Headlines for January 6 - January 12

A Stand For Justice


West Bank civilian dies in Israeli army raid in Hebron
Israeli troops have shot dead a 67-year-old Palestinian man by mistake in an operation to arrest members of the Islamist militant organisation, Hamas.


Palestinians: Israeli troops mistakenly kill man
Israeli troops mistakenly shot and killed a 65–year–old Palestinian man in his bed during a pre–dawn raid Friday to arrest a Hamas militant in the West Bank, Palestinian and Israeli officials said.




2 Palestinians killed along Gaza-Israel border
Gaza's Health Ministry says Israeli troops have killed two Palestinians along the Israel–Gaza border.

Ministry spokesman Adham Abu Salmiya said Thursday the two men were shot in the Israeli–enforced buffer zone near the frontier.




Targeted IDF strike kills Islamic Jihad militant in Gaza
A senior Islamic Jihad militant was killed Tuesday by an Israel Air Force missile while he was driving a motorcycle in the southern Gaza Strip, according to local Palestinian officials.


West Bank: UN warns of new Israeli controls
The United Nations says it is increasingly concerned that Israel is about to tighten access restrictions to the occupied West Bank.


WikiLeaks: Israel charged bribes for Gaza access
The June 14, 2006, cable, published Thursday by Norway's Aftenposten daily, says major American companies told U.S. diplomats they were forced to pay hefty bribes to get goods into Gaza. It was unclear whether the practice still continues.




EU diplomats say East Jerusalem should be treated as Palestinian capital
East Jerusalem should be treated as the capital of the Palestinian state, according to a report compiled by the heads of European diplomatic missions in Jerusalem and Ramallah. The report includes several other unprecedented recommendations to the European Union regarding its attitude toward East Jerusalem.


Hamas urges Gaza militant groups to stop attacks on Israel
Hamas said on Sunday it has begun talks with other militant factions in the Gaza Strip to urge them to stop firing rockets at Israel, attacks that have raised Palestinian fears of a new Israeli offensive.


Israeli military and Palestinians clash over death of West Bank woman
The military sources suggested Abu Rahma may not have been present at the protest and that she suffered from a pre-existing condition likely to have caused her death.

The family's supporters issued a detailed rebuttal of the IDF claims, backed by documentation, and said the military was waging a smear campaign.


Mossad chief: Iran won't go nuclear before 2015
Israel's newly retired spy chief thinks Iran will not be able to build a nuclear bomb before 2015, Israeli media reported Friday – further pushing back Israeli intelligence estimates of when Tehran might become a nuclear power.




2004 IDF study High concentrations of tear gas could be lethal
a high concentration of the gas in a given location could cause serious or even lethal harm, and therefore, the gas cannot be considered innocuous.

Over the last year the IDF has begun using a tear gas grenade launcher in Bil’in, the Ringo, that allows them to shoot six canisters at once into the same place, creating a thick cloud of gas. The Palestinians say Abu Rahmah was caught in such a cloud.


Gaza situation 'very dangerous,' Arabs tell Hamas
Hamas held "urgent" talks with militant groups on Wednesday to pass on a warning from Arab leaders about firing rockets at Israel, faction leaders told AFP.

The meeting at a Gaza City hotel came just days after Hamas said it would ensure militant factions obeyed a national consensus truce on rocket fire, following weeks of rising tensions along the border with Israel.




Israeli military court extends jail term for Palestinian anti-wall activist
Amnesty International has condemned an Israeli military appeal court's decision to extend the prison sentence of a Palestinian non-violent activist, convicted over his involvement in organizing protests in the occupied West Bank. His face is familiar to me because he appears in some of the photos I gathered via Yahoo News; he was at protests of the wall (that runs through and on Palestinian land in violation of international law).

Maybe he is the Palestinian Ghandi that so many Israel-supporters always ask about (ie, 'where is the Palestinian Ghandi?', he's in Israeli jail, geniuses, or crushed under a bulldozer like Rachel Corrie).


Ties make Palestinian state a SAmerican priority



2/3 of Americans say take no side in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
It is important to note the implications of these findings, and what the implications are with respect to the propaganda that 'America supports Israel'.


2 Israelis extradited to US on murder charges
Israel arrested the men in 2008 after a U.S. court charged them with using a San Fernando Valley gang to distribute 1 million ecstasy pills and paying a gang member to kill a man for stealing a drug shipment.

Police say the Abergils head a powerful crime syndicate with interests in drugs and gambling.


Arrest of children – Violation of rights
In 2010, reports of a sharp increase in the number of children being arrested from Silwan and East Jerusalem have been recorded. According to Israel Police figures, between November 2009 and October 2010, the Jerusalem District opened 1,267 criminal files against Palestinian children living in East Jerusalem who were accused of throwing stones. During the same period, the Israeli NGO, B’Tselem reports that 81 children from Silwan have been arrested or detained for questioning, mostly on suspicion of stone throwing.


Chile recognizes Palestinian state
Over 130 countries have officially recognized Palestine as a state based on the 1967 borders, the boundaries that existed before Israel occupied East al-Quds (Jerusalem), the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip.

In December 2010, Brazil, Argentina, and Bolivia recognized Palestine as an independent state.


Palestinians say they'll go to UN for recognition
The Palestinians appear to have a majority in the General Assembly, but are unlikely to get the go–ahead in the Security Council.

The U.S. routinely vetoes measures Israel considers hostile, and the U.S. House of Representatives last week passed a resolution "condemning unilateral measures to declare or recognize a Palestinian state."




EU's Ashton raps Israel for demolishing East Jerusalem hotel
Settlement building on occupied Palestinian territory is illegal, the European Union reminded Israel on Sunday, after a historic hotel in East Jerusalem was partly demolished to make way for a Jewish apartment complex.


Israel Defiant in Face of US Criticism
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying Jews have a right to live anywhere in Jerusalem, defended today a settlement project that drew criticism from US secretary of state Hillary Clinton.


Clinton slams Israeli demolition of historic hotel



Jerusalem hotel demolished for Israeli apartments
"They have no right to anything here," said Inas al–Ghawi, a 38–year–old Palestinian who watched Sunday's demolition. "This is Palestinian land, but they are thieves, they steal everything."




Silwan activists ask EU for protection against Israel's actions
The letter followed the publication of a report compiled by heads of European diplomatic missions in Jerusalem and Ramallah in which they concluded that East Jerusalem should be treated as the capital of a Palestinian state, and included several other unprecedented recommendations to the European Union regarding its attitude toward East Jerusalem.


Irving Moskowitz demolishes part of Jerusalem hotel to build settler housing
Both the US and UK governments have raised objections to the hotel's replacement by a Jewish settlement. East Jerusalem was annexed by Israel in 1967, and settlements there are illegal under international law. The hotel was declared "absentee property" after 1967. Approval was given last year by the Jerusalem district planning and building council to demolish part of the building to make way for 20 housing units.


Appropriators Sound Support for Israel Missile Defense

In August, House appropriators pushed funding for Israeli missile defense to $422.7 million, its highest level ever.

Funding for Israel missile defense over the past two years adds up to nearly $1 billion. Aid to support the short-range David's Sling anti-missile system, for example, more than doubled from $37 million in FY 2008 to $80 million in FY 2010.

With the mounting Iranian threat and Israel's role as America's strongest ally in the Middle East, lawmakers say, Congress will need to continue to strongly fund these programs.

"I continue to view the Jewish state as America's most important military and intelligence and economic ally and friend in that most dangerous and important part of the world," said Rep. Steve Rothman (D-N.J.), who sits on the Appropriations subcommittees on Defense, Homeland Security and State and Foreign Operations As more Americans are jobless and go hungry, Congress continues to shovel billions to Israel.


Psychiatrist in Gaza wins Palme prize for his dedication to peace
Dr Sarraj (66), who studied in Alexandria and London, is the first psychiatrist to practise in Gaza, where he established the Gaza community mental health programme, an independent organisation focused on treating the traumas and stresses of living under Israeli occupation. The programme’s seafront offices were bombed by Israel during its 2008-09 military offensive, which killed 1,400 and wounded more than 5,000 Gazans.


IDF soldier killed, 4 wounded from friendly fire near Gaza border
Israel Defense Forces soldier Sgt. Nadav Rotenberg, 20, was killed Friday and four were wounded when a mortar shot by IDF troops hit the soldiers near the Gaza security fence.


Netanyahu: Only 'credible' military threat led by U.S. can stop nuclear Iran
Only the convincing threat of military action headed by the United States will persuade Iran to drop plans to build an atomic bomb, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Tuesday.


West Bank Families Need More Support
I am inspired constantly by the people I have come to know through my work in Bethlehem. They are not suffering because they do not have the capacity to succeed, but because of a political situation that is beyond their control. I ask myself every day how ANERA can help them with the things we CAN control in order to make their lives better.


Israeli PM defends east Jerusalem construction
The Palestinians, the European Union and the U.S. have all condemned the planned building of 20 apartments for Israelis on the site of an empty hotel in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah. The project, approved in 2009, began in earnest Sunday with the demolition of the Shepherd Hotel.




Security firm G4S confirms involvement in Israel's occupation
By providing security services to illegal settlement businesses, G4S facilitates Israel's violations of international law.


COPTIC ASSEMBLY OF AMERICA - Egyptian lawyers blame Israel for church bombing



Toward defending Israel, mainstream U.S. Jewish groups critique it
What’s new is the concern by U.S. Jewish groups that discrimination and a diminishing of democratic values is becoming mainstream in Israel.

....Anne Clemons, a local community activist who is active with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, among other groups, said she helped organize the event in part to push back against the delegitimization of Israel.

“I felt the community would benefit, the young generation and the press would benefit from learning what Israel was doing to help its Arab citizens,” she said. So, was the event orchestrated as part of a PR campaign to say ,
'look, we had a conference to address discrimination against Arabs' , in other words, to keep up appearances? I hope not.


Why the demise of the Middle East ‘peace process’ may be a good thing



Shepherd Hotel developer top donor to GOP foreign affairs chair Ros-Lehtinen - Laura Rozen - POLITICO.com
Irving Moskowitz, the retired Florida businessman who is developing a controversial Jewish apartment project at East Jerusalem’s Shepherd Hotel, is a top campaign contributor to Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), the new GOP chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, campaign finance records show.

Israeli bulldozers began on Sunday to demolish the Shepherd Hotel, located in the predominantly Palestinian Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, to make way for the apartments for Jewish residents.



Ramsey Clark leads Solidarity delegation in Gaza visit two years after Israeli assault
International human rights activist Ramsey Clark led a delegation that, after a day-long struggle for admission, crossed into Gaza on Jan. 4 to show solidarity with the blockaded population of the strip.


Memo notes Giffords’ Judaism in motives of alleged attacker
Giffords, 40, was raised "mixed" by a Christian Scientist mother and Jewish father, but said she decided she was Jewish only following a visit to Israel in 2001.


Lieberman says Israel won't be Turkey 'punching bag'
In a commentary published in the English–language Jerusalem Post, Avigdor Lieberman accused Ankara of anti–Israel incitement, and warned the situation in Turkey reminded him of Iran just before the Islamic revolution.




YouTube retracts rejection of Palestine Christmas video



Iran says it has arrested spy ring linked to Israel



Christmas in Bethlehem off limits for Gaza's Christians



Israeli Anti-Missile System Faces Fire at Home and Delays in U.S. Funding
speaking under usual diplomatic rules of anonymity, an Israeli diplomat said that Congress’s strong bipartisan support for funding the program meant that Israel had nothing to worry about, despite the unfortunate delay.


As Americans go hungry..


Law and Disorder by Philip Giraldi
So why the sympathy in the media and within government circles for the oligarchs? Well, it is the usual nonsense. Hardliners in Washington, many of whom are our good old friendly neocons, need an enemy and Russia was available. Some have also cleverly woven into their narrative the theme of anti-Semitism, always available when all else fails. The fact is that most oligarchs and their enablers from the West who looted Russia were Jewish and a number were Israeli citizens. But they were also criminals Another must read article by Philip Giraldi.


Iran vows to bring Israel to justice for 'crimes against humanity'
Iran has declared that it intends to seek international action against Israel after blaming the Mossad for the murder of a nuclear scientist last year, Iran's Press TV reported on Tuesday.


Iran broadcasts 'confession' of man it says was part of assassination plot
Iran's state TV has broadcast the apparent confession of a man it describes as "the main element" of an Israeli-trained network involved in the assassination of an Iranian scientist last year.


Israel’s Post-American Future
In an example of dialectical thinking run amok, Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman has turned the strategic logic behind the patron-client state relationship on its head. He has “threatened” Washington that unless it supports his radical Zionist agenda, Jerusalem would ally itself with another global player that would supposedly be willing to prop up a militarized anti-Arab Jewish Ghetto in the Middle East.


US forced to import bullets from Israel as troops use 250,000 for every rebel killed



Israel admits Iran incapable of producing nuclear weapon before 2015
"There's a lot that's happened. We've seen this worm, this virus that's attacked the computers that run the Iranian uranium enrichment process,” Steinberg said. “We've seen some scientists who have been killed and injured, people who are working on the nuclear enrichment program in Iran, and we've seen sanctions. When you put those pieces together, it makes sense to see a slowdown in the process." Israel was behind those events.


Israel’s Top Military Brass Is Marching Away From the Prime Minister
Most in Israel’s security establishment — hard-liners included — worry that continuing to rule over the West Bank, with its 2.5 million hostile Palestinians, is more dangerous than Palestinian statehood. Netanyahu claims to agree, but his Likud doesn’t, and he seems unable or unwilling to budge. As Israel grows more isolated, its defense chiefs grow more alarmed and impatient.





Iran warns neighbors not to aid Israel
Iran warned neighboring countries not to help its arch–foe Israel, one day after announcing it had rounded up a spy ring linked to Israel which it said had assassinated an Iranian nuclear scientist.




Helen Thomas returns to journalism
"Her remarks in June were in response to a question about Israel, not Jews, and were intended to mean that in these times, Jewish people are free to live wherever they wish, because the era of anti-Jewish persecution is ended. That was not adequately expressed because of the impromptu nature of the incident,"




AIPAC Challenged in Court Over Espionage and Theft of Classified Report Investigation
On January 10, 2011, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee was challenged in the District of Columbia Superior Court over its past receipt, duplication and redistribution of U.S. government classified documents.


Hezbollah and its allies topple Lebanon government
Disputes over the tribunal have paralyzed the government for months, with Hezbollah denouncing the court as a conspiracy by the U.S. and Israel and urging the prime minister to reject any of its findings. But Hariri has refused to break cooperation with the Netherlands–based tribunal.


Pentagon Must Sharpen Iran Strategy to Counter Arms Buildup, Congress Says
The provision is the second in as many years directing the military leaders to initiate a specific task pertaining to Iran. Congress last year, in its fiscal 2010 defense bill, required an unclassified report on Iran's current military capabilities and strategy.

The new section goes further and "appears to reflect the views of those who believe a more well–developed military option" is needed to counter Iran's potential nuclear weapons program, said Kenneth Katzman, a Middle East analyst with the non–partisan Congressional Research Service.

Israel pleased, no doubt.


Lebanon's Hariri urges more U.N. pressure on Israel
Lebanon's prime minister urged the U.N. chief on Sunday to increase pressure on Israel to end all violations of Lebanese borders, and to help prevent it from exploiting Lebanese oil and gas, a Lebanese official said.




Mirror Image
Nearly 63 years after Israel’s founding, a thousand-and-one broken promises later, Israel’s Arabs remain second-class citizens. Yes, they have the vote, and yes, Arabic is an official language of the country, but no, and again no, to anything approaching government services equal to those granted Jewish citizens and Jewish communitie





Bilin marches for Jawaher Abu Rahmah
Since Jawaher's killing, the Israeli military has launched an aggressive propaganda campaign of disinformation and half-truths to cover up its culpability in her death. Iyad Burant, one of the leaders of Bilin's Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements, put it simply after the demonstration: "Nothing scares Israel more than nonviolence, so they attack us any way they can and then lie to the media about their actions."


New York State Agriculture Department Dismisses Its Kosher Law Enforcement Inspectors
The state argues that the kosher inspectors and the division are irrelevant since a 2004 court case ruled unconstitutional a law that required the agency to perform religious kosher inspections




Israeli pilot describes 'good strike' that killed 15 Gazans in 2002



Israel's Rightward Lurch Scares Even Some Conservatives
On the table was a bill proposed by Yisrael Beiteinu (Israel Is Our Home), the right–wing party headed by foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman. The measure called for stripping the citizenship of any Israeli convicted of espionage, but the only Israelis under discussion were the country's Arab minority. The move follows a loyalty oath Lieberman would make a condition for acquiring citizenship; calls for bans on Jews renting property to Arabs; and street demonstrations demanding prohibitions on Arab boys dating Jewish girls.


What Would Einstein Say? By Fidel Castro
Today the leaders of the State of Israel practice genocide and are associating themselves with the most reactionary forces on the planet.


Hagee, a blessing and a curse
Jewish Israel is fully aware that the Jewish philanthropic world is challenged at this time, and that turning to Christian aid is increasingly being considered as a viable, albeit complex, option. It is therefore obligatory that Jewish leaders, who do choose to engage in partnerships with devout evangelicals, admit to themselves and to their communities that they are by definition working with missionaries.

It must be acknowledged and considered that encouraging fundamentalist Christian political, economic and humanitarian involvement in the Jewish state will exact a cost in the form spiritual destruction and apostasy Oh?

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