Posted on July 27th, 2009 by Marian Houk
Sunday morning, the first messages came by SMS: Israeli settlers, supported by Israeli Police, had taken over and were demolishing a Palestinian home in Sheikh Jarrah. Then, subsequent messages reported that several members of the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), and the Palestinian Authority recently-resigned Minister for Jerusalem Affairs (who seems to be still functioning in [...]
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Filed under: Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, International Law, Israel, Palestine & Palestinians
Posted on July 26th, 2009 by Marian Houk
Today, at Qalandia “border crossing terminal” manned by the Israeli Defense Forces, Border Police, and private contractors, in the baking afternoon sun, a Palestinian Red Crescent Ambulance coming from Nablus was pulled over to the area next to the “passenger” area. Waiting was an ambulance from the Israeli Magen David Adom (Red Star of David) [...]
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Filed under: Boundaries & Borders, Gaza, Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, Israel, Palestine & Palestinians, Sanctions
Posted on July 26th, 2009 by Marian Houk
Two months after the Israeli Defense Forces announced at the beginning of June that it was removing the Atara checkpoint, north of Ramallah, it was still there today. I went with a team of three Israeli women from Machsom Watch [or "Checkpoint Watch" - women against the occupation and for human rights], to see for [...]
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Filed under: Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, International Law, Israel, Palestine & Palestinians
Posted on July 22nd, 2009 by Marian Houk
What is it like at Israeli checkpoints in the West Bank? Middle East peace negotiators should know, if they don’t already, that what really happens at Israeli checkpoints is not just a matter of obstruction of movement with purely economic consequences. In a recent report, Machsom Watch, a group of Israeli women who observe the [...]
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Filed under: Boundaries & Borders, Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, International Law, Israel, Palestine & Palestinians
Posted on July 21st, 2009 by Marian Houk
The IDF, we now know, has no sense of humor, as the Israeli Cellcom phone company tried to imply in a misleadingly untruthful “feel-good” ad that we have previously reported on here. The Bil’in village website has posted a video send-up here of the Cellcom ad, but there was no light-hearted athletic exchange last Friday [...]
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Filed under: Boundaries & Borders, Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, International Law, Israel, Palestine & Palestinians, Register of damages due to The Wall
Posted on July 17th, 2009 by Marian Houk
Earlier this week, Farouq Kaddoumi (or Qaddumi), also known as Abu Lutuf, one of the original founding members of the largest Palestinian “faction”, Fatah, and one of the senior leaders in the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) made a statement to journalists in Amman, Jordan that has created turmoil in the Palestinian political scene.
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Filed under: Israel, Palestine & Palestinians
Posted on July 15th, 2009 by Marian Houk
The Jerusalem Post’s well-connected defense correspondent Yaakov Katz has confirmed in an article published today that “The IDF has started using undercover elite border policemen to quell anti-fence demonstrations in the West Bank, sources in the Central Command said on Tuesday. Last Friday, officers from the Border Police’s elite YAMAS undercover unit disguised themselves as [...]
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Filed under: Boundaries & Borders, Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, International Law, Israel, Palestine & Palestinians
Posted on July 15th, 2009 by Marian Houk
Just in time for consideration by the UN Human Rights Council’s Fact-Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict, headed by South Africa’s Justice Richard Goldstone, is the release by the Israeli organization of soldiers and former soldiers called Breaking the Silence. Acting out of concern for the deterioration in military observance of Jewish moral values, Breaking [...]
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Filed under: Boundaries & Borders, Gaza, Human Rights, Humanitarian Aid, International Humanitarian Law, International Law, Israel, Palestine & Palestinians, United Nations
Posted on July 14th, 2009 by Marian Houk
This video posted on Youtube hereshows the dreadful Bethlehem “300″ (or “Rachel’s Tomb”) terminal as looking a lot like Erez crossing into Gaza used to look, back in the days when tens of thousands of Gazans lined up in the pre-dawn hours to be herded through lines leading to daily employment in Israel. Here’s another [...]
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Filed under: Boundaries & Borders, Gaza, Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, International Law, Israel, Palestine & Palestinians, Uncategorized
Posted on July 13th, 2009 by Marian Houk
Qaddura Fares, head of the Palestinian Prisoner’s Club, and “Young Guard” Fateh leader, said this morning in a brief phone conversation that there is no decision yet on the Leonard Cohen concert in Ramallah. “We decided [that there would be] at least a freeze on this issue. We will wait until after the Fateh conference”, [...]
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Filed under: Israel, Palestine & Palestinians, Sanctions
