David Azoulai appears to wish to use the symbol of the largest cemetery in the world as some sort of a sick, hateful, pseudo-artistic, symbolic expression.”  “Calling for acts that seem to transgress any civil, wartime, moral, and human laws, that may sound as a call for murder of the scale akin to Auschwitz, puts the whole honest world face-to-face with a madness that must be confronted and firmly rejected,” the museum added. “We do hope that Israeli authorities will react to such shameful abuse, as terrorism can never be a response to terrorism.”  https://www.commondreams.org/news/israel-genocidal-statements

2023-11-12 Hamas Didn’t Attack Israelis Because They Are Jewish       We need a basic analysis of power and history to understand that Hamas’ attacks on Israeli civilians, while egregious, had nothing to do with those Israelis’ religion and everything to do with occupation and settler colonialism.   In all my urgency, I’d neglected the core thing that needed tending to in my Jewish community: the assumption that Hamas’ attacks on October 7 were an expression of antisemitism, and thus, a threat to all of us.

Much of my family was killed in the Holocaust. On my grandparents’ wedding night, Hitler invaded their home country of Belgium. I grew up hearing my grandmother’s stories of narrowly escaping death at every turn, the wails of Jewish mothers over their dead children, fields of lifeless bodies. My grandparents arrived at Ellis Island traumatized by the unfathomable murder of their families in the gas chambers of Auschwitz while the world let it happen.

So I can understand why many of my fellow Jewish Americans’ limbic systems were triggered on October 7, especially in a world where antisemitism still very much exists, particularly in the context of white nationalism. A world where we are told the same story that Elena was, and where Palestinians are demonized to legitimize that story.  Jews can grieve for Israeli lives lost and refuse the weaponization of that grief to commit genocide against Palestinians.

Antisemitism is defined as “discrimination against, violence toward, or stereotypes of Jews for being Jewish.” Let me be clear: Hamas’ killings of Israeli civilians were wrong, in clear violation of international law. But they weren’t about antisemitism.   

The key thing to understand is that, in Israel/Palestine, unlike anywhere else in the world, Jewish people—specifically white Ashkenazi Jews—are the ones in power. Jewish Israelis are the occupiers and Palestinians are the occupied. When I spent eight months in the West Bank documenting human rights abuses, I saw the way Israel controls every aspect of Palestinian life, separating Palestinians from their schools and hospitals; torching their olive groves; demolishing their homes; imprisoning them without trial; discriminating against Palestinian citizens of Israel; and bringing about the slow, sometimes quick, death of Palestinians in Gaza by cutting them off from the outside world, putting them on a collective “diet,” and periodically bombing civilian infrastructure, homes, and families.   https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/hamas-attacks-not-antisemitic

2023-11-10 “Clear Intention of Ethnic Cleansing”: Holocaust Scholar Omer Bartov Warns of Genocide in Gaza    Israeli American scholar Omer Bartov, one of the world’s leading experts on the Holocaust, says Israel’s brutal assault on the Gaza Strip is at risk of becoming a genocide. The monthlong air and ground war has killed more than 11,000 Palestinians in the besieged enclave, a majority of them women and children. Israel has also severely limited the movement of food, water, fuel, medicine and other essentials into Gaza. Bartov says the disproportionate killing of civilians by Israel, as well as dehumanizing statements by Israeli leaders and suggestions of mass expulsion, are of grave concern. He recently joined hundreds of lawyers and academics in signing an open letter warning about Israel’s violations of international law in Gaza. “There is an indication that there are war crimes happening in Gaza, potentially also crimes against humanity,” says Bartov. “If this so-called operation continues, that may become ethnic cleansing … and that may become genocide.”    Democracy Now! is an independent global news hour  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mZMkNJYr-0

2023-11-10 Congress’ Censure of Rep Tlaib Shows There’s a ‘Palestine Exception’ to Free Speech       “I find it horrific that the politicians have the nerve to censure righteous voices for peace and for the lives of Gazans, who are being murdered,” Holocaust survivor Marione Ingram said. 

In the U.S. Capitol Rotunda, the nation’s founding documents are on display, including the Bill of Rights, which enshrines free speech. As Israel subjects Gaza to a massive air and ground assault, Congress has reminded us of what has come to be known as “the Palestine exception” to free speech.

On Tuesday, 22 Democrats joined with the Republican majority to censure Palestinian-American Congressmember Rashida Tlaib. As Congressmember Tlaib was being censured, 87-year-old Holocaust survivor Marione Ingram was nearby, protesting at the White House, demanding President Joe Biden call for a cease-fire.

“I find it horrific that the politicians have the nerve to censure righteous voices for peace and for the lives of Gazans, who are being murdered,” Ingram said on the Democracy Now! news hour the next day. “It is a slaughter that is happening. Rashida Tlaib is, in my eyes, a hero.”

She continued, “I am a Jew, my mother was a Jew, my Jewish family was murdered in 1941. Hamburg Jews were sent to Minsk in Belarus. Upon arrival, they were stripped and then shot and dumped into a mass grave. My grandmother was taken by two Gestapo who came to my mother’s apartment and took her away the night before I turned 6 years old.”

The German American Holocaust survivor was adamant: “Netanyahu’s government, Israel’s policies for decades has been the suppression of Palestinians, land grabs, deprivation of Palestinians… I was a child of war. I have experienced all of these things. I have also known for a fact that what Israel is doing will not end this conflict. It will only exacerbate it.”

Marione Ingram is not alone. Over 1,000 Jewish academics, artists, and clergy have signed an open letter that called for an immediate cease-fire, the release by Hamas of all hostages, and an end to Israeli apartheid and occupation. The effort was led by Omer Bartov, Brown University Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies, described by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum as one of the world’s leading specialists on the subject of genocide.   https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/tlaib-palestine-free-speech

2023-11-08 “Stop This Madness”: Holocaust Survivor Marione Ingram, 87, Condemns Israeli Assault & Calls for Peace   We speak with 87-year-old Holocaust survivor Marione Ingram, who has been protesting outside the White House calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. Ingram says experiencing anti-Jewish hate, losing family members to the Nazi killing machine and surviving the Allied bombing of Hamburg as a child all inspire her to speak out for peace. “What Israel is doing will not end this conflict. It will only exacerbate it,” says Ingram. She calls the vote to censure Palestinian American Congressmember Rashida Tlaib “shameful” and describes her as a “hero.”https://www.democracynow.org/2023/11/8/marione_ingram_omer_bartov_holocaust_gaza

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Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

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Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

High-Impact Explosives

Updated 2023-11-13

2023-11-10 UN Human Rights Chief Demands Investigation Into Israel’s Use of ‘High-Impact’ Explosives in Gaza   The United Nations’ top human rights official on Friday demanded an investigation into the Israeli military’s bombardment of densely populated areas of the Gaza Strip with “high-impact explosive weapons,” a call that came as Israel’s forces surrounded Gaza’s largest city and reportedly attacked several hospitals packed with wounded and displaced civilians.

“After four weeks of bombardment and shelling by Israeli Forces in Gaza, the indiscriminate effects of such weapons in a densely populated area is clear,” Volker Türk, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, said in a statement. “Israel must immediately end the use of such methods and means of warfare, and the attacks must be investigated.”

“Considering the predictable high level of civilian casualty and the wide scale of destruction of civilian objects,” Türk added, “we have very serious concerns that these amount to disproportionate attacks in breach of international humanitarian law.”    https://www.commondreams.org/news/un-rights-chief-investigation-israel

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Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

.

Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Health Care Situation (also see Gaza Health Care)

Updated 2024-08-25

2024-08-17 UN Secretary-General Urges ‘Polio Pause’ in Israeli War on Gaza as First Case Reported     “It is impossible to conduct a polio vaccination campaign with war raging all over,” said António Guterres after a 10-month-old infant became Gaza’s first new poliomyelitis case in 25 years.  

Following over a month of warnings, Gaza recorded its first case of polio since the highly contagious virus was eradicated there 25 years ago, prompting a Friday call by United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres for a temporary truce to enable a vaccination drive in the embattled strip.  

The Gaza Health Ministry said Friday that an 10-month-old infant in the central city of Deir al-Balah “who has not received any polio vaccine dose” has tested positive for the virus, which often causes paralysis and can be fatal. The ministry said the baby is one of “a number of children” who have presented with symptoms consistent with polio in recent days.  https://www.commondreams.org/news/polio-in-gaza

2024-07-29 Palestinian Health Officials Declare Polio Epidemic in Gaza    The Gaza Ministry of Health said on Monday that they now consider Gaza to be a polio epidemic area due to Israel’s relentless assault and deadly humanitarian blockade, portending yet more horrific circumstances being forced on Palestinians in coming months unless Israeli officials agree to a ceasefire soon.

Health officials declared the epidemic in a post on Telegram and warned that it will not only affect Palestinians in Gaza, but also people in neighboring countries. The announcement comes after international health officials announced earlier this month that they had detected the virus that causes polio, specifically polio type 2, in multiple wastewater samples from across Gaza.

The epidemic “poses a health threat to the people of Gaza, to neighboring countries, and a setback to global efforts to end polio,” the ministry said. It called for “immediate intervention” to end Israel’s genocide and address the sanitation catastrophe that has resulted from Israel’s assault on Gaza’s sanitation system.   https://truthout.org/articles/palestinian-health-officials-declare-polio-epidemic-in-gaza/

2024-07-25 US Health Workers Back From Gaza Calculate Death Toll at 92,000 — at a Minimum     ozens of U.S. doctors and nurses who have returned from volunteer trips to Gaza say in a scathing new letter that Israel’s assault, along with the famine and epidemics raging across Gaza, have killed a conservative estimate of at least 92,000 Palestinians so far — over double the widely-cited official death count by health officials.

In their message sent to President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and the first lady on Thursday, the group of 45 health care workers say that the things they saw in Gaza are beyond anything they have seen in other conflicts, and will forever be seared in their minds.

“President and Dr. Biden, we wish you could see the nightmares that plague so many of us since we have returned: dreams of children maimed and mutilated by our weapons, and their inconsolable mothers begging us to save them,” they wrote. “We wish you could hear the cries and screams our consciences will not let us forget. We cannot believe that anyone would continue arming the country that is deliberately killing these children after seeing what we have seen.” https://truthout.org/articles/us-health-workers-back-from-gaza-calculate-death-toll-at-92000-at-a-minimum/

2024-07-22 Advocates Say Biden Must Immediately Act to Stop Polio Outbreak in Gaza     Advocates for Palestinian rights are demanding that the Biden administration take urgent action to stop a potential outbreak of polio in Gaza after the virus that causes the deadly disease was found in Gaza’s wastewater, threatening an epidemic that would be nothing short of catastrophic.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) says that Biden bears responsibility to respond to the crisis after funding Israel’s destruction of Gaza’s health and sanitation systems, which has created conditions ripe for a deadly epidemic.

“Having enabled the wholesale destruction of civilian infrastructure and medical facilities in Gaza, the Biden administration has a duty to ensure that polio vaccines reach all those who need to be vaccinated,” said CAIR communications director Ibrahim Hooper in a statement Sunday.https://truthout.org/articles/advocates-say-biden-must-immediately-act-to-stop-polio-outbreak-in-gaza/

2024-07-19 Public Health Authorities Raise Alarm as Poliovirus Is Found in Gaza Sewage    Poliovirus has been detected in sewage samples at six locations in the Gaza Strip, the World Health Organization said on Friday, following announcements from both the Israel and Gaza health ministries.  Vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 was found in samples taken on June 23 from sites in Khan Younis and Deir al-Balah.

Public health authorities expressed grave concerns about the findings, which, though no cases have yet been discovered, raise the possibility of an outbreak of polio, a highly infectious disease that often causes paralysis and can be fatal.https://truthout.org/articles/public-health-authorities-raise-alarm-as-poliovirus-is-found-in-gaza-sewage/

2024-02-07 War on Gaza: Red Cross warns of ‘catastrophic’ health situation for chronically ill patients    The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said there is a “catastrophic” healthcare situation in the Gaza Strip, as it warned there might only be two functioning hospitals left for the whole population in the coming days. 

Speaking to Middle East Eye, the organisation’s chief protection officer, Christian Cardon de Lichtbuer, said the healthcare infrastructure of the enclave had been left in “survival mode” following months of Israeli bombardment.  “There are still three hospitals functioning, and probably in the coming days, only two hospitals for a population of 2.3 million. These are facts, and this is catastrophic,” he explained.   Lichtbuer said that all medical teams in Gaza were focused on dealing with emergency treatment, and that meant people with chronic illnesses and conditions were being neglected.   https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/gaza-red-cross-hospitals-catastrophic

2023-11-30 “Horror Show”: Doctors Without Borders Demands Permanent Ceasefire in Gaza, Medical Aid for Wounded     We get an update from Avril Benoît, executive director of Doctors Without Borders, on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and violence hospitals are facing in the occupied West Bank. Israeli troops shot dead two Palestinian children Wednesday during a raid on the Jenin refugee camp, and medical workers say they were blocked from reaching the camp to treat the wounded. “Under humanitarian law, anyone should be able to reach a hospital,” says Benoît, who is demanding a “proper ceasefire” in the region to allow medical aid to reach people devastated by Israel’s war. She says the prospect of Israel resuming its bombardment of Gaza, including in the south where people were ordered to move, would be “a horror show.”   Democracy Now! is an independent global news hour      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ayEey38s94

2023-11-28 There’s No Justification for Destroying Gaza’s Health Infrastructure       As the health care system in Gaza collapses from more than seven weeks of targeted Israeli bombardment and complete siege, medical institutions in the United States have been silent. Worse, they have attempted to justify the violence. The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) on Nov. 8, 2023, published an essay that we felt created moral ambiguity around bombing hospitals in Gaza.

We are physicians, and in countless private conversations with other physicians, nurses, and medical workers around the U.S., we hear whispers about people being afraid to lose their jobs if they show support for Palestinians. They have been instructed by their leadership not to say the words “Gaza” or “genocide” in their professional roles, while they watch Israeli forces bomb hospitals, murder health care providers, and assault ICU patients. Many health care workers are discovering—much to their surprise—how many people in leadership roles in their institutions support ethnonationalism, even when health care workers and hospitals are targets.

We wrote the following essay in response to JAMA’s promotion of ethical ambiguity around bombing hospitals. It was rejected for publication—yet another act of institutional silencing. As Israeli media now tours the Gaza hospitals that Israel destroyed, alleging these were military targets, we see no Hamas command center. But we do see thousands of dead patients—many of them children—and hundreds of dead medical workers as a result of Israel’s unprecedented violence.  https://www.yesmagazine.org/opinion/2023/11/28/hospital-israel-bombing-gaza

2023-11-09 Infectious Diseases Surging in Gaza Amid Israeli Siege, Healthcare System Collapse       “The humanitarian suffering in Gaza has already reached catastrophic levels, and it’s set to get worse unless something changes immediately,” said one human rights official.   The infectious disease outbreaks that doctors on the ground, public health officials, and humanitarian groups have been warning about for weeks in Gaza appear to be in full force, the World Health Organization said Thursday as it reiterated its call for a cease-fire to save lives.

The global public health organization said authorities have reported a surge in cases of diarrhea, with more than half of those affected children under the age of 5, as Israel’s decision to cut off fuel access in the blockaded enclave has shut down water desalination plants and disrupted waste collection. The circumstances have created “an environment conducive to the rapid and widespread proliferation of insects, rodents that can carry and transit diseases.”

By Thursday, said the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, all of Gaza’s 120 municipal water wells were expected to be depleted.

Health officials in the blockaded enclave, where nearly 11,000 civilians have now been killed, are also reporting nearly 9,000 cases of scabies and lice; 12,600 cases of skin rashes; more than 1,000 reports of chickenpox; and nearly 55,000 cases of upper respiratory infections as roughly 1.5 million displaced people crowd into hospitals, churches, schools, and shelters in search of safety from Israel’s relentless bombardment.    https://www.commondreams.org/news/infectious-diseases-gaza

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Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

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Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Great March of Return

Updated 2024-04-01

2019-11-30 Abby Martin: Gaza’s fight for freedom needs global solidarity     The Empire Files’ Abby Martin and Mike Prysner discuss their new documentary “Gaza Fights For Freedom,” a vivid account of the Great March of Return against the Israeli siege of Gaza, and the urgency of global solidarity with the Palestinian struggle. https://thegrayzone.com/2019/11/30/abby-martin-gazas-fight-for-freedom-needs-global-solidarity/

2019-03-30 No Choice but to Break Free: An Interview with Ahmed Abu Artema  (starts about 11^th question)  LS:   In your opinion, what’s the most misunderstood aspect, or perhaps even outright lie, about the Great March of Return, that is peddled by the Israeli state and Zionists, or accepted by the media in general? Is there anything you would like to correct for people that are witnessing these demonstrations and perhaps are listening to the wrong voices or narratives that surround them?

AA: We want people to know the reality and truth of what’s happening in Palestine. The reality is that Israel is in violation of international law and is committing human rights abuses, by making refugees out of upwards of five million Palestinians, by building walls that have transformed our lives into open-air prisons. The West Bank is filled with walls and checkpoints that disconnect people from each other and the Gaza Strip is a prison, a true prison. The Gaza Strip is very small, you can get from one end to the other in an hour, it’s very small. These people, what Israel is doing to them and against them is just because they are Palestinian. Because they are ethno-nationalist racists. We want people to know what’s really happening. Palestinians desire freedom. Palestinians desire dignity. Palestinians desire human rights. We don’t want walls. It doesn’t make sense that in the 21st century, there are humans that are caged in by walls and can’t interact with each other. Israel has put up walls to cage in millions of people. We want these walls to come down. We want Israel, we want people to hold Israel accountable, to follow international law. We want Palestinian refugees to have the Right of Return and to have liberation. And ultimately, to have everyone live together, Israelis and Palestinians, with equal human rights.   LS: These are such important insights for the larger picture, for anyone who wants to support Palestinians. Is there anything in specific to the Great March of Return that you’d also like to dispel or want us to know? Perhaps they just don’t know, or perhaps Zionist voices are misrepresenting. What would you tell them to let them know with accuracy what is happening on the ground during the demonstrations?

AA: I want them to know that the Great March of Return movement is derived from the fact that the Palestinians have not forgotten where they came from, the homes from which they were forcibly removed and displaced 70 years ago, and that this hope and desire to return has not stopped and won’t die. No matter how many years and how many decades pass, the will and desire to return will not disappear. Why do they want to return? Simply put: without complicating it with any other factors, it’s their right. That’s first. Secondly, we want them to know: why have people been demonstrating for a full year? It is in response to Israeli violence. The Israeli state has murdered more than 200 peaceful protestors over the course of this year without them presenting any threat against Israeli forces, and they’ve injured over 25,000 demonstrators that haven’t threatened them in any way. Despite this, people continue to demonstrate. Why? Because the issue of Return is a cry for life. We have no choice but to break free from behind prison walls. Like Ghassan Kanafani asked, [in his story, “Men in the Sun,”] why didn’t the men bang on the walls while they were suffocating? Our people don’t want to die in silence, they want their cry to be heard around the world. Because they want to live. We want this cry, this scream, to get to our oppressors.

LS: Yes, like Kanafani said: “the Palestinian people prefer to die standing than to lose their cause”. You’d rather die in dignity, struggling, than on your knees, at the hands of the oppressor. It’s important that you feel they won’t bring you to your knees, that you will continue the struggle, defending yourselves, your rights.

AA: Yes, that’s right.

LS: The United States mainstream media outlets and the Israeli state often talk about or present the Great March of Return as the brainchild of Hamas and that Gazans are intent on breaking through the fence and pouring into Israel to kill Israelis, or that children are being used as human shields, etc. Can you tell us how it looks every week? How are the demonstrations organized? Are there leaders? What does a typical Friday look like?

AA: I want to first reply to the suggestion or rumor that Hamas is organizing these demonstrations. First of all, this is a deceptive trick, sold to the world. Secondly, this is really insulting to us, as a people – we’re not some robots that are controlled by a master.

LS: As though you don’t have your own thoughts or opinions…

AA: Exactly. We have thousands of people, men, women, children, elderly folks coming out. The first day we started I saw older folks with canes, people who can’t walk well, pass us younger, able-bodied people, walking a kilometer just so that they can participate in the demonstrations. The Great March of Return and the issue of Return are a collective choice and all Palestinians are participating, no matter their political affiliations. The Palestinian cause is a call for participation that allows us to collectively resist the Occupation from winning. Okay, all types of political affiliations are present – but it’s for the right of the Palestinian people. What about the right of Return? What about refugees? These are the things we’re all called to focus on when we fight for the Palestinian cause.

LS: Can you tell us more specifics about Friday demonstrations?

AA: There is a society, an organizing society, the National Society for the Right of Return and for Ending the Siege. This is a society that acts as an umbrella for all things of this nature for the Palestinians of Gaza, cultural and political. The society is the one that organizes every Friday, invites people to the demonstrations. The programs on Friday begin typically at noon. People come together in groups, and public gatherings, peaceful of course, and they sing national songs and put on performances.

The occupying forces are not in any danger, they’re not threatened in any way. Even if people get close to the fence, even if they engaged with the soldiers in chants, there’s no threat that’s being imposed on Israeli forces. They’re protected by fences, by their security detail, by heavily armored vehicles. So in this regard, people really are coming together in peaceful protest, but it’s the Occupation that is intent on making this violent and dragging them into a bloody event.

LS: How do you understand the role of women and girls in the Great March of Return every Friday?

AA: Women are actively engaged in this movement and there have also been many martyrs that are women as a result. If you remember Razzan Al Najjar, she died for her Right to Return, she was a woman who had a very active role in the demonstrations. Every Friday I see thousands of women actively engaging in the demonstrations; some of them have been murdered, others have been injured.

LS: The coverage and videos I have watched support what you’re saying – but I’m not sure what others have been watching! I think much of the mainstream media, by way of Islamophobic tropes, view everything through the lens of a Hamas obsession: e.g., Hamas oppresses women. This obsession literally blocks them from seeing reality in front of them, where we see and understand women as engaged in this movement as well.

AA: In the end, and maybe this is a bit outside our topic, but the Palestinian culture has its own beliefs and practices, just like any other culture does, a human right to maintain its cultural practices. But our cultural beliefs do not include oppressing women or restricting their freedom. Women are a central part of every facet of our culture, they have active roles. They are leaders in this movement, not just appendages or add-ons. And we all come together around this movement, and play various roles.

LS: This movement is a peaceful movement. You were in a documentary made by Al Jazeera, “Between Fire and Sea: the Man Behind Gaza’s Great Return March.” There’s a scene in it, you’re speaking to another man who says, paraphrasing, that you should respond to violence with violence. And you say to him, again paraphrasing, we can’t, we have to stay peaceful because remaining peaceful shows our strength. https://viewpointmag.com/2019/03/30/ahmed-abu-artema/

2019-03-29 ‘Shoot to maim’: How Israel created a generation on crutches in Gaza        Doctors tell MEE that Palestinian protesters’ crippling injuries, especially to lower limbs, were inflicted deliberately.  

Israeli snipers have intentionally maimed Palestinians protesting in Gaza over the past year, creating a generation of disabled youth and overwhelming the territory’s already crippled medical system, frontline doctors tell Middle East Eye.   According to a United Nations inquiry released this month, over 80 percent of the 6,106 protesters wounded in the first nine months of the Great March of Return were shot in the lower limbs.

Israeli soldiers intentionally shot civilians and may have committed war crimes in their heavy-handed response to the protests, which have been held regularly across Gaza since 30 March 2018, the report concluded.  Healthcare providers say the pattern of wounds shows that Israeli soldiers are purposefully shooting to maim protesters, most of whom are in their 20s and now require long-term medical care.    “The soldier knows exactly where he’s putting the bullet. This is not random. This is very intimate. This is very planned,” said Ghassan Abu Sitta, professor of surgery at the American University of Beirut (AUB), who treated injured protesters for three weeks at Gaza’s Al-Awda Hospital last May.      https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/shoot-maim-how-israel-created-generation-crutches-gaza

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