IDF waarschuwt Palestijnen die te dicht bij het Gaza hek komen

Israël wil terecht voorkomen dat Hamas langs de grens met Israël versterkingen, bunkers, tunnels en explosieven bouwt om zich zo op een toekomstige confrontatie met Israël voor te bereiden. Voor Palestijnen die hierdoor niet meer bij hun land kunnen is dit op zijn zachtst gezegd 'een beetje lullig' maar zij kunnen hun beklag beter bij Hamas doen, dat sinds het staakt-het-vuren al verhoogde activiteit vertoonde en dit wil gebruiken om zich goed in te graven.

 

RP

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Palestinians who approach Gaza fence will be shot, says IDF

 

By Amos Harel, Haaretz Correspondent

Last update - 07:53 01/07/2008
www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/997897.html

 

Israel has informed Hamas it will fire "warning shots" at Palestinians who enter an area west of the Gaza Strip border fence, extending for several hundred meters.

Egyptian officials told Hamas of the new procedure, which is expected to raise tensions between the two sides.

Israel's representative in truce talks, Amos Gilad, told Egyptian mediators of the decision to declare the area west of the border a "special security zone" and to prevent Palestinians from entering it. The Egyptians informed Hamas, which objects to the plan.

Several incidents have occurred near the fence since a cease-fire came into effect on June 19.

Earlier this week the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported eight cease-fire violations by Israel. Most of these violations apparently consisted of Israeli troops firing at people who approached the fence. OCHA's reports rely mainly on Palestinian accounts.

Israel is interested in maintaining the security zone for fear that Palestinian terror groups will use the truce to plant explosives on the Palestinian side of the fence. This would prepare them if fighting resumes. In the past, explosives aimed at Israel Defense Forces vehicles on the Israeli side have been planted in this area.

Israel also fears that Hamas might build a line of fortifications along the fence as a basis for further attacks, as Hezbollah did in Lebanon between Israel's pullout from South Lebanon in 2000 and the Second Lebanon War in 2006.

However, preventing people from approaching the fence will block Palestinian farmers' access to their lands. Farmers have been unable to reach their fields for years because of the fighting along the border. The IDF suspects that some of the farmers are sent by terror organizations to plant bombs or observe Israeli troops.

Throughout the second intifada Israel declared areas along the fence as "security zones." Soldiers were instructed to fire warning shots at people approaching the fence, and for certain periods were allowed to shoot even at unarmed people. These instructions met resistance in the army, with senior officers saying civilians were being killed.

The IDF believes that Hamas has recently been taking firmer action to curb other Palestinian factions' attacks against Israel. IDF sources told Haaretz that Hamas' leadership in Gaza apparently wants to maintain the truce and is trying to enforce its authority on the smaller factions.

At the beginning of the week Israel opened the border crossings that had been closed last Thursday after Qassam rockets were fired at the Western Negev.

Opnieuw Afrikanen doodgeschoten door Egyptische grenspolitie

Het is al herhaaldelijk voorgekomen dat de Egyptische grenspolitie in koelen bloede Afrikanen neerschoot die naar Israël probeerden te komen. Egypte en Israël moeten dringend om de tafel gaan zitten om een eind te maken aan dit 'beleid' en een humane oplossing voor de Afrikaanse vluchtelingen te bedenken. De internationale gemeenschap (lees: de VN) moet hierbij de helpende hand toesteken.

 

 

Wouter (naar Ami Isseroff)

__________________________

African immigration tragedy continues

Last update - 16:05 28/06/2008

 

Egyptian police kill African man, 7-year-old girl at Israel border

 

By Reuters

 

 

Egyptian police shot and killed two African migrants, including a seven-year-old Sudanese girl, as they tried to cross the border into Israel on Saturday, security and hospital sources said.

 

Speaking on condition of anonymity, the security sources said an Egyptian patrol opened fire on the migrants to stop them getting across the border south of the Rafah crossing.
 
They added that seven other African migrants had been detained, including the dead child's mother.

 

Their deaths bring to 16 the number of migrants killed at the border this year.

 

Hospital sources said the other victim was an unidentified African in his thirties, killed by a gunshot wound to his back.

 

Egypt has pursued a crackdown on African migrants that has seen up to 1,000 Eritrean asylum seekers deported since June 11, despite UN objections.

 

Hoofdpunten overeenkomst gevangenenruil Israël en Hezbollah

Een gevangenenruil is het feitelijk niet, want de 2 Israëlische soldaten zijn zeer waarschijnlijk dood, aangezien Hezbollah geweigerd heeft enig bewijs te geven dat zij nog zouden leven...

 

____________

 

Main Points of the Framework of the Agreement on the Release of Israel's Missing and Captive Soldiers in Lebanon
(Communicated by the Prime Minister's Media Adviser)

 

The Government today (Sunday), 29.6.08, approved the outline for the agreement on releasing the abducted soldiers in Lebanon:

1. The abducted soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev will be returned to Israel, a report on the disappearance of Ron Arad (in continuation of Government decision #978 from 9.11.03) will be delivered to Israel and remains from the Second Lebanon War will also be received.

In exchange for the return of the abducted soldiers, the State of Israel will release prisoners and detainees being held in its prison facilities, and will transfer bodies and information, as follows:

A. Prisoner Samir Kuntar and four illegal Lebanese fighters being held by Israel will be released to Lebanon.

B. The bodies of dozens of infiltrators and terrorists, including eight members of Hezbollah, will be delivered to Lebanon.

C. Information on the four missing Iranian diplomats will be delivered to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

D. Following the implementation of the deal, Palestinian prisoners will be released.  The number and identities of the prisoners will be determined at the sole discretion of the State of Israel.

2. Mr. Ofer Dekel, the official responsible for the negotiations on behalf of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, will continue the process of implementing the negotiations according to the principles detailed in this decision.

3. The Government will hold an additional discussion in order to complete and implement the agreement according to the principles detailed in this decision.

4. The Government of Israel reiterates and confirms its obligation to exhaust all that is required in order to obtain credible and solid information that will shed light on the fate of Israel Air Force navigator Capt. Ron Arad.

5. At the same time, the Government of Israel reiterates and confirms its commitment to continue acting for the release of Cpl. Gilad Shalit.

6. The Government of Israel will not slacken in its efforts to locate and bring home the missing and those Israeli soldiers whose resting place is unknown.


--------------------------------------------
IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis
Website: www.imra.org.il

Gevangenenruil met Hezbollah goedgekeurd

Vanwege de uitgebreide campagne door de nabestaanden van de 2 soldaten, die demonstraties hielden en alle ministers en Knessetleden benaderden met hun hartverscheurende roep om de terugkeer van hun jongens, komt Samir Kuntar samen met een aantal andere terroristen binnenkort vrij. Hezbollah heeft al de overwinning uitgeroepen, en niet alleen Hezbollah ziet het zo. Het grootste probleem is nog niet eens het feit dat deze walgelijke man, die de schedel van een vierjarig meisje insloeg nadat hij voor haar ogen haar vader had gedood, vrijkomt, maar het effect van deze gevangenenruil. Velen wijzen op de vele gevangenendeals die Israël met zowel Hezbollah als Hamas heeft gesloten, maar een belangrijk verschil is dat in dit geval (de lijken van) soldaten worden vrijgekocht die speciaal met dit doel voor ogen zijn ontvoerd.

 

Ratna

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Prisoner swap approved

I still hope, because we must always hope, that I am wrong. That the kidnapped soldiers are alive. That there will be no more kidnappings. I know it is not true though. Alive or dead, this deal will encourage kidnappings.

 

Every Israeli who is hurt or whose loved ones are hurt by future violence cause by this swap should be entitled to sue the government, each official personally, journalists who misled the public and the Goldwasser and Regev families, who should be each and severally held responsible for the damage they have done.

 

In the same way, the Tannenbaum family should have been sued by the Regev and Goldwasser families.

 

It's a done deal. We lost. Hezbollah won.

 

See below,

Ami Isseroff

 

Despite defense officials' warning that prisoner exchange with Hizbullah will prompt further abductions, 22 ministers vote in favor of deal. Earlier,  Prime Minister Olmert tells ministers captives are 'probably dead'

 

Roni Sofer

YNET - Latest Update: 06.29.08, 16:06


Earlier, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert urged his ministers to vote in favor of the deal. "At the end of a long process, I havereached the conclusion that as the Israeli prime minister I must recommend that you approve the proposal which will bring this painful affair to an end - even at the painful price it requires us to pay," Olmert said during Sunday's cabinet meeting.

Olmert said during the discussion that as far as Israel knows, the kidnapped soldiers are no longer alive, and are believed to have been killed during the abduction or died of their wounds shortly afterwards.

The prime minister said the kidnapping was likely aimed at bringing about the release of Samir Kuntar, as Hizbullah knew it was unable to meet its commitment in a previous deal to provide information on missing navigator Ron Arad.

Olmert explained that although the report submitted to Israel regarding the status of missing navigator Ron Arad was more detailed than the previous reports, it offered no clear answer as to the missing navigator's fate.

"The goal and assumption leading us all this time has been that we are working to return live men. Today we know for certain that this is not the case. The report must be the focus of today's discussion."

Ehud Goldwasser's father Shlomo told Ynet in response to Olmert's remarks, "We welcome the prime minister's words. It's nice that the prime minister has decided to rectify his error. He has made a brave decision and the right one at that."

The meeting was attended by Mossad Director Meir Dagan and Shin Bet chief Yuval Diskin. During the meeting, defense sources told the ministers that approving the deal may prompt additional kidnappings, and asked them not vote in favor of it.

At the start of the meeting, Olmert said the deal would affect Israelis' lives in the coming years.

"Even people with the utmost responsibility, like me, have the right and duty to have doubts, as this decision deals with the repercussions on our lives in the coming years."

The prime minister noted, "I admit that I had a lot of doubts due to the problem's multiple aspects, and due to history and the different considerations.

"We have the utmost collective responsibility and mist look the Regev, Goldwasser, Haran (family killed by Lebanese terrorist Samir Kuntar), (Ron) Arad and (Gilad) Shalit families in the eye - as well as our conscience."

He added that the government is faced with sensitive issues on a weekly basis, but that there was no doubt that the discussion on the captives had particular value, was extraordinarily sensitive and had deep national and moral ramifications.

Olmert said that the negotiations for the kidnapped soldiers' release were held for two years, according to UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended the Second Lebanon War. according to the prime minister, during this time Hizbullah attempted to use manipulations and take advantage of the Israeli society's special sensitivities.

Industry, Trade and Labor Minister Eli Yishai said before the cabinet meeting that "this is a difficult decision. The question is whether Ron Arad could be brought back today, would we pay the price? We mustn't wait 22 more years. In any event, this is a difficult decision."

Interior Minister Meir Sheetrit said, "I support this deal wholeheartedly. It's our commitment as a government which sends soldiers. They should have been released by now. The media drama is unnecessary and is the result of politics."

Culture, Sports and Minister Raleb Majadele, who supports the deal, said that "we must stop the families' humiliation campaign, and must carry out a mutual and immediate release."

Rallying in favor of deal
The ministers spoke as dozens of people rallied in the government building area in Jerusalem, calling on the ministers to approve the prisoner exchange deal with Hizbullah.

"I hope the ministers will come to their senses and vote in favor of the deal," Miki Goldwasser, Ehud's mother, told Ynet. "We've spoken with the prime minister and we've made our case," she said.

The rally was also attended by several of missing Israeli Air Force navigator Ron Arad's friends, who called on the cabinet not to forget the MIA airman and to continue in their efforts to find out what became of him.

Should the Regev-Goldwasser deal be pushed through, the government would be greenlighting the release of Samir Kuntar, who has long been considered Israel's strongest bargain chip for any information pertaining to Arad's fate.

Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser have been held captive by Hizbullah for 718 day.

 

Ronen Medzini contributed to this report

 

Families van vermiste Iraanse Joden eisen informatie in deal met Hezbollah

De deal met Hezbollah waartoe Israël maandag heeft besloten, omhelst ook informatie aangaande vier Iraanse diplomaten die in 1982 in Libanon waren ontvoerd door een Libanese christelijke militie. Dit op verzoek van Hezbollah's leiders in Teheran. 

De verwanten van een aantal Iraanse Joden die in de jaren '90 naar Israël wilden emigreren en bij de grens werden aangehouden, willen dat Israël als onderdeel van de deal met Hezbollah ook informatie van over hun lot eist. De advocaat motiveert dit als volgt:

 

"We have proof that at least some of these missing Jews are being held in Iranian prisons today. These individuals attempted to come to Israel at the encouragement and with the assistance of the Israeli government.  It is therefore the responsibility of the Israeli government to do everything it can to gain reliable, specific information regarding their whereabouts in order to save them if we can and give closure and end the suffering of the wives, children, fathers and mothers [of the twelve] to those who were murdered by the Islamic Republic.

 

Na deze deal is de kans dat Iran informatie over hun lot zal vrijgeven miniem. In tegenstelling tot de ontvoerde Israëlische soldaten, zijn deze mensen mogelijk nog in leven en zitten in Iraanse gevangenissen weg te kwijnen. Maar omdat hun families wat minder hebben gelobbied bij Israëlische politici en minder worden gehoord in de media, lijkt dat niet zo'n probleem te zijn...

Ratna

----------

 

June 29, 2008

FAMILIES OF 12 MISSING IRANIAN JEWS TO FILE HIGH COURT PETITION TO BLOCK HIZBOLLAH DEAL OVER RELEASE OF INFORMATION TO TEHRAN ON FATE OF MISSING IRANIAN DIPLOMATS

Demand Israel Receive "Quid Pro Quo": Missing Jews for Missing Diplomats

The families of 12 missing Iranian Jews will file a petition in the Israeli High Court of Justice in Jerusalem on Monday, June 30th, seeking to block the government from releasing information on the fate of four missing Iranian diplomats as part of the deal with Hizbollah. The Jews were arrested in the 1990s as they sought to escape from Iran across the border with Pakistan and they are believed to still be in Iranian prisons. The Iranian diplomats were captured by Christian militia forces in South Lebanon in 1982.

The urgent petition, to be filed by the families' attorney Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, director of the Shurat HaDin Israel Law Center human rights organization, demands that the Prime Minister not authorize the transfer of information regarding the diplomats until such time as reliable and detailed information is received about the missing Jews' fate. The families of the missing Jews have never received any acknowledgment of their loved ones' arrests, status or whereabouts from the Islamic regime.

Shurat HaDin claims it has reliable information that at least one of the Jews is still alive and being held as a prisoner in Tehran.

The petition will argue that the government must honor the obligations imposed upon it by the Israeli High Court approximately two years ago that [the Israeli government] "Push forward diligently without sparing any effort in order to gain information about the [12 missing] Jews of Iran." The families are insisting that there be a "quid pro quo" on information about their family members in exchange for the release of the details on the fate of the missing Iranians.

Darshan-Leitner emphasized that, the families' are not appealing against the deal to bring back the Hizbollah captives itself but rather are demanding that the fate of the 12 missing Jews be included as a "quid pro quo" before any information about the diplomats is released.

Background:

In the years between 1994-1997, 12 Iranian Jews who attempted to flee Iran and emigrate to Israel disappeared without a trace.  All of the Jews were attempting to cross the Iran-Pakistan border.  It is alleged by the families that the Jews were kidnapped by Iranian security services and are still being held captive in Tehran.

Details of a planned prisoner exchange with Hezbollah released by the government of Israel today call for Israel, in addition to other concessions to provide the United Nations with information concerning 4 Iranian diplomats who were abducted in Beirut in July 1982 during the first Lebanon War, by a Lebanese-Christian militia (the Samir Jaja faction), in South Lebanon. The information on the fate of the missing Iranian officials is being requested by Hezbollah's financial patrons in Tehran and the United Nations has been appointed as the transmitter.

In a warning letter sent to the Prime Minister last week, Shurat HaDin wrote: "If the Israeli government intends to honor their court-ordered obligations, the government is not permitted to hand over information in its possession regarding the four Iranian diplomats, which is the last bargaining chip Israel has that could shed some light on the fate of the twelve missing."

Attorney Darshan-Leitner has stated: "We have proof that at least some of these missing Jews are being held in Iranian prisons today. These individuals attempted to come to Israel at the encouragement and with the assistance of the Israeli government.  It is therefore the responsibility of the Israeli government to do everything it can to gain reliable, specific information regarding their whereabouts in order to save them if we can and give closure and end the suffering of the wives, children, fathers and mothers [of the twelve] to those who were murdered by the Islamic Republic.

"Without proof that the information has been received from Iran and transmitted through Hezbollah, the only thing we can draw from this is that the fates of the twelve [Iranian Jews] have been abandoned.  It is simply unthinkable that the State of Israel would convey information about the four disappeared Iranian diplomats without receiving in exchange information about the twelve missing Jews in Iran.  Information about the diplomats is the last bargaining chip in Israel's hands toward acquiring information about the missing Jews in Iran.  If we give it up with nothing in return, the possibility of knowing what happened to the twelve missing is totally dead.

"Saving the lives of these missing Jews, still being held in Iranian prisons after years of torture must be a central component of any deal with Hizbollah and Iran."


Contact:

Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, 011.972.52.383.7020, 011.972.3.751.4175
Mike Cohen, 011.972.54.499.6453, 011.972.3.751.4175

media@israellawcenter.org

http://www.israellawcenter.org


--------------------------------------------
IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis
Website: www.imra.org.il

Hamas: dictators en terroristen, maar de straten zijn schoon

Het Hamas regime lijkt na een jaar controle over de Gazastrook nog niet te wankelen. Dat komt volgens Barry Rubin door de brede steun onder Palestijnen voor de extremistische opstelling van Hamas, en dat Fatah nog steeds geen aantrekkelijk alternatief weet neer te zetten. Na jaren van incompetent en corrupt Fatah bestuur zijn de schone straten nu in Gaza toch wel een verademing, terwijl de repressie onder Fatah niet zoveel minder erg was.

 

Het is waarschijnlijk alleen aan de Israëlische grensblokkades en internationale isolatie van Hamas te danken dat het regime haar nieuwe machtpositie in Gaza niet heeft kunnen gebruiken om het aantal aanslagen op Israëlische burgers op te voeren.

 

Wouter

________

 

The Jerusalem Post Sunday, June 29, 2008
Jun 26, 2008 13:52 | Updated Jun 27, 2008 15:28

The Region: They're dictators and terrorists, but look what clean streets!

 

By BARRY RUBIN
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1214132697657&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull


Hamas just celebrated its first anniversary of power in the Gaza Strip amid massive misinterpretations regarding the situation there.

Ironically, Hamas's victory and survival has little to do with Israel.

Instead, it rests on the rotten strategy of Yasir Arafat, who ruled the Palestinian movement for 35 years by establishing a weak, anarchic, corrupt and factionalized structure which he played like a violin. Only after Arafat's death did the Palestine Liberation Organization pay the price: Fatah collapsed in the Gaza Strip, first electorally, then militarily. Following which, having failed at governing, Fatah proved itself a failure in opposition as well.

As for Hamas, its power is founded on repression, radical ideology, international protection and an incompetent enemy. As one Palestinian storekeeper told an American reporter, "What can we do? Hamas is even stronger than a year ago. They can take me and put me away whenever they want."

FATAH IS its own worst enemy in combating Hamas.

President George Bush recently stated that a Fatah-ruled Palestinian state should be quickly developed since, "It will serve as an alternative vision to what is happening in Gaza."

This is rubbish. No matter how much money the West pumps in, the nationalists are not going to offer an attractive regime. Fatah's lower level of still-considerable repression as compared to Hamas is counterbalanced by the corruption and anarchy included in the package.

Moreover, Fatah is still up to its old tricks. When it does arrest those involved in terrorism, they are quickly released. Incitement to commit violence continues on the Palestinian Authority media, and the PA is far more eager to reconcile with Hamas than to make peace with Israel.

Yes, the PA's survival is a US, Western, and Israeli interest, but let's not get sentimental or naive about these weak, corrupt and largely radical allies of necessity.

AS FOR Hamas, it possesses three key weapons.

* The mainstream appeal of extremism and terrorism. "Hamas is strong and brutal but very good at governing," Eyad Sarraj told The New York Times, which described him as a British-trained psychiatrist and secular opponent of Hamas. After all, he continues, it's distributing gas coupons, getting people to pay electricity bills, and keeping the city clean.
Suddenly, people considered "progressive" see the up side of having a police state. Imagine this kind of thinking applied to other dictatorships around the world: they are brutal, but boy do they keep law and order! Sarraj also forgets that Hamas's war policy resulted in reducing the gas and electricity supply.
In any case, Sarraj is no moderate. In 1999, he wrote that Palestinians were better off without the peace process. Refusing to recognize Israel had been their "nuclear weapon" and armed struggle their great asset. Giving these up was a mistake, Sarraj insisted, and might lead to ending the conflict without eliminating Israel.

Sarraj, while a member of Gaza's tiny left, advocated a strategy parallel to that of Hamas today. Perhaps that's why he protested Arafat's repression but now seems content to accept Hamas's, however much he dislikes its Islamism. The continued extremism of mainstream Palestinian activist opinion makes Hamas's rule seem an acceptable trade-off because of its militancy.

* The success of ideological demagoguery. As one Hamas supporter told a reporter: "Israel is trying to pressure us to make us forget that the real problem is the occupation." Of course, there is no Israeli occupation in the Gaza Strip, which is one reason why Hamas was able to seize power. "We can take it," she continued, "The Koran teaches that in the end we will be victorious."

This expresses widespread sentiment: Israel is the only enemy; everything else is irrelevant, suffering isn't important, victory is inevitable. Shortly after Hamas seized power, Sarraj told a Canadian reporter how Hamas threw Fatah men off the tops of buildings, murdered them in hospital beds, and tortured them in a "horrific" manner. But that isn't important. Whether Hamas brutalizes Palestinians, creates conditions that destroy living standards, drags people into endless war, turns Gaza into a mini-Iran or causes numerous casualties, its militancy and refusal to compromise is what counts.

That may seem irrational to Western observers, but that's how Palestinian politics work.

* Pretended moderation as a scam. Since Westerners can't understand the culture of ideology and extremism, they're sure Hamas will moderate. This is "proven" for them when Hamas leaders say that if Israel only returns to the 1967 borders - giving the West Bank and east Jerusalem to the Hamas-ruled state - and lets millions of Palestinians live in Israel, they'll make a truce until they decide otherwise.

That silly evaluation reminds me of an American high-school textbook which said Israel should try this idea - if it didn't work, we would all know better.

FINALLY, THERE'S the strange conclusion that since Hamas isn't about to fall from power, this proves sanctions have failed. One could argue that this shows economic and military pressures should be increased. But at least it should be understood that the sanctions' purpose is to make Hamas less able to kill even more people, take over the West Bank, damage Israel, or turn Gaza into - to stand Bush's view on its head - an "attractive alternative."

Any policy that prevents those things seems pretty valid; any Westerner favoring a strategy that strengthens Hamas should be forced to live under its rule.

 

--------
The writer is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center at IDC Herzliya and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs Journal .

Groot-Brittanië subsidieert martelpraktijken op Westoever

Het is een bekend dilemma: geef je steun aan dictators die er vreselijke praktijken op na houden, omdat de alternatieven nog erger zouden zijn?

 

Met name de VS heeft decennialang politiek, financieel en militair rechtse dictaturen gesteund in Latijns-Amerika en elders, omdat naar haar mening het alternatief - een overwinning van de 'communistische' oppositie - tot een veel ergere dictatuur zou leiden. Waarschijnlijk dacht men dat ook oprecht, maar minstens zo zwaar zal hebben gewogen dat die rechtse dictaturen de economische belangen van Amerikaanse bedrijven en de strategische belangen van de Amerikaanse regering goed behartigden. Zo ook met de dictaturen en autoritaire regimes in het Midden-Oosten. O.a. Egypte ontvangt jaarlijks miljardensteun van de VS sinds dat land in 1979 vrede sloot met Israël.

 

In de Arabische wereld lijkt - anders dan op veel plaatsen in de wereld - de zorg terecht dat de alternatieven erger zouden zijn. De basis voor democratisering lijkt in veel Arabische landen zwak, zoals onder meer bleek bij de verkiezing van islamitische extremisten in Algerije in de jaren '90 en in de Palestijnse gebieden in 2006.

Als dictators al het mindere kwaad zijn om te steunen, dan nog zou die steunpositie gebruikt kunnen en moeten worden om tenminste een minimum aan beschaving af te dwingen bij de steunontvanger.

 

NB: Conform de Britse traditie voor understatement wordt in onderstaand artikel Hamas omschreven als "een conservatieve islamitische partij"...

 

Wouter

____________

West Bank torturers funded by Britain

 

Marie Colvin

The Sunday Times June 29, 2008
www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article4232022.ece

 

Millions of pounds of British government money is going to Palestinian security forces which use methods of torture including hanging prisoners by their feet and putting them in "stress" positions for hours at a time.

Evidence to be published next month in a report by Human Rights Watch was corroborated last week in interviews by The Sunday Times with victims in the West Bank, ruled by President Mahmoud Abbas's western-backed Palestinian Authority.

Prisoners who have emerged from Palestinian Authority jails - many of whom have never been charged with any offence or even seen a lawyer - said they had been subjected to mock executions, kicked, punched and beaten with sticks, plastic pipes and hoses.

The disclosures came at the end of a week in which a Berlin conference of 40 donor nations, including Britain, pledged GBP121m over the next three years to bolster the Palestinian security forces and judicial system in the West Bank.

Of this total, about GBP20m will come from Britain, which is already committed to spending GBP2.7m on the training of Palestinian security forces this year. A British brigadier based in the West Bank city of Ramallah is involved in the training. Britain has set aside a further £4.5m for reform, civil justice and public prosecution over the next three years.

A total of GBP4 billion overall has been promised to the government of Abbas, who is the commander-in-chief of the Palestinian security forces.

Western support for Abbas's security forces is part of a strategy to isolate Hamas fundamentalists who seized control of Gaza last year.

However, many of those detained on suspicion of links to Hamas described a form of torture called "shabah" in Arabic - being forced to hold stress positions for prolonged periods.

Some have been made to stand with one leg and one arm raised for hours. Others have had to sit on the edge of a chair with their hands tied to their feet.
Amar al-Masri, 43, a Nablus businessman who is married to Kholoud al-Masri, an elected Hamas municipal official, has been held since last month in al-Jenid prison in Nablus. Last Thursday, his son Abdullah, 13, crossed off day 54 on a calendar on the family's refrigerator.

"What is shocking me is that no charge has been addressed against my husband," Kholoud said last week, sitting in her home in Nablus, a hijab (head-scarf) covering her hair.

"He is in a Palestinian jail, but we don't know why." She has been allowed to visit him only once.

"He said he was hung by his two legs by a rope connected to the ceiling," Kholoud said. The prisoner's lawyer said he had seen puffy wrists and legs that supported the testimony, as well as scabs on his legs and hands.

A former prisoner, interviewed at a coffee shop near his third-floor flat in Nablus after he was released at the end of a 50-day spell in prison, described similar experiences.

"They arrested me on fantasy charges that I had rockets," said the 29-year-old law student, who did not want his name used out of fear the security forces would come after him.

"They tied my hands behind my back, and the rope was connected to a pipe," he said. "They would stress the rope every 20 seconds. They said if they did it more I would be paralysed."

He was eventually released without charge. "They [the security forces] told me, 'You have been steadfast under torture so we have decided you are clean. We will not bother you again.' " The Palestinian Authority denied using torture in detention centres. "They are prisoners. We do not give them chocolate and roses," said Akram Rajoub, head of preventive security in Nablus. "But I can assure you that we don't use torture methods or shabah methods."

The Foreign Office expressed concern at the Human Rights Watch revelations.

"The UK is concerned to hear reports of human rights violations in the occupied Palestinian territories," a spokesman said. "We are committed to reforming the Palestinian security sector."

British officials confirmed that the aid money pledged last week would be going to the West Bank security forces, which locals said were engaged in a crackdown on their political opponents in Hamas.

Although Hamas, a conservative Islamic party, was elected to power in January 2006, it has been largely shunned by the West because it refuses to recognise Israel or renounce violence.

Palestinian territory is virtually divided by internal disputes; Hamas's writ runs in Gaza, while Abbas has appointed an emergency government composed mostly of officials from his Fatah party in the West Bank.

A spokesman for the Department for International Development, which administers the funds paid to the Palestinian Authority, confirmed that money was going to West Bank security forces but said some of it would be used to root out abuses.

"People are aware of irregularities in their behaviour . . . and that's why we are investing in making them a more professional outfit and a more accountable police force," the department said.

Human Rights Watch last week called for the aid going to the Palestinian Authority security forces to be made conditional on effective efforts to reduce arbitrary arrests and torture and on improving the system of justice.

 

Additional reporting: Nicola Smith in Brussels

Israëlische Arabier houdt lezingen over de Holocaust voor Palestijnen

Het is zeker goed als de Palestijnen over de Holocaust leren, maar de precieze strekking van Mahamids boodschap wordt in onderstaand artikel niet duidelijk. 'Ken Uw vijand' of 'Maak Uw vijand tot Uw vriend'? Dat veel Palestijnen de 'Protocollen van de Wijzen van Zion' voor een echt geschrift houden doet hun imago zeker geen goed, evenmin als de populariteit van Mein Kampf en Holocaustontkenningen. Het is de vraag in hoeverre Mahamid dat moreel afkeurt.

 

Mahamid has a unique perspective on this issue. He argues that the Palestinian people paid the price for the Holocaust during their Nakba - Arabic for "catastrophe" or the day of Israel's independence.

Mahamid says that Palestinians are still paying for the Holocaust, and will continue to do so, if it does not learn what happened to the Jews.

 

Dit is een dubieuze motivatie om Palestijnen over de Holocaust te leren. Het is overigens verre van een 'uniek perspectief'. Antizionisten als Van Agt roepen dit al jaren. Het is onjuist, want Israël is niet gesticht vanwege de Holocaust maar omdat de Joden als volk een nationaal thuis opbouwden in Israël/Palestina, en opkwamen voor hun recht op zelfbeschikking. De Palestijnen betalen vooral voor hun weigering tot een compromis en hun bijna 100-jarige gewelddadige strijd tegen Joodse zelfbeschikking. Bovendien sympathiseerden een aantal Palestijnse leiders, voorop nazi collaborateur Haj Amin Al Husseini, openlijk met de nazi's, en deden de Palestijnen er alles aan om de Joodse immigratie naar Palestina in de donkerste dagen van de Joodse geschiedenis onmogelijk te maken. Zo onschuldig zijn ze dus niet.

 

Alleen een einde aan het terrorisme, aan de ophitsing tegen Israël en de Joden, en het erkennen van de eigen zwarte bladzijden in de geschiedenis kan tot een einde van het conflict leiden.

R&W
----------

Last update - 15:36 26/06/2008

Israeli Arab teaches Palestinians about the Holocaust

 

By Yoav Stern, Haaretz Correspondent
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/996592.html

On the way to the Hawara checkpoint, near the West Bank city of Nablus, Khaled Ksab Mahamid says: "You remember that you are American, yes? How is your accent in English?"

Mahamid, whose family originates from a destroyed Arab village near what is now Megiddo, is the founder and director of a private Holocaust museum in Nazareth.

We are on our way to the Balata refugee camp, where he is scheduled to give a lecture. The tension at the checkpoint is rising.

In general, Palestinians and Arabs try not to talk about the Holocaust. The distance between solidarity with the Jewish people and solidarity with the Jewish state is short, and is not usually up for discussion, especially in a refugee camp.

Mahamid has a unique perspective on this issue. He argues that the Palestinian people paid the price for the Holocaust during their Nakba - Arabic for "catastrophe" or the day of Israel's independence.

Mahamid says that Palestinians are still paying for the Holocaust, and will continue to do so, if it does not learn what happened to the Jews.

He has lectured in the Nablus area in the past, but this is his first time in Balata. He does not know exactly what to expect. The organizers of the lecture welcome him at the entrance to the camp, shake his hand.

The first stop: memorial for the fallen. Mahamid mumbles the fataha, the opening chapter of the Koran, within the palms of his hands extended upward like an open book.

After the memorial, we go down to one of the alleyways in the camp. It is exactly like in the movies - the narrow alleyways of a refugee camp.

A dozen or so residents gather next to a clubhouse - which also serves as the headquarters of Al-Alqsa Martyrs Brigade commander and Fatah parliament member, Jamal Tirawi, who was arrested by Israeli forces last year.

Mahamid begins his lecture with the claim that the Zionist movement has failed, in a big way.

"Most Jews did not come to Palestine. Also today, there are eight million [Jews] in the world that are not here. Where are they?"

The crowd listens quietly. One of the guests gets up to serve juice and cookies. When he stands, the gun in his belt is evident.

Mahamid raises his hands and warns that the Palestinians must not be like Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. This, he says, plays into the hands of the Zionists. Palestinians must remember the Jews' weak points. "Know your enemy," he says.

He does not exactly tell what happened to the Jews during the Holocaust; he hints at it. He shows pictures of Jewish prisoners in the death camps and says Palestinians must use "understand what the other thinks, not deny it."

"The Israelis believe in this, the Germans and the French believe in this. We also need to adopt this," he says. Addressing the crowd, he continues: "You, who live in Balata, could you tell somebody this is a lie?"

Mahamid insists that the Palestinians have to end the violent struggle against Israel, as given that they have lost six million of their people, the deaths of 25 in a terrorist attack will not deter them.

Another person attending the lecture, of local origin, becomes angry. There is no logic in making the occupation a five-star occupation, he says. He is also against Mahamid's claim that the Zionist movement has failed.

"If one Jew comes, if they took my father's orchard in Jaffa, it has not failed. Have you not read the Protocols of the Elders of Zion? They sit in a tent but want to control the entire world."

As we leave the refugee camp and head back toward Hawara checkpoint, the tension eases. The journalists are already chatting in Hebrew with the guests. At the checkpoint, Mahamid pulls out his ID for the woman soldier. With his ID, he always carries a picture of a Jewish child from the Holocaust - why not shame the soldiers a little? When the woman soldier expresses amazement, he produces more pictures of Jews from the Holocaust and tells her that he just gave a lecture on the subject at Balata.

Palestijnen vuren mortiergranaten af op Karni grensovergang

Terroristenlogica: nadat Israël had besloten ondanks de schendingen van het staakt-het-vuren toch de grenzen zondag weer beperkt te openen, vuurden Palestijnen een aantal mortiergranaten op de Karni grensovergang af.

 

R.

-----------------------

Palestinians fire mortars at Karni crossing

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3561413,00.html
In another breach of agreed upon truce, number of shells land near crossing that is expected to be reopened Sunday; no injuries reported

 

Shmulik Hadad
Published:  06.28.08, 23:42 / Israel News

 

 

Palestinians fired a number of mortars Saturday evening toward the Karni crossing on the Gaza-Israel border. It remains unclear whether the shells landed in Israeli or Palestinian territory. No injuries or damage were reported in the attacks.
 
An explosion was heard near the western Negev community of Gabim, but a search for a rocket or mortar landing site came up empty.

 

The Karni crossing is expected to be reopened by Israel on Sunday for the transfer of goods to the Strip within the framework of the agreed upon ceasefire between Israel and the armed Palestinian organizations in the coastal enclave.

 

The crossings were closed down a week ago following repeated truce violations on the part of the Palestinians.

The Nahal Oz fuel terminal was reopened on Friday to allow the transfer of fuel to Gaza in a limited capacity.

A senior Israeli security establishment official said on Thursday that "any breach of the ceasefire agreement will be dealt with accordingly. However, if the calm is upheld, we'll fulfill our part of the deal.

Earlier on Saturday, Islamic Jihad threatened to resume rocket attacks on Israel if the IDF continues its military operations in the West Bank.

 

"Islamic Jihad reserves the right to respond to all Israeli violations," one of the group's Gaza chiefs Khaled al-Batch said, but added they would "not take the initiative in breaking the calm."

Shin Bet akkoord met vrijlaten Palestijnen met bloed aan hun handen voor Shalit

Tegenover elke Israëlische dode schijnen honderden Palestijnse doden te staan, maar voor één Israëlische soldaat moeten ook 1.000 Palestijnse gevangenen worden vrijgelaten. Sommigen beschuldigen Israël van racisme, en van een extreme vergeldigspolitiek, anderen wijten dit aan de doodscultuur van de Arabieren. Dat is wat sterk uitgedrukt, maar feit is dat de Palestijnen in meerderheid het doden van Israëlische burgers goedkeuren en hun doden - ook als dat plegers van zelfmoordaanslagen zijn - eren als helden, en Hamas gebruikt burgers geregeld als menselijk schild.

 

Het absurde aantal gevangenen dat Israël vrij laat voor een soldaat heeft niet zozeer met racisme te maken, maar de Israëlische moraal dat je alle mensen van het slagveld thuisbrengt wordt door de regering tot in het extreme getrokken, niet in de laatste plaats vanwege de chantage door de familie van de soldaten, die geregeld overleg hebben met regeringsfunctionarissen. Wie is er bestand tegen de pijn, het verdriet en de hartverscheurende pleidooien om alles te doen om haar zoon terug te krijgen?

 

R&W

___________
 

Last update - 11:13 27/06/2008

 

Shin Bet agrees to free prisoners 'with blood on their hands' for Shalit

 

By Amos Harel and Yoav Stern, Haaretz Correspondents
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/996811.html

 

Shin Bet security service chief Yuval Diskin has somewhat softened his position regarding the prisoners who could be released in return for Shalit. Diskin is now prepared to release some prisoners "who have the blood of Israelis on their hands," so long as the risk they pose is lessened.

The government's coordinator for hostage negotiations, Ofer Dekel, left for Cairo on Thursday, where talks have resumed over a deal to secure the release of kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.

Shalit was abducted two years ago in a cross-border raid by Palestinian militants, and has since remained in captivity in the Gaza Strip.
 
Sources in the defense establishment expressed satisfaction at the renewed effort to advance the deal, and in particular at the increased Egyptian role in mediating between the parties.

The resumption of the talks is part of the agreements Israel and Egypt reached in connection with the cease-fire (tahadiyeh) between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

Dekel held meetings in Cairo with Egyptian intelligence officials, headed by Egypt's intelligence chief, General Omar Suleiman. Simultaneously, talks are taking place between Egypt and Hamas. Dekel was supposed to talk to his hosts about the procedural aspects of the talks, while gaining an impression as to areas where Hamas might prove flexible.

Israeli officials are encouraged by the Egyptians' attitude toward the mediation, which they found to be more serious and thorough this time around. The intention is to conduct intensive negotiations in the near future, in order to advance a deal. The gaps between the sides are still substantial, primarily because of Hamas' demand that Israel release dozens of its members who are serving multiple life sentences for their roles in suicide bombings that killed and wounded many.

The solution being proposed is to transfer such inmates who are from the West Bank to the Gaza Strip or another country. A similar solution was used in the deal involving the wanted militants who holed up in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, in 2002. Dekel is in favor of a similar arrangement, as are Defense Minister Ehud Barak and IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi.

The London-based Arabic-language newspaper Al Hayat reported on Thursday that Egypt had given Israel a list of 1,000 prisoners Hamas wants freed in return for Shalit, but Israel objected to 75 percent of them. According to the paper's sources, the deal in the works is set to include the release of 150 Palestinian inmates in the first stage, in return for Shalit being transferred to Egypt, where his family will be able to visit him. On Shalit's return to Israel, 800 additional prisoners will be released in two stages.

Etnische zuivering in het Midden-Oosten

99% van de Joodse inwoners van Arabische landen is over een periode van enkele decennia verdreven. Hier is internationaal nooit veel aandacht voor geweest, en sommige 'historici' durven zelfs te beweren dat zij maar al te graag hun geboortegrond, huis en haard en al hun bezittingen achterlieten vanwege hun heimwee naar Jeruzalem. We mogen zulke personen geen antisemieten noemen, maar ze ruiken er wel een beetje naar...

 

Wouter

____________

 

Jun 23, 2008 19:12 | Updated Jun 24, 2008 10:05

The ethnic cleansing of Arabic Jews

By ASHLEY PERRY

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1214132663726&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

 

Israel is perhaps the least efficient "ethnic cleanser" in the history of mankind, calumnies to the contrary notwithstanding.

In 1947 some 740,000 Palestinians lived in the British Mandate for Palestine. Today, the Arab residents of the West Bank and Gaza, together with Arab citizens of Israel, comprise a total of over five million Palestinians (altogether over nine million people worldwide refer to themselves as Palestinian.)

Using a popular population growth rate equation, the Palestinian growth rate has been calculated as close to double that of Asia and Africa over a comparable period of time.

Drazen Petrovic defines ethnic cleansing as "a well-defined policy of a particular group of persons to systematically eliminate another group from a given territory." By this definition, only one type of ethnic cleansing has occurred in the Arab-Israeli conflict - that of the Jews of Asia and North Africa. Whereas before 1948 there were nearly 900,000 Jews living in Arab lands, by 2001 only 6,500 remained.

THOSE WHO claim Israel carried out ethnic cleansing of Arabs can point to no official command to that effect. Jewish ethnic cleansing from Arab lands, on the other hand, was often official state policy.

Jews were formally expelled from many areas in the Arab world. The Arab League released a statement urging Arab governments to facilitate the exit of Jews from Arab countries, a resolution which was carried out through a series of punitive measures and discriminatory decrees that made it untenable for Jews to remain in their native lands.

On May 16, 1948, The New York Times recorded a series of measures taken by the Arab League to marginalize and persecute the Jewish residents of Arab League member states. It reported on the "text of a law drafted by the Political Committee of the Arab League, which was intended to govern the legal status of Jewish residents of Arab League countries. It provides that, beginning on an unspecified date, all Jews except citizens of non-Arab states would be considered 'members of the Jewish minority state of Palestine.' Their bank accounts would be frozen and used to finance resistance to 'Zionist ambitions in Palestine.' Jews believed to be active Zionists would be interned and their assets confiscated."

IN 1951, the Iraqi government passed legislation that made affiliation with Zionism a felony and ordered "the expulsion of Jews who refused to sign a statement of anti-Zionism." This pushed tens of thousands of Jews to leave Iraq, while much of their property was confiscated by the state.

In 1967, many Egyptian Jews were detained and tortured, and Jewish homes confiscated. In Libya that year, the government "urged the Jews to leave the country temporarily," permitting each to take one suitcase and the equivalent of $50.

In 1970, the Libyan government issued new laws confiscating all the assets of Libya's Jews, issuing in their stead 15-year bonds. But when the bonds matured, no compensation was paid. Libyan leader Muammar al-Gaddafi justified this on the grounds that "the alignment of the Jews with Israel, the Arab nations' enemy, has forfeited their right to compensation."

These are just a few examples of what would became common measures throughout the Arab world - not to mention the pogroms and attacks on Jews and their institutions that drove a major part of the Jewish exodus.

THE ECONOMIC suffering on the part of the two refugee populations was equally lopsided.

According to the newly released study "The Palestinian Refugee Issue: Rhetoric vs. Reality" by former CIA and State Department Treasury official Sidney Zabludoff in the Jewish Political Studies Review, the value of assets lost by both refugee populations is strikingly uneven.

Zabludoff uses data from John Measham Berncastle, who in the early 1950s, under the aegis of the newly formed United Nations Conciliation Commission for Palestine (UNCCP), undertook the task of calculating the assets of the Palestinian refugees. Zabludoff calculates that their assets were worth $3.9 billion in today's currency.

The Jewish refugees, being greater in number and more urban, had almost double those assets.

On top of this equation, it must be taken into account that Israel returned over 90 percent of blocked bank accounts, safe deposit boxes and other items belonging to Palestinian refugees during the 1950s. This considerably diminishes the UNCCP calculations.

THESE FACTS are conveniently forgotten or not publicized, leaving the way open for Israel-bashers like Exeter University history Prof. Ilan Pappe to omit any mention of the Middle East's greatest ethnic cleansing.

However, a few recent events are clearing the world community's perception of this history. On April 1, the US Congress adopted Resolution 185, which for the first time recognizes Jewish refugees from Arab countries. It urges that the president and US officials participating in Middle East discussions ensure that any reference to Palestinian refugees "also include a similarly explicit reference to the resolution of the issue of Jewish refugees from Arab countries."

Just as importantly, the first-ever hearing in the British parliament on the subject of Jewish refugees from Arab countries takes place today in the House of Lords. It will be convened by Labor MP John Mann and Lord Anderson of Swansea, a joint briefing organized by Justice for Jews from Arab Countries (JJAC) in association with the Board of Deputies of British Jews.

Greater recognition of the refugee issue and the ethnic cleansing of Jews from the wider Arab world will bring clearer definition of the area's history to a greater number of people.

A people cannot be said to have been "ethnically cleansed" from an area in which it has grown at double the rate of its geographic neighbors. On the other hand, a people that lost more than 150 times its number from an area over the course of a few decades can make a very strong case for having undergone ethnic cleansing.

 

The writer, a political analyst who has worked with many organizations including the Israel Prime Minister's Office, is the editor of the Middle East Strategic Information project.

 

Hamas dreigt overtreders staakt-het-vuren te arresteren

Het staakt-het-vuren is in Hamas' belang en dat beseft men dondersgoed, vandaar dat, nu de herhaaldelijke schendingen de deal in gevaar brengen, men eindelijk bereid lijkt om het actief te handhaven, nadat Hamas eerder zei dat men geen 'geweer tegen het hoofd van een vrijheidsstrijder' zou houden.

 

Ratna

----------

 

Zahar pledges to arrest truce breachers

 

Jun. 28, 2008

Khaled Abu Toameh , THE JERUSALEM POST
www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1214492525696&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

 

Hamas leaders in the Gaza Strip over the weekend issued new warnings to the Palestinian armed groups against violating the cease-fire agreement with Israel and threatened to arrest anyone who does not abide by it.

The latest warnings came after members of Fatah and Islamic Jihad fired a number of rockets at Israel last week.

This is the first time that Hamas threatens to arrest Palestinians who launch rockets at Israel from the Gaza Strip. The threat is seen as a sign of Hamas's keenness to preserve the cease-fire and show that it is capable of enforcing its will on all the factions in the Gaza Strip.

Sources in the Gaza Strip told The Jerusalem Post that Hamas's security forces arrested Friday five Fatah militiamen on suspicion of firing three rockets at Israel last week. The five were arrested in the town of Bet Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip, the sources said, noting that Fatah's armed wing, the Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, had claimed responsibility for the attacks.

Mahmoud Zahar, a senior Hamas official, said his movement's position regarding the violations made by Fatah and Islamic Jihad were "clear."

He said representatives of Fatah and Islamic Jihad have been summoned to meetings with Hamas officials who warned them against breaching the agreement.
"Some elements were working secretly to foil the [cease-fire] agreement," Zahar told reporters. "they don't want this agreement to succeed because they are working against the national interests of our people."

Zahar also said that some Palestinian "collaborators" and unruly factions were behind the attempts to foil the cease-fire agreement. He said that his movement has made it clear that anyone who violates the agreement would be arrested, even if he belongs to Hamas.

"We have reached an agreement with Islamic Jihad that anyone, even if he's from Hamas, would be arrested and disarmed if he violates the agreement," he said. "Those who violate the agreement would be accused of sabotaging the national program."

Asked if he was not concerned that Hamas would be accused of serving Israel by arresting rocket launchers, Zahar said: "Whoever makes such an allegation does not understand anything and is himself a collaborator with Israel. This agreement was reached on the basis of national consensus."

Zahar revealed that Hamas has already arrested a number of Palestinians who fired mortars and rockets at the border crossings in the Gaza Strip or trucks supplying fuel. He also revealed that some clans in the Gaza Strip have handed over their sons who were accused of violating the agreement and "harming the national interests of the Palestinians."

Hamas's Interior Minister, Said Siam, on Friday night summoned representatives of various Palestinian armed groups to an urgent meeting at his home where he warned them against breaching the cease-fire. "All those who accepted the agreement must now honor it," he said after the meeting. Anyone who acts otherwise will be held responsible and will be seen as serving the interests of Israel."

On Friday Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh called on all Palestinian factions to honor the cease-fire with Israel.

Speaking at the conclusion of Friday prayers, Haniyeh said that "The [Palestinian] factions and people accepted the cease-fire in order to stop the Palestinian people's suffering, stop the siege [on Gaza] and bring an end to the Israeli occupation. Therefore, we hope that everyone will respect the national agreement, since its in our mutual interest," Haniyeh urged.

Haniyeh's call to honor the cease-fire came after it had been broken yet again earlier Friday by terrorists firing two mortar shells at southern Israel.

One of the shells landed near Kibbutz Kfar Aza, in the Sha'ar Hanegev region, while the other landed in an open area. No one was wounded and no damage was reported.

IDF spokesman Peter Lerner said industrial fuel was transferred Friday into Gaza to run power stations, but that most crossings remained closed.
Lerner said Israel last let food into the Gaza Strip on Tuesday.

Herb Keinon, Yaakov Lappin and AP contributed to this report.

 

Grensovergangen Gazastrook blijven dicht na nieuwe mortier inslagen

 

Afgelopen dinsdag een mortiergranaat en 4 Qassams, woensdag nog een Qassam, en vrijdag weer 2 mortiergranaten. Israëlische soldaten zouden waarschuwingsschoten hebben gelost naar Gazanen die te dicht bij de grens kwamen, en 1 keer een Gazaan hebben geraakt daarbij, wat de aanleiding voor de eerste mortiergranaat zou zijn geweest. Het staakt-het-vuren begint een lachertje te worden. Als dit nog een of twee dagen zo doorgaat zal Israël het van haar kant waarschijnlijk ook voor gezien houden - en terecht!

 

Wouter

______________

 

Last update - 12:16 27/06/2008

 

Gaza mortar shells hit Israel despite truce; crossings stay shut

 

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/996694.html

By Fadi Eyadat, Haaretz Correspondent, and The Associated Press

 

 

Two mortar shells fired from Gaza hit the western Negev on Friday, exploding in open areas, despite a cease fire agreement between Israel and Hamas, which went into effect last week. No damage or injury were reported.

The attack came one day after two Qassam rockets were fired from the Strip into Israel. The militant Fatah offshoot Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade claimed responsibility for the attack and demanded that the cease fire agreement between Israel and Hamas, which currently includes only the Gaza Strip, be extended to include the West Bank as well.

At a high-level security meeting late Thursday, Israel decided to keep the border crossings into the Gaza Strip closed on Friday because of the latest rocket attack defense officials said. They added that a limited amount of fuel would be transferred into the Strip despite the closure.

Since the cease fire went into effect last Thursday, instead of retaliating for rocket attacks with airstrikes at Palestinian rocket squads, Israel closed the border crossings, where vital supplies are shipped into Gaza - restoring a blockade that has caused severe shortages.

The move hits at the main interest of Hamas - ending the blockade and easing the hardships facing the people under its control. Hamas officials charged that by restoring the blockade, Israel is violating the truce. Underlining the high level of distrust, Palestinians formed a committee to track Israeli violations.

At a meeting Wednesday, Israeli defense officials discussed how to proceed once the crossings are reopened. According to the same officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the meetings are closed, Israel might reset the truce clock each time it closes the crossings in response to a Palestinian violation.

Israel had significantly increased the amount of supplies flowing into Gaza on Sunday, in accordance with the truce agreement, and was ready for another increase next Sunday. But a barrage of four Qassam rockets, claimed by Islamic Jihad, stopped the process. Now Israel is considering counting three days from each reopening of the crossings before it reinstates the original increase.

During a visit to Prague, Czech Republic, Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad said Israel should reopen the crossings to preserve the truce.

"[The reopening is] important because the closure... of Gaza is actually producing a situation where you have 1.5 million of our people who live there with a sense of not much to lose," Fayyad said. "That is a situation that's got to end."

Hamas charged that the re-imposed blockade is a violation. But Hamas official Taher Nunu said that Hamas is committed to the truce. "The [Hamas] government will not allow anyone to violate this agreement," he said.

The rocket attack Thursday came as Israeli envoy Ofer Dekel headed to Egypt to meet with Egyptian officials on the final stage of the truce - a swap of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners for an Israeli soldier Hamas has held captive for two years. Israel has balked at Hamas' demands, saying its list of prisoners includes militants involved in deadly attacks on Israelis.

Hamas also has demanded that Israel allow reopening of Gaza's only border crossing with Egypt in the final phase of the six-month truce deal.

The Rafah crossing has been sealed since the Hamas violent takeover over the Strip last June, confining Gaza's people to the tiny seaside territory. Israel has said it would not allow reopening of Rafah until the soldier is freed.

Protest tegen vrijlaten moordenaar voor waarschijnlijk dode soldaten

Een hartstochtelijk en goed onderbouwd pleidooi van Ami Isseroff tegen het uitwisselen van twee dode lichamen voor een wrede terrorist.

 

The problem is not Kuntar, but Hassan Nasrallah and the Hezbollah. The problem is that releasing Kuntar in return for dead bodies is not going to bring our boys home, and it will whet the appetite of the Hezbollah for further kidnappings, and perhaps further wars. How can we possibly justify this risk? It will also signal to the Hezbollah and other enemies that Israeli captives are worth as much dead or alive. That puts a death sentence on any future kidnap victims. It is easier for politicians and op-ed columnists to succumb to the tears of mothers and loved ones and the pressure of PR campaigns. It is much harder to explain that what they are asking will not bring our beloved sons back to life, and will condemn many other sons and daughters to death.

(....)

If Israel gives up Samir Kuntar, does anyone believe it would put an end to kidnapping? If we give up every enemy prisoner in Israeli jails, won't the the Hamas kidnap more Israelis in order to get Sheba farms or some part of northern Israel that they claim? Will an Israeli government of the future be faced with a crowd of angry parents and "advocates" insisting that we must give up Rosh Haniqra or Kiriat Shmona in order to free their sons, alive or dead?

 

Onder het artikel staan de contactgegevens van Israëlische politici.

 

 

Hezbollah prisoner swap: it's not too late to save our boys and girls

27.06. 2008
http://www.zionism-israel.com/log/archives/00000577.html
Original content copyright by the author
Zionism & Israel Center http://zionism-israel.com

We can still stop the Israeli government from making a bad mistake. If all goes as scheduled, the Israeli cabinet may make a decision on Sunday, June 29, that would affect the lives of not two, but thousands of Israelis - boys, girls, men and women, Jews and Arabs. If the Israeli cabinet decides to release convicted Samir Kuntar in return, most likely, for the bodies of murdered soldiers Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser, they will open the way for the next round of kidnappings that may end in a much larger war than the Second Lebanon War (see With blood on their hands).

Since I last wrote about this issue, a few things have changed. Pressure has grown within the Israeli government and beyond to make Prime Minister Olmert reconsider his ill-judged promise to the families of the kidnapped soldiers to make the swap. As I noted, experts had concluded that Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser probably died shortly after the kidnapping. The "difference" is that now this is admitted publicly and the IDF is proceeding with the religious process that would declare them dead. This will not change the reality.

Ehud Olmert never bothered to explain the reasoning behind decision to make the swap, and strangely nobody asked him. Israel fought the Second Lebanon War precisely in order to avoid making this sway, so what changed? Israel would not give up Samir Kuntar in any previous hostage situation, including the hijacking of the Achille Lauro. What changed since then?

Most of what has been written about the swap, and most of the publicly voiced considerations are irrelevant. Eitan Haber writes that it doesn't matter if Samir Kuntar is a bad guy, we still have to do anything to return our captives. Israel Hasson writes that it would be "immoral" to release Kuntar. The obvious and inconvenient point that they are missing is that the Israeli government is not conducting a kindergarten class in morality, but making a policy decision. Haber recounts that the first such swap was made thirty years ago. He forgets to tell you that a live soldier was exchanged for some prisoners of various descriptions, rather than exchanging a convicted murderer for dead bodies. In 1978, it wasn't quite so clear that such exchanges would drastically increase the likelihood of kidnappings. The Israeli soldier exchanged then had not been intentionally kidnapped from Israeli soil.

Of course there are "moral" issues, but they are not related to Kuntar as Haber thinks or to motivation of soldiers as Hasson thinks. The problem is not Kuntar, but Hassan Nasrallah and the Hezbollah. The problem is that releasing Kuntar in return for dead bodies is not going to bring our boys home, and it will whet the appetite of the Hezbollah for further kidnappings, and perhaps further wars. How can we possibly justify this risk? It will also signal to the Hezbollah and other enemies that Israeli captives are worth as much dead or alive. That puts a death sentence on any future kidnap victims. It is easier for politicians and op-ed columnists to succumb to the tears of mothers and loved ones and the pressure of PR campaigns. It is much harder to explain that what they are asking will not bring our beloved sons back to life, and will condemn many other sons and daughters to death.

There are other alien considerations that play a role, but are not mentioned. Many in the Israeli government and defense establishment feel that not not enough was done to try to save navigator Ron Arad when it was still possible to do so. The "Ron Arad complex" however, does not apply to Goldwasser and Regev. Israel has tried very hard indeed to get them back or at least to get some signs that they are alive, but with no success.

It is true, as advocates of the swap insist, that Goldwasser and Regev might be alive despite all the indications to the contrary. Very well. Let them get some evidence that they are alive. If Regev and Goldwasser are alive, and if the Hezbollah are honestly interested in a deal, they would be willing to provide such information in return for some lesser captives. Surely, the number of prisoners Israel would be willing to release would be very much greater if the government had evidence that the captives are alive, as is the case for Gilad Shalit, captured by the Hamas.

If Israel gives up Samir Kuntar, does anyone believe it would put an end to kidnapping? If we give up every enemy prisoner in Israeli jails, won't the the Hamas kidnap more Israelis in order to get Sheba farms or some part of northern Israel that they claim? Will an Israeli government of the future be faced with a crowd of angry parents and "advocates" insisting that we must give up Rosh Haniqra or Kiriat Shmona in order to free their sons, alive or dead?

It is still not to late to demand a reasoned accounting of advocates of the prisoner swap, an accounting based on the realistic assumption that the kidnap victims are dead. and that takes into account the great victory that will be handed to the Hezbollah and the price that all our sons and daughters will surely pay in the future.

Please help - write, call or fax Knesset members or members of the government - preferably in Hebrew. Ask them to stop the swap and save our kids from future kidnapping and blackmail. Their contact information is
here
(http://www.knesset.gov.il/mk/eng/mkindex_current_eng.asp)

Some important cabinet officials and government members:
PM Ehud Olmert
eulmert@knesset.gov.il
pm@pmo.gov.il
Telephone: 02-6753227
Telephone 2: 02-6753547

---

Avi Dichter
adichter@knesset.gov.il
Telephone: 02-6753727
Fax: 02-6496168

---

Benjamin Ben Eliezer
Telephone: 02-6408193
Telephone 2: 02-6408194
Fax: 02-6496127
Email: binyaminb@knesset.gov.il

---

Israel Ministry of Defense
pniot@mod.gov.il
TEL: 03-6975423 03-6975540
FAX: 03-6976711
Kaplan St 37, Tel Aviv, 61909

Please do it today, as the issue will be discussed on Sunday.
Thanks.

Ami Isseroff

---

Original content is Copyright by the author 2008. Posted at ZioNation-Zionism and Israel Web Log, http://www.zionism-israel.com/log/archives/00000577.html where your intelligent and constructive comments are welcome. Disributed by ZNN list. Subscribe by sending a message to ZNN-subscribe@yahoogroups.com. Please forward by e-mail with this notice, cite this article and link to it. Other uses by permission only.

 

Hamas wil 1.000 gevangen Palestijnen vrijkrijgen voor Shalit

 

According to the report, Shalit's transfer to Egypt would go ahead in the first stage of a deal, after 150 Palestinian prisoners are released from jail. With Shalit's return to Israel after one week, 300 additional prisoners would be freed, and after another two months, 550 more ? mostly women and children.
The talks held by Dekel and Suleiman on Thursday are to deal with the prisoners on Hamas' list who Israel refuses to free, said the report, due to their involvement in attacks that have killed Israelis. The Egyptian sources quoted by Al-Hayat blamed Israel for "foot-dragging" because it rejected the names submitted by Hamas.

 

1.000 Gevangenen voor een soldaat. Wat klopt hier niet? En hoe kan het zijn dat, omdat Israël een paar terroristen die erg veel bloed aan hun handen hebben, niet wil vrijlaten, Israël en niet Hamas wordt beschuldigd van 'foot dragging' door Egypte? Misschien is Egypte toch niet zo neutraal als het zich graag presenteert. Nota Bene was afgesproken dat Hamas zich, in ruil voor het staakt-het-vuren, flexibeler op zou stellen.

'Vrouwen en kinderen' klinkt sympathiek en geeft ze een aura van onschuld, maar houdt in jongens van 16 en 17 die niet onderdoen voor hun volwassen broeders, en in de tweede intifada speelden vrouwen een niet onbelangrijke rol, juist omdat zij makkelijker door de veiligheidscontroles komen.

 

Noam Shalit read the speech his wife Aviva had planned to give. "Who would have believed that 731 days have passed and the prime minister who took full responsibility for the matter has not managed to reach an agreement on the return of Gilad? Who would have believed that 731 days have passed and Gilad still does not see the light of day and not even the light at the end of the tunnel."
Shalit called on Olmert to "make a decision, as difficult as it is, to return Gilad home. Gilad was sent by you on a mission and without any hesitation or deliberation he carried it out and was abducted. Gilad paid and is still paying an unbearable price. But the government needs to fulfill its ultimate moral responsibility to a soldier. Here there is nothing taken for granted."
Later Shalit called on Israeli mothers to wake up and cry out, and tell the prime minister clearly that two years of talking is enough.

 

Het antwoord op Noam Shalits vraag waarom Shalit nog niet thuis is, is simpel: omdat Israël niet langer over zijn lot en vrijlating gaat, maar Hamas. Hoe begrijpelijk de woede, frustratie en pijn bij de familie ook moge zijn, als een soldaat de oorlog in wordt gestuurd bestaat er altijd een risico dat hij niet terugkeert. Het is niet verantwoordelijk als de regering grote aantallen terroristen met bloed aan hun handen vrijlaat om een soldaat vrij te krijgen. De regering moet het landsbelang en de veiligheid van het land dienen, en dat moet in haar daden de doorslag geven, niet de pijn van deze familie.

 

Israëlische moeders beseffen hopelijk dat hoe meer terroristen voor Shalit worden vrijgelaten, hoe groter dus de beloning voor Hamas en hoe aantrekkelijker het wordt om vaker soldaten te kidnappen: hun zonen.

Ratna

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Last update - 12:19 26/06/2008

Israel to give Egypt new proposals for Shalit swap 

By Barak Ravid, Yossi Melman, and Jack Khoury, Haaretz Correspondents and Agencies
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/996293.html

 

 

Israel was to present Egyptian mediators in Cairo on Thursday with new formulas that it hopes will result in progress in the case of the abducted Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit, who has been held captive by Hamas in the Gaza Strip since June 2006.

In a meeting in Cairo on Thursday, the Israeli official charged with the negotiations on the prisoners, Ofer Dekel, was to discuss Israel's new proposals to further the deal on Shalit with Egyptian Chief of Intelligence General Omar Suleiman.

Dekel was expected to tell Suleiman that Israel expects Hamas to show greater flexibility regarding the list of prisoners it wants freed in exchange for Shalit.

Suleiman is scheduled to hold a similar meeting with Hamas representatives in Cairo next week.

Intensive indirect negotiations are planned at a later stage, where representatives of Israel and Hamas will be based in the same hotel, and the Egyptian mediators will shuttle between them with proposals and counter-proposals.

Nevertheless, senior Hamas official Osama al-Mazeini said Wednesday that the group is not willing to bend on its demands for the release of its prisoners.

"Israel has been given 350 names, and wants to release only 70 of them," al-Mazeini said. "Until all the names are approved, there is no chance for a deal.

The London-based Al-Hayat daily reported on Thursday that Cairo officials said that if and when an agreement is struck, Shalit would be moved to Egypt for one week, during which his family would be able to see him.

The report also said that Jerusalem told Egypt it would be willing to free prisoners that have killed Israelis, on the condition they are sent to other countries. Cairo reportedly rejected the suggestion.

According to the report, Shalit's transfer to Egypt would go ahead in the first stage of a deal, after 150 Palestinian prisoners are released from jail. With Shalit's return to Israel after one week, 300 additional prisoners would be freed, and after another two months, 550 more ? mostly women and children.

The talks held by Dekel and Suleiman on Thursday are to deal with the prisoners on Hamas' list who Israel refuses to free, said the report, due to their involvement in attacks that have killed Israelis. The Egyptian sources quoted by Al-Hayat blamed Israel for "foot-dragging" because it rejected the names submitted by Hamas.

Shalit family marks two years since Gilad's abduction

Meanwhile, hundreds took part in a rally in the Shalit family's hometown of Mitzpeh Hila on Wednesday to mark the two-year anniversary of Gilad's abduction.

Shlomo and Miki Goldwasser, the parents of abducted soldier Ehud Goldwasser, and Zvi Regev, the father of Eldad, also came to show support for the Shalits, as did the Avitan family, whose son's body was returned from Lebanon a few years ago.

In a special show of solidarity, Hen Arad, the brother of missing navigator Ron Arad, and Ron's daughter Yuval, were also present. For a moment it appeared that there was a resemblance between the two situations and families - and that it was forbidden to let the same thing happen again.

"Ron did not volunteer to be a pilot in order to be a gladiator, and Gilad did not join the tank corps to be a martyr. It turns out our leaders don't believe in anything," said Hen Arad at the rally, describing the country's political leaders as if they were the last of the Roman emperors.

"On my way here I thought of a fantasy, that if Ron had returned he would have stood in my place today with his daughter Yuval and told the families there is someone to rely on to return the soldiers home," said Arad.

During his speech he read part of his brother's last letter, where he asked his family to act to help bring him home.

Many young people came to the rally, including members of youth movements and some of Gilad's friends from school. One read an emotional letter to Gilad: "It is hard for us, Gilad, when we pass your house in our uniforms, when we see your picture in the newspaper and hear your name on the radio. And every time we are truly happy and before we fall asleep, we wonder if you know whether it is already night and whether you are sleeping."

Mordi Cohen of Mitzpeh Hila, who led the rally, called on the cabinet to make decisions and act from strength. "Do not give in to the demands of release, but to decide on releasing; force the Hamas prisoners with blood on their hands to save the life of an Israeli soldier," he said.

Noam Shalit read the speech his wife Aviva had planned to give. "Who would have believed that 731 days have passed and the prime minister who took full responsibility for the matter has not managed to reach an agreement on the return of Gilad? Who would have believed that 731 days have passed and Gilad still does not see the light of day and not even the light at the end of the tunnel."

Shalit called on Olmert to "make a decision, as difficult as it is, to return Gilad home. Gilad was sent by you on a mission and without any hesitation or deliberation he carried it out and was abducted. Gilad paid and is still paying an unbearable price. But the government needs to fulfill its ultimate moral responsibility to a soldier. Here there is nothing taken for granted."

Later Shalit called on Israeli mothers to wake up and cry out, and tell the prime minister clearly that two years of talking is enough.

At the end of the rally, two children set loose a flock of white doves, and amazingly the birds flew due South. One young girl asked her mother where they were going, and she answered: "To say hello to Gilad."