Tag: racism

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Suheir Hammad – magnificent poetry

Sometimes I use this blog to remind myself later of people who add to the weft and weave to transform for a moment my wretched, mundane existence into a dance of possibilities and wishes. Suheir is possessed by the muse – when she performs it is the whole woman, the laughing medusa of Helene Cixous, the frightening yet irresistible gypsy who leads us to prophecy with a toss of the head – it is up to us if we wish to grasp the destiny she offers.

Hammad’s poem ‘The Refugees’ has poignancy at present in Australia, where the inglorious prime monstress Julie Gillard is esconsced to wage a battle royale in the August election. Gillard is dog-whistling – calling the noxious Australian xenophobes who need so little encouragement. Both parties are craven in this regard, yet there’s something particularly obscene about a party which is supposed to have at least some respect for human rights pandering to racist human refuse.

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How Israel fails to protect the rights of Palestinian children – Day 4

From the UN Children and armed conflict: Report of the Secretary-General (A/64/742–S/2010/181) of April 13 2010:

Nakba
Developments in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel

99. At the close of 2009, the effects of Israel’s military operations in Gaza, codenamed “Operation Cast Lead”, from 27 December 2008 to 18 January 2009, were still being felt across the Gaza Strip. Thousands of Gaza residents, including children, are still living in alternative or temporary accommodation and many schools, health facilities and parts of vital water and sanitation infrastructure networks have not been rehabilitated or repaired. The ongoing blockade by Israel and the resulting lack of necessary materials in Gaza make such repairs and rehabilitation difficult.

100. A total of 374 Palestinian children were killed and 2,086 were injured during the reporting period, including at least 350 killed and 1,815 injured in Gaza alone during “Operation Cast Lead” by Israeli forces. The Israel/occupied Palestinian territory working group on grave violations against children confirmed 12 cases of Palestinian children who were killed while bearing arms and acting as combatants during “Operation Cast Lead”. The working group also confirmed one case of recruitment of a 16-year-old boy by the armed group Ezz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades. The actual number of cases is believed to be higher and there had been other reported incidents of children being trained and/or used by Palestinian militant groups in Gaza. Community members are, however, reluctant to provide information on this practice.

101. The working group confirmed reports of seven Palestinian children used by Israeli soldiers as human shields in three separate incidents during “Operation Cast Lead.” The office of Israel’s Military Attorney-General is investigating those incidents, although the United Nations is unaware of the actual process under way or the outcome of the investigations to date. On 11 March 2010, the Military Advocate for Operational Affairs brought criminal charges against two Israel Defense Forces staff sergeants who ordered a nine-year-old Palestinian child to open bags and suitcases suspected of being booby-traps. The criminal investigation of this case was launched in June 2009, following the report of my Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict. The indictment was filed with the District Military Court for offences of excessive authority that endangers life or health and of unbecoming conduct.

102. Since the end of the offensive in January 2009, 24 children were killed and 271 were injured in incidents involving Israeli gun and tank fire in the Gaza buffer zone as a result of unexploded ordnance, and in settler-related incidents in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. One Israeli child was killed during the reporting period and three Israeli children were injured in two separate incidents in the West Bank. The working group was able to verify three incidents of Palestinian inter-factional fighting during 2009, resulting in the injury of six children and the deaths of two others. The two children, allegedly affiliated with the Jund Ansar Allah group, were killed in armed clashes between Hamas-affiliated security forces and members of the Jund Ansar Allah group in the southern Gaza town of Rafah.

103. No children were harmed as a result of rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip on Israeli communities in adjacent areas. However, attacks and the threat of attacks are known to cause high levels of prolonged anxiety among Israeli children residing there and among Palestinian children in Gaza.

104. In 2009 the working group documented at least five children who were requested to become informers for the Israeli intelligence while being subjected to violent interrogation by the Israeli authorities. The actual figure is suspected to be much higher, but as testifying puts the lives of the concerned children at risk, the United Nations does not actively seek information on this practice.

105. The number of Palestinian children arrested and detained by Israeli military authorities rose sharply at the beginning of 2009, immediately after the start of “Operation Cast Lead”, but has decreased steadily since then, although remaining systematic and widespread. As of December 2009, 305 children were being detained. There are serious concerns regarding the rise in the number of young children, from 12 to 15 years of age, being detained, with 42 children in that age category being held in Israeli detention in December 2009 compared to 30 in December 2008. The United Nations has documented over 87 reports of ill-treatment and torture of Palestinian children during the reporting period, including 6 reports of threats of rape and sexual assault against the children to elicit confessions or in some cases collaboration from child detainees. Israeli authorities stress that the Israel Security Agency operates in strict compliance with Israel’s Supreme Court ruling (HCJ 5100/94), which states that investigations are free of torture, cruel inhuman treatment and any degrading handling, and absolutely prohibits the use of “brutal or inhuman means” in the course of an interrogation. Israeli authorities also stress that note should be taken of Israel’s commitment to investigate any allegation, irrespective of the source, and of Israel’s concern that more information should be provided in order to enable the appropriate authorities in Israel to investigate and respond substantively, where appropriate.

106. On 29 July 2009, the Israeli military commander in the West Bank, Major General Gadi Shamni, issued a new military order (Military Order No. 1,644) establishing a juvenile military court in the West Bank. This attempt to incorporate juvenile justice standards within the military court system was met with concern by the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child during its session in January 2010. Since the order came into effect on 1 October 2009, lawyers have observed that the military court judges, who adjudicate on juvenile matters in the West Bank, also continued to preside over cases involving adults. However, unlike previously, children under 16 years of age are now tried separately from adults and are brought into the courtroom individually, but are still taken to the courts from the detention facilities with adults.

107. In Gaza, 18 schools were destroyed and more than 260 were damaged, including 5 schools run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, by Israeli forces during “Operation Cast Lead”. In some cases, the Israel Defence Forces forcibly entered school compounds and used schools as interrogation centres. The lack of materials for reconstruction and rehabilitation of schools, coupled with chronic shortages of educational supplies as a result of an ongoing blockade forced thousands of students to learn in overcrowded schools operating on double shifts and often under unsafe and unsanitary conditions. To date, very few of the destroyed or damaged schools have been rebuilt or repaired. In addition, discrimination and neglect by Israeli authorities in East Jerusalem and Israel-controlled area C of the West Bank have also jeopardized children’s right to education. Inadequate structures, including tents, shacks and crude cement structures, are being used as schools owing to the difficulties in obtaining building permits needed to expand and upgrade existing schools and build new ones to accommodate the student population in area C, while in East Jerusalem, each year large numbers of Palestinian children are denied admission in the municipal schools run by the Jerusalem municipality and the Israeli Ministry of Education owing to a shortage of over 1,000 classrooms.

108. Almost half of Gaza’s health facilities were damaged or destroyed during “Operation Cast Lead” and Gaza’s health-care system is currently unable to provide adequate responses to children’s health-care needs. As a result, some patients must seek treatment outside Gaza — in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, Egypt, Jordan and Israel — for a wide range of medical assistance. During the reporting period, while 1,407 of 1,648 applications for children who sought to obtain medical assistance outside Gaza were approved, nine children in Gaza died while waiting for the appropriate permits to travel outside Gaza. In 2009 there was also an increase in the number of interrogations at Erez crossing, including the interrogation of children leaving Gaza for medical treatment.

109. Throughout 2009, the continuing high rate of settler violence against children was registered. Palestinian children continue to be shot, beaten and threatened while walking to school, grazing their livestock or playing outside their homes. According to reports, it has been revealed that a new pattern of violence has emerged since 2009, which suggests that Israeli settlers undertake attacks against Palestinians and their property in response to attempts by the Israeli authorities to dismantle “unauthorized” settlement outposts, raising additional concerns regarding the protection of Palestinian children. The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has documented at least two such incidents, in which 11 children were attacked by settlers. It is suspected that there are many more incidents that remain unreported. Perpetrators are never held accountable. This underscores the need for greater enforcement by the Israeli Government of the rule of law where violent settlers are concerned.

The Palestinian Campaign for Academic & Cultural Boycott of Israel is trying to get UNICEF to comply with the boycott for the upcoming conference organised by the Minerva Centre for Human Rights at the Hebrew University, jointly with the Van Leer Institute.

In essence, this conference establishes a false symmetry between the Palestinians under occupation and the Israeli occupiers and totally ignores the vastly divergent contexts in which children’s lives are embedded. The conference omits, in fact covers up, the fundamental source of the vulnerability and suffering of all children in this “conflict” zone: Israeli colonisation of Palestinian land and multi-tiered oppression of the Palestinian people. By inviting Israeli “security personnel” — the very same people who devise and execute policies that indiscriminately target Palestinian civilians, killing and maiming hundreds of children, as was done in the Gaza massacre — this conference not only gives them a credible and ‘respectable’ voice, but goes further than most in attempting to whitewash Israel’s atrocities in Gaza, its accelerating colonization of the West Bank and its gradual ethnic cleansing of entire Palestinian communities in occupied East Jerusalem and the Naqab (Negev).

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Get Up, Stand Up to the Zioteeth – Day 3

Noone’s commented on the new design, and I didn’t expect them too – this blog has been allowed to meander and waste, while Jin strew and threw bouquets and brickbats elsewhere through the cyberverse. Redoing the decor was overdue – and the new template has lots of space and options for customisation without fuss.

Crazed settlers at Sheik Jarrah

A Palestinian woman whose house has been occupied by Jewish settlers argue with Israelis who came to celebrate Jerusalem Day on May 12, 2010 in front of her disputed house in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah. Israel is celebrating the anniversary of the “unification” of Jerusalem, marking 43 years since it captured mainly Arab east Jerusalem during the 1967 Middle East war. Thousands of people, mostly nationalist-religious Jews, were expected to take part in an annual march through Jerusalem later Wednesday that culminates in the Old City at the Wailing Wall, one of the holiest sites in Judaism AFP PHOTO/AHMAD GHARABLI (Photo credit should read AHMAD GHARABLI/AFP/Getty Images)

Some peculiar synchronicity at the moment – it could almost be orchestrated. Folks seem to love Chomsky or hate him – I’ve long realised no theorist will satisfy my longing for human liberation completely and that minor points of contention are ubiquitous in the heated world of political discussion goes without saying, so tend to make my own judgment, regardless of what shibboleths I’m offending.

As an anarchist, Chomsky has been known to disagree with all national borders. But what’s this? Ali Abunimah wonders why the big C describes the “normal route” for colonialism – collaboration – in Palestine without condemning it and its neoliberal outcome. We hear also that very soon Israel will have a missile chastity belt and won’t be able to bleat any more about those pesky rockets to justify blasting Gazans with US supplied DIME bombs and white phosphorus. No doubt another pretext will be stimulated or invented to continue the collective punishment the zionists have perfected over the past 70 years or so which serves as a means of making life intolerable for Palestinians so they will be encouraged to leave. Sometimes, just the little things niggle – like today when the zionists capriciously declared the mail service between Gaza and the West Bank kaput.

Fright of the week has to be these maniacal settler boys harassing a Palestinian women, picked up by Mondoweiss – look at all those ferocious zioteeth!

Jin experienced the gnashing of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs teeth on twitter this arvo – the IMFA flunkey seemed to be pushing the same sort of lies it did during previous aid flotillas and convoys to Gaza – that Israel did provide aid, when it’s actually the international community which provides aid which the apartheid ziocolony lets through to the Gaza bantustan when it feels like it.

The FA Ministry hasbara team turned up on cue after this wee tweet, as @avinunu observed, apparently the reference resonated for them.

Or it might have been this one 🙂

@Jinjirrie to @amities small appendaged nations develop addiction for mafia money and missiles as power substitutes?

@IsraelMFA Weekly Summary of Humanitarian Aid Transferred into the Gaza Strip http://bit.ly/dayJFc

@Jinjirrie mwhahha …Liberman’s MFA is so brand israel conscious, it’s spamming twitter users 999 @IsraelMFA anyone home there?

@IsraelMFA yap why do you say that?

@Jinjirrie gee thanks for letting other countries help the people in your #Gaza concentration camp, here’s the HR report http://is.gd/ciKSS

[that’s the real humanitarian reports – these reports are always available via reliefweb.int and should be obtained from the source, rather than from an untrustworthy intermediary.]

@Jinjirrie at least you aren’t a bot – Liberman coulda fooled me at times tho, what do you reckon?

@IsraelMFA i am not Liberman 🙂 and i do want that gaza to prospers together with israel, what do you think about hamas?

@Jinjirrie Hamas are the elected government of the Palestinian people tortured, bombed and stolen from by Israel, the US & UK 100 yrs tears
@Jinjirrie meant 2 say “phewww, at least you aren’t liberman” – so why two twitters, the med one & the idf one? latest MFA hasbara concept?
@Jinjirrie if you’re not Liberman, perhaps you could work on the inside to dismantle the racist zionist state 🙂 i will help you :))

Jinjirrie to @milandroid liberman is still the foreign high chair pooh bah isn’t he wot? so they are his somewot inadequate mouth pieces
Jinjirrie to @milandroid i mean, the lies they are telling aren’t very credible – so they make israel look even more shonky than it is
Jinjirrie to @medicare2gaza yeah that’s right, look down the page – NONE OF THE HUMANITARIAN AID CAME FROM #ISRAEL, it was all donated by internationals

. @milandroid seriously here’s one for you, @IsraelMFA & minions http://is.gd/ciTVD straight from my heart to yours, grok it dudes

I sent them the Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa (HSRC) 09 study which found Israel is practicing both colonialism and apartheid in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

Jin to . @medicare2gaza don’t they train you properly at those luxury hasbara weekends anymore? very disappointed

Jin to @medicare2gaza no you are right, gaza is not israel, still, they both have walls around them – whose are really higher, do you think?

Jin to @medicare2gaza why are you imagining that it is israel’s aid? it isn’t – it’s international aid, that israel only sometimes lets through

@Jinjirrie i can see it all now – the ziohasbaratwitter machine is being oiled to counter the flotilla as well … groan, fanatics are sooo predictable

@Jinjirrie: OCHA UN Humanitarian Monitor in the OPT April 10 http://is.gd/cj3WN [pdf] #israel #palestine #humanrights #gaza

UPDATES

avinunu: @Jinjirrie put yourself in @IsraelMFA’s position. Trying to make excuses for Israel is like putting lipstick on pig as Ms Palin would say.

Gaza Flash Appeal Feb 2009, along with lots of data about international donors and needs.

Max Ajila on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla –

I think that if the Israeli government were interested in perpetuating its apartheid for a little longer, it would let the boats in. The WHO—as mainstream as organizations get—has recently called on Israel to lift the siege on Gaza. John Ging has called for a sea-lift to bring supplies in, effectively putting UNRWA’s stamp-of-approval on the boats. The Israeli government, when it attacks the boats (and please asshole Zionist readers let me be wrong about this one!), will make an exceptionally bad scene for itself. Not quite at the level of the winter massacre. But it will look foolish. It will be making an unusually stark decision, choosing to ally itself with precisely no one, against nearly every government in the world, against mainstream civil society organizations that are far to the right of the Palestine solidarity movement. Israel could make itself look good by letting the boats in, with the help of stenographers like Ethan Bronner, but there is no way it will do so.

The ziopathology is daily more florid, the chronic condition has become critical.

Do they think that the counter flotilla, armed with banners reading, “Hamas Sucks,” and “The Armenian Genocide Happened!” make Israeli civil society look like anything but fools? If they had any interest in the symbolism of their actions they’d commandeer the counter-flotilla and ask them why they’re behaving so inanely. Publicizing their naval exercises in which half the Israeli navy is participating? Utilizing half of their war fleet to stop boats carrying diapers and dialysis machines? Come on now.

As the zio hasbara team bowdlerise, the Israeli pirates fire on Gazan fishermens’ vessels, again,.

Abbas’ Vichy mob are assisting the Israeli Occupation in tormenting people in Gaza with limited electricity supplies.

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End Apartheid, Slavery, Caste & Racism – Support WCAR 2009

From Open Anthropology – The 5th Annual Israel Apartheid Week is Now On.

The US, Canada, France and Israel have stuck their noses in the air and are planning to boycott the UN World Conference Against Racism to be held in Geneva on the 24th April.

Reportedly, the American delegation in attendance at the conference’s preparatory talks concluded that “the anti-Israel and anti-Western tendencies were too deeply entrenched to excise.

Cynthia McKinney, Presidential candidate for the Greens in the last US elections, attended the last conference in Durban which she saw as a triumph and landmark for marginalised people.

In order to prevail in Durban, I had to go toe to toe with the Anti-Defamation League and Members of Congress Tom Lantos and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen who, among many other Members of Congress, vociferously denounced Durban. This was something that I did because I felt it was the right thing to do. Given Israel’s recent actions in Gaza that have brought upon it the world’s opprobrium, I can imagine that this is the last point in time that Israel might want to revisit Durban. Israel has said that it will not attend the Conference in Geneva.

To Obama on his shunning of the forthcoming Geneva sessions she says:

This morning, I sent the following message to the White House:

‘Mr. President, it was with great disappointment that I read of your decision to pull out of Durban II. Even the Bush Administration, under pressure from the Congressional Black Caucus, provided some funding for the United Nations effort and sent staff to support the Congressional delegation that attended the Conference. I was there. I was head of the Congressional Black Caucus Task Force that negotiated Congressional and Administration engagement on this issue. There is still time for the U.S. to participate. Your decision is not irrevocable. I would encourage you to please reconsider this decision and not only attend the Conference, but also provide funding to ensure its success.”

I implore the Members of the Congressional Black Caucus to spearhead the participation of the United States in the United Nation’s World Conference Against Racism: to boldly go where we have gone before. Dr. King reminded us that “the ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.” On this issue, President Obama has shown us his measure. I hope that the Congressional Black Caucus and the Progressive Caucus and the Democratic Caucus can show us, oh, so much more.

Will Australia choose to attend or bow to the Zionist Lobby? As Antoun Issa aptly illustrates, an Australian presence is vital. Australia is a nation which has said sorry to our indigenous people – along with our anti-discrimination legislation, it’s a start, and a positive example of a country addressing its historical crimes against humanity.

Israel’s bid to equate criticism of its policies to anti-Semitism is merely an attempt to deflect attention from its handling of the Palestinian question. No country likes to admit that its policies have traces of racism or they are committing fault. It took Australia seven decades to abolish the White Australia Policy, and it took years for us to even acknowledge that stealing Indigenous children from their parents was wrong.

…

Contrary to Dan Gillerman’s idea that strong democratic nations like Australia should steer clear of the anti-racism conference in Geneva, countries like Australia and Israel both have a lot to gain from attending a forum dedicated to addressing the persistent issue of racism across the world. Within such a forum, and after it, Australia can make a valuable contribution by helping Israel to move away from policies that inevitably cause racial hate, violence and failure. As a friend to Israel, Canberra must make it clear that the country’s pursuit of the racist path will not result in a peaceful solution for either side.

Attending Durban II will send Israel the message it needs to hear from its closest friends in the world: Tel Aviv must abandon its racist approach to the Palestinian conflict. And we, with recent experience in taking a pivotal step in racial reconciliation, are in a good position to help Israel accept its own indigenous population.

The Geneva Conference has the below objectives:

1. To review progress and implementation by all stakeholders of the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action. Through an inclusive, transparent and collaborative process the Review Conference will assess contemporary manifestations of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, while identifying concrete counter measures to eliminate these manifestations of intolerance.
2. To assess the existing Durban follow-up mechanisms and their effectiveness, as well as other relevant United Nations mechanisms dealing with the issue of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance.
3. To promote the universal ratification and implementation of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination and proper consideration of the recommendations of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination;
4. To identify and share good practices in the fight against racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance.

Until past wrongs are acknowledged and responsibility taken for better, more just future strategies, as with South African apartheid, boycotts, divestment and sanctions are appropriate responses – and these are proving effective.

As McKinney says:

“… dignity will not come without first an acknowledgment of the truth: with truth we can have justice; and with justice we can have peace; and it is only with peace that we can truly have dignity.”

For more Israel Apartheid Week 2009 links, visit Open Anthropology.