Tony Blair

By John Pilger* | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

Tony Blair must be prosecuted, not indulged like his mentor Peter Mandelson. Both have produced self-serving memoirs for which they have been paid fortunes. Blair's will appear next month and earn him £4.6 million. Now consider Britain's Proceeds of Crime Act. Blair conspired in and executed an unprovoked war of aggression against a defenseless country, which the Nuremberg judges in 1946 described as the "paramount war crime." This has caused, according to scholarly studies, the deaths of more than a million people, a figure that exceeds the Fordham University estimate of deaths in the Rwandan genocide.

In addition, four million Iraqis have been forced to flee their homes and a majority of children have descended into malnutrition and trauma. Cancer rates near the cities of Fallujah, Najaf, and Basra (the latter "liberated" by the British) are now revealed as higher than those at Hiroshima. "UK forces used about 1.9 metric tons of depleted uranium ammunition in the Iraq war in 2003," the Defense Secretary Liam Fox told parliament on 22 July. A range of toxic "anti-personnel" weapons, such as cluster bombs, was employed by British and American forces.

Such carnage was justified with lies that have been repeatedly exposed. On 29 January 2003, Blair told parliament, "We do know of links between al-Qaeda and Iraq ...." Last month, the former head of the intelligence service, MI5, Eliza Manningham-Buller, told the Chilcot inquiry, "There is no credible intelligence to suggest that connection ... [it was the invasion] that gave Osama bin Laden his Iraqi jihad." Asked to what extent the invasion exacerbated the threat to Britain from terrorism, she replied, "Substantially."

The bombings in London on 7 July 2005 were a direct consequence of Blair's actions.

Documents released by the High Court show that Blair allowed British citizens to be abducted and tortured. The then foreign secretary, Jack Straw, decided in January 2002 that Guantánamo was the "best way" to ensure UK nationals were "securely held."

Instead of remorse, Blair has demonstrated a voracious and secretive greed. Since stepping down as prime minister in 2007, he has accumulated an estimated £20 million, much of it as a result of his ties with the Bush administration. The House of Commons Advisory Committee on Business Appointments, which vets jobs taken by former ministers, was pressured not to make public Blair's "consultancy" deals with the Kuwaiti royal family and the South Korean oil giant UI Energy Corporation. He gets £2 million a year "advising" the American investment bank J P Morgan and undisclosed sums from financial services companies. He makes millions from speeches, including reportedly £200,000 for one speech in China.

In his unpaid but expenses-rich role as the West's "peace envoy" in the Middle East, Blair is, in effect, a voice of Israel, which awarded him a $1 million "peace prize." In other words, his wealth has grown rapidly since he launched, with George W. Bush, the bloodbath in Iraq.

His collaborators are numerous. The Cabinet in March 2003 knew a great deal about the conspiracy to attack Iraq. Jack Straw, later appointed "justice secretary," suppressed the relevant Cabinet minutes in defiance of an order by the Information Commissioner to release them. Most of those now running for the Labor Party leadership supported Blair's epic crime, rising as one to salute his final appearance in the Commons. As foreign secretary, David Miliband, sought to cover Britain's complicity in torture, and promoted Iran as the next "threat."

Journalists who once fawned on Blair as "mystical" and amplified his vainglorious bids now pretend they were his critics all along. As for the media's gulling of the public, only the Observer's David Rose, to his great credit, has apologized. The WikiLeaks' exposés, released with a moral objective of truth with justice, have been bracing for a public force-fed on complicit, lobby journalism. Verbose celebrity historians like Niall Ferguson, who rejoiced in Blair's rejuvenation of "enlightened" imperialism, remain silent on the "moral truancy," as Pankaj Mishra wrote, "of [those] paid to intelligently interpret the contemporary world."

Is it wishful thinking that Blair will be collared? Just as the Cameron government understands the "threat" of a law that makes Britain a risky stopover for Israeli war criminals, a similar risk awaits Blair in a number of countries and jurisdictions, at least of being apprehended and questioned. He is now Britain's Kissinger, who has long planned his travel outside the United States with the care of a fugitive.

Two recent events add weight to this. On 15 June, the International Criminal Court made the landmark decision of adding aggression to its list of war crimes to be prosecuted. This is defined as a "crime committed by a political or military leader which by its character, gravity, and scale constituted a manifest violation of the [United Nations] Charter." International lawyers described this as a "giant leap." Britain is a signatory to the Rome statute that created the court and is bound by its decisions.

On 21 July, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, standing at the Commons despatch box, declared the invasion of Iraq illegal. For all the later "clarification" that he was speaking personally, he had made "a statement that the international court would be interested in," said Philippe Sands, professor of international law at University College London.

Tony Blair came from Britain's upper middle classes who, having rejoiced in his unctuous ascendancy, might now reflect on the principles of right and wrong they require of their own children. The suffering of the children of Iraq will remain a specter haunting Britain while Blair remains free to profit.

* John Pilger is a world-renowned journalist, author and documentary filmmaker, who began his career in 1958 in his homeland, Australia, before moving to London in the 1960s. He has been a foreign correspondent and a front-line war reporter, beginning with the Vietnam war in 1967. He is an impassioned critic of foreign military and economic adventures by Western governments.

By Stuart Littlewood* | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

Millions would love to see the present crop of war criminals dangling from lamp-posts.

But somebody called "Ellie" writing on Medialens has put a damper on this happy prospect. She explained the difficulties in bringing the scum to book. One of the things the British government wants to do, she said, is "stop the possibility of private prosecutions for (international) crimes committed by foreign nationals, so that friendly war criminals can continue to sup tea in Buckingham Palace".

Unfortunately crimes that can supposedly be tackled under universal jurisdiction are limited and don't include waging a war of aggression (although they do include war crimes in general), "so we can't get anywhere with this charge (e.g. against Bush) in a domestic court".

Thanks "Ellie" for that. To pursue someone like Blair for war crimes in a British court it would be necessary to get the Crown Prosecution Service to take the case. However, our corrupted establishment are hardly going to initiate steps against one of their own, or make it easy for outsiders to do so. Efforts so far have met with little success. There could of course be good reasons for this. To make a war crimes charge stick it may be necessary to show, for example, that our armed forces carried out attacks disproportionate to any military gain. That's not as easy as it sounds.

Those who have tried to lay charges need to work on refining the way they formulate and present their case until they leave judges no wriggle-room.

The impression I get is that unless the prime minister and the hordes of MPs who clamour for illegal war and its consequential mega-deaths actually pick up a weapon and personally gun down a classroom of Iraqi kids in front of witnesses, British justice won't touch them.

The International Criminal Court at The Hague is not exactly blazing a trail for justice either. Its Chief Prosecutor, referring to a case before him in February 2006, remarked: "The events in question occurred on the territory of Iraq, which is not a State Party to the Rome Statute and which has not lodged a declaration of acceptance under Article 12(3), thereby accepting the jurisdiction of the Court.

"Therefore, in accordance with Article 12, acts on the territory of a non-State Party fall within the jurisdiction of the Court only when the person accused of the crime is a national of a State that has accepted jurisdiction." Bush isn't, Blair is. The Clinton administration, after much grumbling, signed the Rome treaty but the Bush administration announced afterwards that the US would not be party to the Rome Statute.

The Chief Prosecutor also pointed out that the ICC can examine conduct during the conflict, but not whether the decision to engage in armed conflict was legal. "International humanitarian law and the Rome Statute permit belligerents to carry out proportionate attacks against military objectives, even when it is known that some civilian deaths or injuries will occur. A crime occurs if there is an intentional attack directed against civilians (principle of distinction) or an attack is launched on a military objective in the knowledge that the incidental civilian injuries would be clearly excessive in relation to the anticipated military advantage (principle of proportionality).

"The available information established that a considerable number of civilians died or were injured during the military operations... [but] did not indicate intentional attacks on a civilian population." Furthermore there was a lack of information showing clear excessiveness in relation to military advantage or indicating the involvement of nationals of States Parties, therefore there was no reasonable basis for believing a crime within the jurisdiction of the Court had been committed.

Although any crimes within the jurisdiction of the Court are grave, the Statute required "an additional threshold of gravity" because the Court will only deal with situations where they are committed as part of a plan or policy involving mass crimes.

The Chief Prosecutor ended by saying: "Effectively functioning national legal systems are in principle the most appropriate and effective forum for addressing allegations of crimes of this nature." In other words, don't bother us.

It shows the sort of thing peace campaigners are up against. Of course, horrendous evidence has come to light since 2006. And just recently the states party to the Rome Statute finally agreed on a definition of "aggression".

The crime of aggression is "the planning, preparation, initiation or execution by a person in a leadership position of an act of aggression".

An act of aggression is "the use of armed force by one State against another State without the justification of self-defense or authorization by the Security Council". It must constitute a manifest violation of the Charter of the United Nations.

But before we start jumping for joy, the Court will have no jurisdiction to consider waging wars of aggression before 2017. So the circle of buck-passing and general paralysis remains unbroken.

There can surely be no greater crime than going to war illegally or on a false prospectus. The same criminal trash who did so before are bored with their murderous adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan and sulking because they haven't turned out to be as heroic as advertised. They are now impatient to do it all again only better... in Iran. Judging by the massive campaign of disinformation and reports of an imminent assault, they are determined not to be deflected from their evil path by the far distant prospect of being hauled up in front of the ICC.

If our elaborate national and international justice machinery won't take out this stinking garbage, which has offended our nostrils for too long, who will?

Assassination made 'legal'

It wouldn't surprise me if angry citizens resorted to some kind of a private 'good riddance' service to get the job done. It conjures up a vision of members of the public, who feel themselves at war with these evil forces, queuing up for the services of an assassination bureau - an upright, socially responsible organization acting in the public interest to eliminate the world's worst tormentors.

Readers may remember the 1969 film The Assassination Bureau, a tongue-in-cheek romp set at the turn of the century a hundred years ago, a time for purging rotten monarchs and cruel tyrants. The Bureau's hit team is for hire provided that Ivan Dragomiloff, its founder and mastermind, deems the targeted killing "socially justifiable" and there's proof of the candidate's misdeeds.

The need for a purge hasn't changed. And these days assassination can be perfectly legal - ask Israel and the US.

Although US President Ford outlawed targeted political killings in 1976, White House and CIA lawyers claim that an intelligence 'finding' makes all the difference. The right sort of finding puts things on a war footing and allows the US, for example, to assassinate so-called terrorists. In the wake of 9-11, all the Americans have to do is invent a 'finding', label the folk who stand in their way 'terrorists' and claim the murder was an act of self-defence in a war situation, and they're home and dry.

Remember the US bombing Gaddafi's home in 1986 in the hope of rubbing him out? And the Clinton administration firing cruise missiles at suspected guerrilla camps in Afghanistan in 1998? And Bush instructing the CIA to engage in "lethal covert operations" (based on an intelligence 'finding') to destroy Bin Laden and his al-Qaeda organisation?

The Bush administration is believed to have sat down with the world expert in these matters - Israel - to work out a legal framework for a new targeted-assassination policy. Annoying pockets of resistance in the Occupied Palestinian Territories are answered with the wholesale imposition of Israeli-concocted warfare laws for the benefit of Israel's 'self-defence', which trample everyone else's rights. This was just the ticket for Bush's crooked nonsense as he pressed ahead with his war on terror.

Israel's liking for assassination goes back to pre-state days when such atrocities were committed against Arab and British targets by the Irgun, a Jewish terror organisation that resorted to murder and mayhem for removing obstacles to the Zionist cause and driving the Arabs off their lands.

The Israelis cleverly bumped off master bomb maker Yahya Ayyesh and Hezbollah's Imad Mughniyeh, 'the Fox', both in 1996.

In 1997 Mossad agents, apparently fans of Shakespeare's Hamlet, entered Jordan and injected a lethal nerve toxin into the left ear of Hamas boss Khaled Meshaal as he walked to his office. They were caught by the Jordanian authorities and King Hussein demanded the Israeli PM Netanyahu hand over the antidote. Netanyahu refused, but Bill Clinton intervened and forced the issue. Meshaal lived.

Assassination became official Israeli policy in 1999 to stop Yasser Arafat's militia, the Tanzim, firing on illegal Jewish settlers in the West Bank and Gaza. "If anyone has committed or is planning to carry out terrorist attacks, he has to be hit. It is effective, precise, and just," said Israeli minister Ephraim Sneh in 2001, not caring too much about the frequent lack of precision, the collateral casualties and the possibility that intelligence is wrong.

That same year Israel's security cabinet gave the army carte blanche to kill anyone suspected of being involved in armed activity, meaning that mere suspects on a 'list' became targets for extra-judicial execution.

The Israelis' preferred method is the air-strike, which is often lacking in finesse. In 2002 an Israeli F-16 warplane dropped a one-ton bomb on the house of Sheikh Salah Shehadeh, the military commander of Hamas, in Gaza City killing not just him but at least 11 other Palestinians, including seven children, and wounding 120 others.

In 2004 Hamas's spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, wheelchair-bound since the age of 12, and nine innocent bystanders were killed in a helicopter gunship attack. Yassin had survived an F-16 bomb blast the previous year. Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon called him "the mastermind of Palestinian terror" and a "mass murderer", which was comical coming from a war criminal who ran Israel's death squad, Unit 101, and was found indirectly responsible for the massacres in the Sabra and Chatila refugee camps.

Israel's Airforce massacred Palestinian Cops in airstrike.

According to the Israeli human rights organisation B'Tselem 238 Palestinians have been assassinated and more than 160 innocents have died in the process, along with heaven knows how many injured or mutiliated, since the second Intifada (uprising) in 2000. "The use of state assassinations by Israel against Palestinian suspects is undermining the rule of law and fueling the cycle of violence in the region," warns Amnesty International.

The finger of suspicion points to Israel for the murder of Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri in 2005. We've recently seen Mossad's assassination of the Hamas commander in Dubai (their hit team using stolen British passports) and the execution of several crew members of the Mavi Marmara while on a humanitarian mission in international waters.

The US State Department similarly describes its own hits on Al-Qaeda as "legal and necessary."

If universal jurisdiction is not made to work then other means will probably be found. Assassination may not remain the private playground of shadowy CIA and Mossad operatives for much longer, so war criminals had better start looking over their shoulder.

A lamp-post awaits them.

* Stuart Littlewood is author of the book Radio Free Palestine, which tells the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. Read other articles by Stuart, or visit Stuart's website.

Turkel Commission Report

As its practice Israel has never allowed an international investigation of its war crimes. Israel flatly rejected the U.N.'s "statement" calling for such an investigation. Obama as usual caved in to Israel's rejection and agreed to an internal Israeli investigation.

The appointed members of the investigation commission are:

1. Former Supreme Court Justice Jacob Turkel: 75, Chair
--Justice Turkel has declared that he doesn't believe this panel should exist and dismisses the need for foreign observers

2. Shabtai Rosen: 93, Professor of International Law
--From 1948-1967 he served as a legal adviser in the Foreign Ministry. In 1953 Ben Gurion directed Ariel Sharon's elite force 101 to attack the West Bank village of Qibya (Operation Shoshana). Sixty nine innocent Palestinians were massacred; many in houses blown up over their heads; along with the destruction of 45 homes, a school and a mosque. Shabtai Rosen advised Moshe Sharett, Foreign Minister, to cover up the massacre by passing a law allowing collective punishment of Palestinian border settlements and blaming them for initiating the attack to which the IDF responded. In other words, a cover up of this war crime.

When the world condemned Israel for the attack Ben Gurion issued a statement denying that the IDF was involved. He said:

"None deplores it more than the Government of Israel, if ... innocent blood was spilled... The Government of Israel rejects with all vigor the absurd and fantastic allegation that 600 men of the IDF took part in the action ... We have carried out a searching investigation and it is clear beyond doubt that not a single army unit was absent from its base on the night of the attack on Qibya."

Decades of Israeli war crimes against Palestinians, Lebanese and other Arab nationalities were constantly denied by Israel, blamed on the victims, with no allowance for international investigation of its war crimes from massive ethnic cleansing to repeated massacres and genocide against civilians.

3. Brigadier General Amos Horev: 86, former president of Haifa's Technion.

The Two Foreign Observers are:

1. Lord William David Trimble, from Northern Ireland:
--Co-Founder of "Friends of Israel", ironically, formed the same day of the deadly IDF raid, May 31, 2010. He is joined by staunch supporters of Israel like John Bolton, Dore Gold, and Spain's former right-wing prime minister, Jose Aznar.

At its founding, the group released this statement:

"This initiative is promoted by people who are not Jewish and whose motivations are based on the deep conviction that Israel is part of the Western world. In fact, today Israel is a fundamental actor for the future of the West. Although the peace process is important, the members of Friends of Israel Initiative are more concerned about the onslaught of radical Islamism as well as the specter of a nuclear Iran since these are threats affecting not only Israel, but the entire world. The sponsors of this Initiative believe there is no West without Israel."

2. Ken Watkin: Former Canadian judge advocate general.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the move to set up an inquiry would demonstrate clearly "to the entire world that the state of Israel acts according to law, transparently and with full responsibility."

According to the Prime Minister's Office, the commission's mandate will be limited to:

• Addressing the legality of the Gaza naval blockade
• Legality of Israel's actions within the context of International Law, and the Goldstone Report.
• Examine the identity, actions and real intentions of the flotilla's organizers, especially the Turkish group IHH, which Israel alleges has ties to terrorist groups.

The two foreign observers will not be able to view confidential material or vote on any decision by the commission.

The commission will not hear testimony from the flotilla passengers. It will not interview participating IDF soldiers in the attack but will rely on the IDF's internal investigation report that found Israel acted legally and in compliance with international law in its "self defense" raid of the Flotilla where its soldiers were ambushed, attacked, lynched, and shot.

According to a CNN report Deputy Minister Daniel Ayalon said there were 75 mercenaries on board the ship with ties to Al Qaeda. He stated that weapons were found on board the ships and that $10,000 was found on the dead bodies. He said that it's Turkey and the passengers who owe Israel an apology for the raid, not Israel.

The first meeting of the commission was held on Wednesday, June 16, prior to the arrival of the two foreign observers. It was decided that the discussion will be held in Hebrew but that the observers will have access to English translations when warranted.

After a few quick meetings the Commission submitted its final report to Prime Minister Benjamin on July 4, 2010.

The Report states:

At the request and appointment by the Most Honorable Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the Turkel Commission carried out its duty faithfully, transparently, and in an open and fair minded manner depending solely on the facts as presented by Israel is proud to issue its final report as follows: It was a deep honor to serve Israel and its Jewish people.

WHEREAS Israel's history has been one of victimhood at the hands of Arab armies and Palestinian terrorism.

WHEREAS Arab armies attacked Israel in 1967. Israel nevertheless defeated the invaders and was forced to occupy the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem.

WHEREAS the Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem showed their gratitude to the benevolent and civilizing Israeli presence in Eretz Israel by adopting terrorism as their modus operandi against innocent Israeli soldiers and Jewish settlers.

WHEREAS Hamas, a terrorist organization in Gaza, violently took over Gaza in 2005 thereby establishing an existential Islamist threat to Israel's security.

WHEREAS in self defense Israel four years ago had to establish a total blockade of Gaza by air, land and sea to prevent weapons from reaching Hamas that has fired thousands of rockets over six years killing 3 Israeli civilians.

WHEREAS Israel in self defense attacked Gaza for 23 days in 2008-2009 that resulted in the killing of 13 Israelis, 3 of them civilians, the rest were honorable and courageous soldiers.

WHEREAS 700 Israeli haters and Anti-Semites from Turkey and 40 nations decided to sail a Flotilla (Free Gaza Flotilla) to break Israel's legal naval blockade of Gaza, a "terrorist Iranian entity"; Israel in self defense tried to peacefully warn the Flotilla that their approach to Gaza is a breach of Israel's security and sovereignty.

WHEREAS the Flotilla ignored Israel's repeated warnings, the IDF had no choice but to approach the Flotilla and board it peacefully in International Waters to prevent weapon smuggling to Hamas.

WHEREAS militant members of the Flotilla attacked the IDF with various weapons forcing the soldiers to open fire in self defense which tragically resulted in injured soldiers and the death of nine Turkish citizens.

After reviewing all the videos, facts, and testimony by Israel's Prime Minister, the Defense Minister Ehud Barak, and Israel's Chief of Staff, the Commission has reached the following conclusions:

1. Israel's siege and naval blockade of Gaza is legally justified under the U.N. Charter and International Law that grant member states the right to self defense by any means necessary.
2. Given that the Flotilla was repeatedly warned not to approach Israel's legal naval blockade of Gaza and that Israel is willing to deliver their aid to Gaza and the Flotilla's outright rejection of the warning, Israel had no choice but to board the Turkish ship the Mavi Marmara that carried hundreds of so called "peace activists".
3. Given that the ship was boarded by lightly armed soldiers, the militants on board attacked and injured several soldiers who in self defense fired their weapons killing nine of the Turkish mercenaries.
4. We find the international community's outrage at this incident to be outrageous and Anti-Semitic. No nation will allow militants with weapons to breach its sovereignty and deliver weapons to a terrorist organization. Hamas is a terrorist organization with a few hundred lightly armed militants dedicated to the annihilation of Israel, the world's fourth most powerful army in possession of hundreds of nuclear weapons.
5. We find the Goldstone Report to be biased, unsubstantiated, and Anti-Semitic in its conclusion that Israel committed "war crimes", and "crimes against Humanity" in its incursion into Gaza in 2008-2009. The Goldstone panel refused to meet with Israeli officials to hear their balanced view of the circumstances surrounding the incursion. The claim that Israel used banned weapons is false.

   We agree with the statement of Israel's Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman regarding the Goldstone Report:

"[the] commission's conclusions were pre-determined... members of the panel did give the facts a chance to confuse them."

6. We support Israel's historical principle never to allow an international investigation of its self defense operations because Israel knows well that the entire world (except Obama, Congress, and the Jewish dominated financial system, banks and media) hates Israel and wishes its total destruction. No other civilized nation from the U.S., Canada, Europe, to Australia, have ever allowed an international investigation into their war crimes against innocent civilians across the third world.
7. We applaud Israel's honorable decision to internally investigate this incident, a process lacking in many countries such as Iran, China, Russia, and most of the Muslim world.
8. We condemn Turkey, an Islamist state, a harborer and supporter of terrorist states like Iran and the terrorist organizations of Hezbollah and Hamas, for its deliberate support of the Flotilla's provocative actions against Israel forcing its hand to raid the Flotilla.
9. We applaud the Arab States (especially Egypt that is Israel's partner in Gaza's siege by building another Apartheid Wall to seal its Rafah crossing into Gaza) in their private support of Israel's siege of Gaza and its action against the Flotilla. In particular we express our deepest gratitude to Mahmoud Abbas, the President of the Palestinian Authority, who asked President Obama to tell Israel NOT to lift the naval blockade of Gaza in order to further weaken Hamas.
10. Finally the Commission wishes to express their deep gratitude to America, the only country in the world that constantly stands with Israel, in the person of President Obama and Congress for understanding, supporting, and blocking any Anti Semitic international investigation of Israel's self defense operation against the Flotilla.

Our Conclusion despite the worldwide attack on the members and mandate of this honorable Commission (Haaretz called it a "farce") by world governments, U.N. organizations, the European Parliament, the International Red Cross, and all Human Rights Organizations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, we deem that the Turkel Commission carried out its duty in a legal, credible, and honorable manner. If you don't believe us ask the Congress of the world's sole superpower, the United States.

Thereby our final conclusions and recommendations are as follows.

1. We find Israel Not Guilty of all charges brought against it by the International Community. It broke no laws but simply acted on its right to self defense.
2. We recommend that the report of the Turkel Commission be the final word on this matter and that no further investigation be carried out by the U.N. or any other entity.

We the Undersigned, Members of the Commission present this Final Report to the Honorable Prime Minister of Israel Benjamin Netanyahu on July 4, 2010.

--Former Supreme Court Justice Jacob Turkel
--Shabtai Rosen: Professor of International Law
--Brigadier General Amos Horev

The Two International Observers:
--Lord William David Trimble
--Ken Watkin

(END)

* Mohamed Khodr is a political activist who frequently writes on the plight of Palestinians living under the brutal occupation of Israel, U.S. Foreign Policy, Islam, and Arab politics.

Illustration by Pete Pasho: www.dollopsofirony.com

By Stephen Lendman* | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

The Flotilla attack was a well-planned act of premeditated murder in international waters, the Netanyahu government (on June 14) announcing an inquiry commission this writer discussed in a same-day article.

It explained the planned whitewash of a grievous crime against humanity, one Israel mustn't be allowed to get away with despite it being minor by comparison with far greater ones, Cast Lead most prominent recently.

The internal commission is illegitimate, even with international observers (chosen for supporting Israel), nonetheless endorsed by the White House, its paymaster/partner in crime, colluding in the coverup.

Called an Independent Public Commission, Netanyahu said it will demonstrate clearly "to the entire world that the state of Israel acts according to law, transparently and with full responsibility."

In his released statement, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs endorsed the announcement as an "important step forward," saying "the structure and terms of reference of Israel's proposed independent public commission can meet the standard of a prompt, impartial, credible and transparent investigation."

The administration was silent after the May 31 massacre, only saying it regretted the loss of life, its usual boilerplate cover for Israeli belligerence, partnered with our own globally.

Commission Members - Chosen for Coverup

Two voting members include former Israeli Supreme Court Justice, Jacob Tirkel, its head. A conservative jurist, his experience entails handling military court appeals, virtually always favoring Israel over Palestinian plaintiffs.

Amos Horev, the other voting member, is a retired major general, prominent in Israel's military-industrial complex, a reliable choice, like Tirkel, to whitewash IDF crimes.

Two non-voting foreign observers include David Trimble, an Ulster, Northern Ireland unionist allied with its power structure that used death squads during "The Troubles" to kill people for being Catholic. He's also a member of the Netanyahu/Dore Gold-established "Friends of Israel," a "worldwide Christian ministry....fostering solidarity with (the right of) the Jewish people....to live in their ancient homeland, Israel," no matter that for centuries it was historic Palestine.

General Ken Warkin (ret.) was also chosen, former head of Canada's military judiciary, involved in the coverup of the Canadian Airborne Regiment Battle Group's early 1990s Somalia atrocities.

Like past Israeli and Washington commissions, whitewash is assured this time, the bogus investigation to produce lies, distortion, omissions, false conclusions, and exoneration of cold-blooded murder, ordered by top government and military officials who'll walk away scot- free, what Israel planned by appointing an earlier investigation into Operation Cast Lead.

Its conclusion was preordained, on the mind of a Haaretz June 15 editorial writer who said:

"A committee whose makeup and authority are perceived as predetermined will be unable to satisfy international leaders and their constituencies abroad who demanded the inquiry in the first place."

"....the committee's membership nor its authority is suited to meet the challenges posed by the affair. (It's more) a public relations tool (than a body able) to bring justice to bear on those found responsible for the operation's failings....It would have....been better if the (committee) had never been born, sparing us the deceptive appearance of a real investigation," what this commission will dutifully avoid doing.

A same day Gush Shalom (GS - Israel's "hard core" peace movement) called the commission "toothless and powerless, (its) terms of reference exclude in advance all the main points which should be investigated." GS will petition Israel's High Court to challenge it, though prevailing against supportive justices faces near impossible odds.

The commission's mandate excludes days of cabinet planning to interdict and slaughter designated Flotilla activists, nor will it consider eyewitness accounts from passengers called "terrorists."

Instead, it will rely on IDF testimonies, whitewashing what happened, including fake video footage to show Israel's version of events, not the accurate recording showing commandos firing from helicopters before ever landing aboard, shooting passengers in the head at point blank range, and dumping bodies, and perhaps live activists, overboard to perish at sea, to hide the true death toll, believed to be at least 15, not the official nine reported, though at first Israeli radio said 19.

Netanyahu's commission will avoid truth, presenting the IDF's sanitized version of events instead, Israel's customary type coverup, why an independent investigation is essential. More on that below.

Internal Findings from Cast Lead Investigations

On April 29, 2009, IDF Chief of Staff, General Gabi Ashkenazi approved and authorized publication of the findings of five investigative teams, headed by colonels and composed of officers, not in the Gaza war's chain of command. They investigated five issues:

• claims about UN and international facilities fired on;
• incidents involving shootings at medical facilities, buildings, vehicles and crews;
• others harming civilians;
• the use of white phosphorous weapons; and
• damage to infrastructure and buildings.

At the same time, an overall IDF investigation reviewed the entire operation to "verif(y it) at various levels." In other words, to assure the five investigative teams absolved Israel of any culpability.

Unsurprisingly, they concluded that:

"throughout the fighting in Gaza, the IDF operated in accordance with international law. The IDF maintained a high professional and moral level while facing an enemy that aimed to terrorize Israeli civilians whilst taking cover amidst uninvolved civilians in the Gaza strip and using them as human shields."

It continued at some length justifying Israeli crimes of war and against humanity, repeated in a sixth investigation and one by Major General Avichai Mandelblit, Military Advocate General, concluding on February 24, 2010 from two investigations into Israel's human shield usage that:

"There is no dispute that during the military conflagration the use of human shields was completely forbidden," his investigation finding no basis that IDF troops hid behind noncombatants during the war, despite clear evidence they did and committed grievous crimes throughout the 23-day assault against a civilian population.

Instead, he added that "while we regret, of course, any harm to civilians, we emphasize that the responsibility for that lies solely at the doorstep of the Hamas organization, following its use of the civilian population for its despicable purposes," - Israel's customary response, blaming victims for its own crimes, Mandelblit repeating a scripted judgment, no matter how compelling the evidence against it, what the Goldstone Commission and other human rights groups concluded.

Often far less than impartial, so did Human Rights Watch (HRW) after conducting its own investigation saying:

A year after the war's end, neither side conducted serious investigations to determine whether or not war crimes were committed, failing to explain that Israel launched a premeditated attack against defenseless civilians, protected by Hamas and other resistance forces armed with homemade rockets and light arms against a powerful military invader using the latest Washington-supplied weapons and technology to commit mass-murder and devastation.

HRW agreed, calling Israeli attacks "indiscriminate, disproportionate (and) at times seemingly deliberate, in violation of the laws of war," causing vast destruction and large numbers of deaths and injuries - IDF investigations providing cover for serious crimes, bogus "after-action reports....in which an officer in the chain of command interviews soldiers involved, with no testimony from victims or witnesses," that at most results in minor disciplinary action against lower-ranking participants, never the high command, HRW adding:

"....they are not a substitute for impartial and thorough investigations into laws-of-war violations."

In other words, the entire process was bogus, the IDF absolving itself and government officials of any culpability, the planned outcome from Netanyahu's commission, its members to deliver judgments he wants, why HRW titled its report, "Turning a Blind Eye," Israel and Washington's exculpatory self-examinations, no matter how compelling the evidence against them.

Calls for an Independent Commission

On June 2, the UN Human Rights Council passed a resolution (32 - 3 with nine abstentions, including Britain, France, Japan and South Korea) calling for an independent fact-finding mission into Israel's Flotilla attack, similar to the one leading to the Goldstone Commission.

Sponsored by Arab states, it harshly condemned Israel "in the strongest terms" for violating international law at sea, also calling on Tel Aviv to lift the Gaza blockade and supply immediate humanitarian aid in the form of food, medicines, fuel, and other essentials.

Other human rights organizations voiced support:

• Amnesty International (AI) wants "an independent inquiry into the incident;"
• Human Rights Watch calls for "A prompt, credible, and impartial investigation....to determine whether the lethal force used by Israeli commandos was necessary to protect lives and whether it could have been avoided;" and
• a coalition of 30 human rights organizations demands an "end to impunity

....following Israel('s Flotilla) attack," saying:

"We, the undersigned organisations (sic)....are shocked by Israel's killing and injury of civilians carrying humanitarian supplies to Gaza, (and) call on the international community to immediately take all appropriate measures in response to this unacceptable violence."

"This tragedy is the result of the prolonged impunity granted to Israel by the international community, despite Israel's documented, persistent disregard for international and humanitarian law in (Occupied Palestine) and its violation of fundamental human rights, including the right to life."

Israel is criminally liable, including for maintaining a genocidal Gaza siege. The 30 organizations also called for its immediate lifting, and urged the International Criminal Court's (ICC) Prosecutor "to make an urgent determination regarding the opening of an investigation into the" OPT situation, and for the UN Secretary-General to use all measures at his disposal to act, not abstain beyond his disingenuous rhetoric, best not said unless followed by specific measures aimed at holding culpable parties accountable and achieving justice for aggrieved victims at long last, something neither he or his predecessors have done.

The following organizations endorsed the statement:

The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR)
The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR)
The International Federation of Human Rights (FIDH)
Turkish Coalition for the ICC
Track Impunity Always (TRIAL)
Kenyan Section of the International Commission of Jurists
Gender Justice Initiative
Fondazione Internazionale Lelio Basso (Italy)
Cairo Institute for Human Rights
University College Dublin (Ireland)
Uganda Joint Christian Council
Human Rights Network - Uganda
Uganda Women and Children organization (UWCO)
Hope After Rape (HAR, Uganda)
Disabled Women's Network & Resource Organisation in Uganda (DWMRO)
Cameroon Coalition for Human Rights
Iranian Islamic Human Rights Commission
Kituo Cha Sheria (Kenya)
Coalition for Justice and Accountability (Sierra Leone)
Colombian Commission of Jurists
Network Movement for Democracy Human Rights (Sierra Leone)
Mexican Commission for the Defense and Promotion of Human Rights
Indonesian Civil Society Coalition for the ICC
Ligue pour la Paix et les Droits de l'Homme (Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC))
Synergie des ONG's Congolaise pour les Victims
Femme pour la Paix, le Developpement et les Droit de l'Homme (DRC)
Sierra Leone Coalition for the ICC
Association Espanola De Derecho International De Derechos Humanos
Justice Without Frontiers
Lebanese Centre for International law and Human Rights
La Coalition Marocain Pour La Cour Penal Internationale
Institute for Justice and Reconciliation

In a separate statement, B'Tselem demanded an "immediate, independent and effective investigation....carried out by a group that is not affiliated with the Israel army - (to include) testimonies of eyewitnesses....who participated in the flotilla."

The Adalah Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel also called for an immediate independent international investigation, accusing Israel of violating international law by attacking civilians with disproportionate force.

Free Gaza, other Israeli and Palestinian human rights groups, along with others worldwide demand the same thing, saying Israel must be held accountable.

Global nations (including Turkey, Arab states, Venezuela, Cuba, Argentina, Brazil, Sweden, Russia, China and many others) called for appropriate actions in response to Israel's unjustified attack, including an open, independent investigation, an airing of all relevant facts, and accountability for those responsible for crimes in international waters.

Countries only expressing regret for the lives lost included America, Israel, Canada, Britain, Japan, Australia, and several others, including Pope Benedict in the Vatican, a loyal ally of imperial aggression like his predecessors.

Posted on numerous sites, including Palestine Chronicle, Uruknet, Countercurrents and others, writer Ahmed Amr, former NileMedia.com editor, made "The Case For An Impartial Turkish Inquiry," since nine of their citizens were murdered, one a Turkish America, Furkan Dogan, the Obama administration dismissive, though he was shot four times in the head at point blank range, clearly an assassination.

Given Turkey's outrage over the attack, Prime Minister Recep Erdogan calling it "state terrorism," its Foreign Minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, saying it was "banditry and piracy," and their country's street expressing outrage in protest, "A robust inquiry might uncover some uncomfortable truths (and) make the Mediterranean a safe neighborhood for one and all."

Indeed so if regional states had leaders and officials credentials as distinguished as the Free Gaza Movement, one of the Flotilla's organizers.

Its Board of Advisors includes:

• James Abourezk, former US Senator from South Dakota, the first Arab-American to hold that office, and founder of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC);
• M. Cherif Bassiouni, Distinguished Research Professor of Law emeritus, Depaul University, as well as a UN international human rights and humanitarian law consultant;
• Noam Chomsky, noted linguist, philosopher, political activist, author, lecturer, and Massachusetts Institute of Technology Institute Professor emeritus;
• Gretta Duisenberg, international human rights activist, board member of "One Justice," an international Paris and Geneva-based legal group, and honorary president of the Hebron-based Arab Centre for Research and Studies on Palestine;
• Jeff Halper, Israeli Professor of Anthropology, political activist, author, lecturer and co-founder of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD);
• Archbishop Theodosius (Atallah) Hanna, Archbishop of Sebaste from the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem;
• Peter Hansen, former UNWRA Commissioner-General and Assistant UN Secretary-General;
• John Pilger, noted author, journalist and award-winning documentary filmmaker, including his 2002 film, "Palestine is still the issue;"
• Leila Sharaf, a Jordanian Senator, former Minister of Information, and former board member of the Arab Organization for Human Rights;
• Aengus O. Snodaigh, Irish political leader and activist;
• Baroness Jenny Tonge, human rights activist and member of the British House of Lords; and
• Naomi Klein, lecturer and noted author, including "The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism."

Its Advisory Council includes:

• Dr. Mona El-Farra, physician, human/women's rights activist, and Deputy Director of the Union of Health Work Committees in Gaza;
• Mahfouz Kabariti, human rights activist and President of the Palestinian Sailing Federation and Fishing & Marine Sports Association in Gaza;
• Jamal El-Khoudary, Chairman of the Popular Committee Against the Siege and independent parliament member in Gaza;
• Dr. Eyad Sarraj, physician and Gaza-based human rights activist; and
• Amjad Al-Shawa, human rights activist and Director of the Gaza-based Palestinian NGO Network (PNGO).

Israel and Washington call these noted activists "terrorists." People of conscience call them heroic for years of activism and dedication.

* Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon.

Another Compromised Reporter

By Alison Weir* | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

The New York Times, whose regional bureau chief has a son in the Israeli military, reports that Israel has just appointed a panel charged with investigating its attack on an aid flotilla that killed nine aid volunteers, including a 19-year-old American.

Isabel Kershner, who is an Israeli citizen and has refused to answer questions about her possible family ties to the Israeli military, writes the report.

Kershner reports that the White House hailed the announcement of the panel as an "important step forward," stating that "the structure and terms of reference of Israel's proposed independent public commission can meet the standard of a prompt, impartial, credible and transparent investigation."

In her story, Kershner reports that the panel will include eminent Irish Nobel Peace Laureate Lord David Trimble as an observer, but omits the fact that Trimble is a leader of the newly formed pro-Israel organization "Friends of Israel" and is close to Netanyahu associate Dore Gold.

Irish journalist Patrick Roberts writes, "This is a little like putting the fox in charge of the hen house."

Kershner reports that the other foreign observer is Brig. Gen. Ken Watkins, former judge advocate general of Canadian Forces, but fails to mention that Watkins is known for stonewalling a 2009 House of Commons investigation into Afghan prisoner abuse.

One House of Commons member commented at the time about Watkins' lack of cooperation with the investigation: "Obviously the cover-up continues."

Kershner informs readers that the panel will be led by a retired Israeli Supreme Court Justice, but fails to mention reports that he does not believe in such a panel and opposed foreign participation.

Kershner reports in the bottom half of her story that Israel's Ha'aretz newspaper calls the proposed panel a "farce," but does not mention that this is a longstanding pattern for Israeli governmental investigations (and lack thereof) into military human rights abuses. For example:

• From 2001 through 2006 the Israeli State Attorney's office received more than 500 complaints about abuse of interrogees. There was not a single criminal investigation.
• In 2005 Israeli human rights organization B'Tselem released a report entitled "Israeli military grants impunity when soldiers kill Palestinian civilians," finding that although Israeli soldiers had killed at least 1,694 Palestinian civilians, including 536 minors, only one soldier had been convicted of "causing the death of a Palestinian."
• In 2009 eleven Israeli human rights organizations released a joint report in which they called on the Israeli government to "Stop whitewashing suspected crimes in Gaza."
• In 2010 B'Tselem found that the Israeli military's "cover-up of phosphorous shelling in Gaza proves army cannot investigate itself." An Amnesty International report concurred in this conclusion, finding that Israel's investigations into Cast Lead had not met "international standards of independence, impartiality, transparency, promptness and effectiveness."

In her story Kershner reports Netanyahu's allegation that the blockade "is necessary to prevent Hamas from smuggling in weapons or materials needed to make them, and to weaken Hamas control." She goes on to acknowledge that "there is a growing consensus abroad that the blockade has taken a toll mainly on civilians," but neglects to report the fact that Israeli closures of Gaza preceded the election of Hamas and that the "toll" is massive and calamitous.

She also fails to include any of the vast evidence for such a consensus, for example:

Nearly 99 percent of Gaza's 4,000 fishermen are now considered either poor (making between $100 and $190 a month) or very poor (earning less than $100 a month); there are acute, sometimes lethal shortages of fuel, cash, cooking gas and other basic supplies; 98 percent of industrial operations have been shut down since 2007; and 3,500 families are still displaced from last year's invasion due to Israel's blockade on building materials.

Although the Israeli government has failed to investigate itself honestly and thoroughly through the years, a great many respected international human rights organizations from Christian Aid to the Red Cross have done so, documenting a pattern of widespread human rights abuses by the Israeli military.

In 2006 independent researchers Patrick O'Connor and Rachel Roberts found that since fall 2000:

"[T]hree of the leading human rights organizations focusing on Israel/Palestine – Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and the Israeli organization B'Tselem – published 76 reports focused primarily on Israeli abuses of Palestinian rights, and four reports primarily focused on Palestinians abuses of Israeli or Palestinian rights. This weighting suggests that Israel has committed a disproportionate share of the human rights violations."

During this time, the New York Times published two news stories on reports documenting Israeli human rights abuses and two stories on reports documenting Palestinian human rights abuses.

In other words, in its "even-handed" style, the New York Times covered fifty percent of the reports on human rights abuses committed by Palestinians, while covering under three percent of those detailing human abuses perpetrated by Israelis.

* Alison Weir is executive director of If Americans Knew. Photos and videos referenced in the article can be viewed on the website (http://ifamericansknew.org) She can be reached at contact@ifamericansknew.org

Illustration by Bendib

US Department of Justice Asked to Regulate AIPAC as a Foreign Agent of the Israeli Government

The US Department of Justice has been formally asked to begin regulating the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) as the foreign agent of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs. A 392 page legal filing presented by a four person IRmep delegation in a two hour meeting with top officials of the Internal Security Section substantiated the following case for AIPAC's immediate registration:

1. AIPAC is a spinoff of an organization already ordered by the DOJ to register as an Israeli foreign agent. In November of 1962 the American Zionist Council was ordered by the Attorney General to begin filing disclosures as an Israeli foreign agent under the 1938 Foreign Agents Registration Act. http://www.IRmep.org/1962Order.pdf. Six weeks later, former AZC employees incorporated the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in Washington, DC, taking over the AZC's lobbying activities. http://www.IRmep.org/AIPAC.pdf. AIPAC did not register as a foreign agent.
2. AIPAC's founder Isaiah L. Kenen was the chief information officer for the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs in New York and for a time duly registered in that role. http://www.IRmep.org/Kenen.pdf The Justice Department ordered Kenen to personally re-register after he formally left the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs to head up private lobbying and publicity for the Israeli government at the nonprofit American Zionist Council. Kenen never complied with the order. http://www.IRmep.org/order.pdf.
3. Espionage related FBI investigations in 1984 and 2005 reveal AIPAC's ongoing stealth foreign agency activities. Declassified FBI files released on the Internet last week reveal that in 1984 AIPAC and the Israeli Ministry of Economics were investigated for jointly obtaining and circulating classified US economic data to obtain favorable trade benefits for Israel. http://www.irmep.org/ila/economy. In 2005 Pentagon Colonel Lawrence Franklin pled guilty and two AIPAC employees were indicted for obtaining and circulating classified US national defense information to Israeli government officials allegedly in the interest of fomenting US action against Iran.
4. AIPAC's executive committee consists of the original member organizations of the AZC in addition to newer members. The Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations, the umbrella group of AIPAC's executive committee, is housed in the same New York office as the World Zionist Organization - American Section, a registered foreign agent that is heavily involved in illegal settlement expansion according to Israeli prosecutor Thalia Sasson.

According to Grant F. Smith, director of IRmep, the case for reregulating AIPAC as a foreign agent immediately is compelling. "AIPAC was designed to supplant the American Zionist Council as the arm of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the United States after the DOJ ordered the AZC to register as a foreign agent. As such, Americans should have full public access to biannual FARA registrations detailing AIPAC's publicity campaigns, lobbying expenditures, funding flows, activities of its offices in Israel and internal consultations with its foreign principals - particularly over such controversial issues as illegal settlements and US foreign aid."

Concerned organizations and individuals who wish to supplement the Department of Justice filing or participate in future negotiations with law enforcement officials should contact the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy, Inc. at info@IRmep.org or 202-342-7325. IRmep is a private nonprofit that studies how warranted law enforcement and civil action can improve U.S. Middle East policy.

SOURCE: Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy

By Amira Hass* | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

Something about 12-year-old Bassam caused two Israelis to smile. Two Palestinians noticed, but did not remember their smiles as being disparaging or arrogant. On the contrary. The Palestinians regarded the smiles as a rare moment in which two Israelis - and not just any Israelis, but military judges - realized how ridiculous the situation was.

There were three other Israelis present, who held back their cries as they watched the boy enter, faltering - the chains around his legs clanging against each other, the prisons service coat he wore much too big for him. These three women, of their own accord, go regularly to the caravans that house the Ofer military tribunal and take notes. Were it not for these three women, who eventually shared his story, Bassam would have become yet another hidden detail of a non-event. A non-event of the sort that takes place countless times, all the time. Without those non-events, it is impossible to comprehend what life is like under hostile rule.

This particular non-event began with Bassam (not his real name), who lives in a village west of Ramallah, deciding to visit his aunt who lives in another village 14 kilometers away. It took place in the afternoon hours of Monday, December 21, 2009. Bassam's home is some 10 kilometers north of Route 443 and his aunt's home to the south. A narrow, winding path links the villages located along the way. Bassam took two taxis, then began walking the rest of the way. At the suggestion of another boy he met on the path, he took a shortcut through a valley and headed for the little tunnel that runs below the road which is closed off to Palestinians, but built on their land.

Several hundred meters from the elevated road, some Israel Defense Forces soldiers popped out from in between the olive trees. According to the boy, they called him over, saying "Come, come." "I was afraid and fled," Bassam says. But the soldiers grabbed him. He noticed there were two jeeps nearby.

"They boxed me a little on my ears, covered my eyes and put plastic handcuffs on my wrists. Then they lifted me and threw me into a jeep," he says. An Arabic speaker, he says, told him: "If they ask you, say that you threw stones." "I was so afraid that I did not think about anything," Bassam says two weeks later, at home.

With his eyes covered and hands cuffed, Bassam was taken from place to place. At the first stop, he was kept about two hours. They offered him water, but he said he did not want any. Then they drove to another place where a police interrogator asked him if he "had ever thrown stones on 443," Bassam relates. "I said yes - because that's what the soldier in the jeep told me - but I didn't know what 443 was. He asked me whether I had ever thrown stones with a sling. I asked him what a sling was. He explained to me and I said no."

At the third stop, Bassam was seen by a doctor who spoke some Arabic. "He asked me if I had had any operations and I said no. Then they covered my eyes again, handcuffed me and we went off," he says. By then it was already dark; they next arrived at the Ofer Prison. In the Prison Service records, Bassam is registered as prisoner number 1336183.

The inmates in the cell he was taken to immediately calmed him down, gave him something to eat, and explained that he would appear in court the next day. "I knew about Shabak [the Shin Bet security service] but I didn't know what the court was," he says.

'But I am standing'

At around 3 P.M. on December 22, in the caravan which houses the court, Iyad Misk, an attorney with DCI (Defence for Children International), spotted Bassam, whom he did not know, huddled among the other prisoners. When the judge, Major Shimon Leibo, entered, Misk thought Bassam didn't realize he had to stand. "Get up, get up," he said in a stage whisper from the attorney's stand. Bassam stared at him in amazement. "But I am standing," he said. Judge Leibo heard, looked and began to smile.

Misk immediately volunteered to represent the kid. The prosecutor, police officer Asher Silver, said: "We ask that the suspect be released on condition of a NIS 1,500 deposit and that he be called to a hearing, as we intend to submit an indictment against him."

Misk explained that the suspect did not have NIS 1,500 (approximately one and a half times a Palestinian worker's monthly wage), and that his family members were not present and apparently did not even know where he was. In what sounded like a suppressed reprimand, the judge said that not enough had been done to inform the boy's family about the arrest, and ordered that Bassam be released after NIS 500 was deposited. Misk _ who believed the police should have immediately released the boy the previous day, when the soldiers brought him to the police interrogator - was prepared to pay out of his own pocket, but the offices where the payment was to be made were already shut.

Meanwhile, Bassam's parents were beside themselves with worry. When he did not return home in the morning from his aunt's home, they started searching for him throughout the surrounding areas _ in the orchards, at the checkpoints, on the roads, at army posts. "I walked through the mountains looking for him and crying," his father, who is a welder, recalls. In the evening, one of Misk's friends found the father and informed him that Bassam would be spending a second night in detention. The following day, December 23, the father appeared at the military tribunal.

He held back his tears as he watched his son enter the caravan. The jacket reached his knees and his hands were buried inside the long sleeves. "Take a look at him," the father told the judge, Major Sharon Rivlin-Ahai, in fluent Hebrew. "Is this what the great Israel Defense Forces are needed for - to arrest this boy?"

And then it was time for the second smile - hers this time. The father remembers her saying, "Right." But then she added: "That's the law." She reduced the amount of the deposit to NIS 200, along with a guarantee that his son would appear in court if and when a charge sheet is brought against him. As long as there is no indictment, no one will know what the soldiers who took in Bassam are claiming. It is their word against the word of a Palestinian boy.

* Amira Hass is a prominent Israeli journalist and author, mostly known for her columns in the daily newspaper Ha'aretz. She is particularly recognized for her reporting on Palestinian affairs in the West Bank and Gaza, where she has also lived for a number of years.
The daughter of two Holocaust survivors, and was educated at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. On Oct. 20, the International Women's Media Network reward Hass the 2009 Lifetime Achievement Award. Hass was the recipient of the Press Freedom Hero award from the International Press Institute in 2000, the Bruno Kreisky Human Rights Award in 2002, the UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize in 2003, the inaugural award from the Anna Lindh Memorial Fund in 2004 and Hrant Dink Memorial Award in 2009.

By Daniel Machover* | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

According to news reports, David Miliband plans to call the leader of the Israeli opposition, Tzipi Livni, to explain the British government's stance on the grant of an arrest warrant against her when she had been due to speak at a Jewish National Fund meeting in Hendon.

One reasonable version of this call to Livni is as follows:

"I am calling to explain why it would be wrong for me to apologise publicly or privately for the apparent decision by one of this country's independent judiciary to issue an arrest warrant against you.

"I should first explain that the British legal system has a strong tradition of fairness. All people under criminal investigation or criminal charge are entitled to the presumption of innocence: that is, they are presumed innocent unless and until convicted through a fair trial on the criminal standard of proof (that is, beyond reasonable doubt). Therefore, nobody here is saying you have been found guilty of any offence and any comments of this kind would be unacceptable.

"It does seem, however, that a judicial decision was taken that there exists a reasonable suspicion that you committed a grave breach of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which is a criminal offence under our Geneva Conventions Act 1957. Of course, I have not seen any of the evidence that a court would have seen when making that decision. This is entirely right and proper: British ministers cannot interfere in such individual judicial decisions, as we must respect our ancient democratic tradition of non-interference with our independent judiciary. I hold the utmost respect for our independent judges.

"I am sorry, but I hope you understand that it is not my job as foreign secretary or any part of this government's job to second-guess a judge's decision or to interfere with it. I can tell you, however, that no charges could be brought against you without a decision by the attorney general. We very carefully guard the legal role of the attorney general, as the senior law officer, in making such decisions. The attorney general would first need advice from the head of our independent prosecution body, the director of public prosecutions, that the evidential test of the code for crown prosecutors was thought to be met (ie that there was more than a 50% chance that a jury would convict a defendant, having found on the evidence that it was beyond reasonable doubt that she had committed the alleged offence). If this evidential test was met, the independence of the UK legal system from the executive and the rights of victims of alleged crimes to see a just outcome to their complaints would be seriously undermined if the attorney general made a decision that it was against the public interest to bring charges of war crimes against a foreign national, who did not otherwise enjoy immunity from prosecution.

"Moreover, the attorney general would have to take into account this country's solemn treaty obligations under Article 146 of the Fourth Geneva Convention which states that we are 'under the obligation to search for persons alleged to have committed, or to have ordered to be committed ... grave breaches, and shall bring such persons, regardless of their nationality, before [our] courts'. The mandatory wording (ie 'shall') creates a presumption that it is in the public interest for criminal charges to be brought under our Geneva Conventions Act 1957 if the evidential test is met. I cannot say what the attorney general's decision would be in your case, as it must be a matter for her, on advice from the DPP.

"I understand that this may be a difficult position for you to accept. However, it is only appropriate that I also draw to your attention to some very disturbing aspects of the report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza conflict, headed up by the respected independent international judge Justice Richard Goldstone. As you know, the Goldstone report was adopted by the UN Human Rights Council in October and further endorsed at the general assembly in November. While the British government did not participate in the vote when the council adopted the report, we cannot ignore its conclusions that, from the facts that it gathered, grave breaches of the Fourth Geneva Convention do appear to have been committed by Israeli armed forces in Gaza, including wilful killing. Also, at paragraph 1975, the Goldstone report recommended that 'state parties to the Geneva Convention ... should start criminal investigations in national courts, using universal jurisdiction, where there is sufficient evidence of the commission of grave breaches ... where so warranted following investigation, alleged perpetrators should be arrested and prosecuted in accordance with internationally recognised standards of justice'.

"In the light of all this, Her Majesty's government must therefore carefully weigh everything in the balance when considering whether it would be appropriate to prevent alleged victims applying for judicial arrest warrants. As I have great faith in the standards of justice in this country and in the quality of our judiciary, the political embarrassment that is sometimes caused by standing by our legal traditions will have to be endured. Changing these provisions would undermine our strong democratic values and the rights of victims of alleged serious crimes to access to justice. I hope that the assurance that I have given you that criminal charges will only be brought for grave breaches if the most senior prosecutor in this country thought there was sufficient evidence to justify charges, will satisfy you that only where there appears to be a case to answer will someone be charged with such offences in this country.

"I implore you to join calls within Israel for compliance with the rule of law and for the establishment of an immediate and urgent independent and effective judicial investigation, which can conclude whether or not any of the Israeli leadership that made operational decisions during Operation Cast Lead, including you, should face criminal charges under your own laws. The same applies to the Gaza authorities. Alternatively, if you are concerned that Israel cannot meet this challenge, then Israel could refer itself to the only fully independent international body that has the resources and the ability to resolve such matters, namely the international criminal court.

"Only once the matters set out in the Goldstone report are brought to a just and satisfactory resolution, which may include the need for some individuals on both sides of the conflict to be held accountable for their alleged individual criminal responsibility, the whole region can perhaps benefit from a durable and lasting peace. Without justice there cannot be peace."

Unfortunately, it seems that Miliband is unlikely to make the above phonecall to Tzipi Livni, but instead will repeat his statements of recent days, which implicitly criticise the role of our independent judiciary, and which fly directly in the face of this country's international legal obligations to "search out and prosecute" all those alleged to have committed war crimes. This sends a message that Britain is in fact a safe haven for suspected torturers and war criminals, especially if they come from a country which is identified as an ally of the United Kingdom. This is particularly alarming given that just one week ago, with his fellow EU foreign ministers, David Miliband endorsed a document promoting compliance with international human rights law which concluded with the promise that "The European Union will continue to do its utmost to promote an international order where no state or individual is above the law and no person is outside the protection of the law."

* Daniel Machover is chair of Lawyers for Palestinian Human Rights and a partner at London lawfirm Hickman Rose

By Stuart Littlewood* | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

The British public must be wondering what has happened to the nation's backbone - and its moral compass - when they see news items like these.

"British Foreign Secretary David Miliband yesterday apologized to MK Tzipi Livni and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman for the arrest warrant issued against Livni in London earlier this week. He also promised Lieberman to begin working immediately to change the UK laws that enable the issue of arrest warrants against Israeli officials accused of war crimes."

Who does this foreign secretary think he is, apologising in our name for the operation of British law, especially when the warrant was issued to answer well-founded charges of war crimes?

Livni claims it was not personal. "It's about the entire State of Israel and our ability to go on working together against common threats."

What common threats? We have nothing in common. The threats Israel faces are caused by its racist expansion, land theft, general lawlessness and hateful attitude towards its neighbours, and by the lethal threat Israel itself presents to others in the region. Our government puts us in harm's way by associating so closely with the regime and continually taking its side.

As for ex-night club bouncer Lieberman, a deranged loudmouth who lives in an illegal Jewish settlement in the Palestinian West Bank and thrives on extremist language, since when did he merit a British apology?

"Miliband called the warrant intolerable and said he had spoken to Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Justice Minister Jack Straw to find an urgent solution. Prosor [the Israeli ambassador in London] chastised the British secretary saying it was time the British government took action."

Prosor "chastised" a Minister of the Crown... demanded a change to our laws? Your own laws need changing more than ours, Prosor.

"Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office also released a statement: 'We will not agree to a situation in which [former prime minister] Ehud Olmert, [Defense Minister] Ehud Barak and [opposition leader and former foreign minister] Tzipi Livni will be summoned to the bench. We utterly reject the absurdity that is happening in Britain.'"

Get your tanks off Palestine's lawn, Netanyahu, and your squatters off Palestinian land before you criticize anyone else.

The Israelis' arrogance is breath-taking. Livni would gladly repeat the atrocities in Gaza last December-January. Her office issued a statement saying she was proud of Operation Cast Lead. And speaking at a conference at Tel Aviv's Institute for Security Studies, she said: "I would today take the same decisions."

Leave the law on arrest warrants alone

Miliband's grovelling, especially to the Lieberman and Livni, is enough to make any red-blooded UK citizen cringe with shame. Few of us, surely, would touch these people with a barge-pole.

This abandonment of principle and descent into the abyss is explained in the Foreign Office statement: "The UK is determined to be a strategic partner of Israel."

Why? I have always wanted to know how this serves our best interests.

The law on arrest warrants, of course, should be left undisturbed. It's all quite simple. If Israel behaved in a civilised manner there would be no need for them.

This diplomatic ruckus helps us to see clearly the lunacy of stacking the British Foreign Office with Israel-lovers. There's Miliband, of course, with his ethnic links. He voted enthusiastically for the Iraq war and against an investigation.

Then there's our minister in charge of Middle East affairs, Ivan Lewis. He's a former vice-chairman of Labour Friends of Israel. He too voted for the Iraq war and against any investigation. In January, with the sickening stench of Israel's blitzkrieg on Gaza in the world's nostrils, Lewis told a rally in Manchester: "This community stands shoulder to shoulder with the people of Israel in the good and the bad times. We do not apply double standards to Israel..."

The trouble is, his kind don't apply any standards at all.

In July, with the blood of 1,400 dead Gazans (including 320 children and 109 women) on the hands of the Zionist devils, and with thousands more horribly maimed, the insensitive Lewis told the House of Commons: "Israel is a close ally of the UK and we have regular warm and productive exchanges at all levels."

Lewis is also chief executive of the Manchester Jewish Federation and a trustee of the Holocaust Educational Trust. Along with Miliband, he is the face of British diplomacy in the explosive Middle East.

Add to the team Miliband's Principal Private Secretary, Matthew Gould, just promoted as Britain's first Jewish ambassador to Israel with effect from next year. Gould told Haaretz that he and his wife will keep a Jewish household and bring up their kids in the Jewish tradition. "The fact that I'm Jewish means I will come with a particular insight and sympathy and understanding, because the story of my family is in certain respects the story of the people of the State of Israel. But fundamentally I'm going as the British ambassador, to pursue British policies and advance British interests."

That's difficult to believe, and some will point to a hopeless conflict of interests not only for Gould but also Miliband, Evans and others who feel an affinity with the appalling "story" of Israel.

Presiding over all this is our disaster-prone prime minister Gordon Brown, a Zionist sympathizer and patron of the Jewish National Fund, which is an organization set up to facilitate the confiscation and development of illegally occupied Palestinian lands.

As if to illustrate just how far Britain will go to appease Israel's ‘Criminal Tendency', the Jewish Chronicle reported a few days ago how the Foreign Office stamped on an initiative by the Department for Communities and Local Government to reassure the Muslim community that the British government did not support Israel's actions in Gaza. Foreign Office officials considered it pandering to the Muslim community's prejudices about Israel, especially when it was discovered that some Muslim leaders around the country wanted the government to recognise Hamas's right to armed resistance. Tut-tut. Oh dear, no. Everybody knows that only Israel is entitled to self-defence. And Britain panders only to Israel.

British-Jewish MP Sir Gerald Kaufman recently threw a bucket of cold water over this obscene Anglo-Israeli love-in by branding the Israeli government a gang of amoral thugs. These are the undesirables Miliband wants to accommodate with a change in the law. Well, I doubt if the British public would welcome the idea of such vile people, who think nothing of burning women and children to the bone with white phosphorus, coming and going as they please in our capital city.

These same thugs won't even allow thousands of Palestinian students like Berlanty Azzam the freedom to travel within their own homeland to attend university and finish their degree.

Mr Miliband, your cruel friends are not welcome here.

* Stuart Littlewood is author of the book Radio Free Palestine, which tells the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. Read other articles by Stuart, or visit Stuart's website.

By Khalid Amayreh* | Sabbah Report | www.sabbah.biz

The recent arrest warrant issued in London for former Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni is more than justified.

This woman, along with two other Israeli leaders, Ehud Olmert and Ehud Barak, stood at the helm of the Israeli government that ordered, supervised and charted the genocidal onslaught against the Gaza Strip this time last year.

She was a chief participant in the decision-making process who also supervised the progress of the hideous massacre from the beginning to the end.

Needless to say, the decisions taken by Livni, and other suspected Israeli war criminals, did lead to the murder of more than 1440 people, including hundreds of innocent children whose lives were terminated by indiscriminate bombings from air, land and sea. This is in addition to the pornographic destruction of a huge part of Gaza’s civilian infrastructure, including tens of thousands of homes, mosques, and public buildings of every kind.

The monstrous, satanic and evil lady knew perfectly what she was doing. She knew that her SS-like army was murdering kids in their mothers’ laps, annihilating entire families, frightened and huddling in their refugee shanties or whatever other places they thought would shield them from death.

She saw the pornographic death and destruction on television screens. She was alerted by human rights organizations, including Israel’s own B’tselem, that the Israeli army was murdering civilians knowingly and deliberately. But she chose to ignore what was too obvious to most people.

And instead of ordering an immediate halt to the massacre, she resorted to mendacious propaganda by blaming the victims and accusing Hamas of using civilians as human shields.

There is a huge mountain of evidence indicting this evil woman. She is an Adolph Hitler in a feminine form. She carries on her sinful hands tons of blood of innocent children and innocent men and women.

Livni may have a diplomatic immunity, but diplomatic immunity is not a license allowing bearers to murder children in cold blood as Livni did nearly 12 months ago.

It is sad that the British government is behaving in a perplexed manner, reluctant to tell Israel that Israel and its leaders are not above the laws of nations, including the British law.

Well, the UK should never compromise its own laws for the sake of shielding a war criminal, a mass murderer and child killer, from justice.

A crime is a crime is a crime, irrespective of the religion or race of the perpetrator. I know that certain diplomatic and political considerations may be pressing 10-Downing Street to seek a solution that would appease Israel.

However, appeasement, it should be understood by all, would only embolden Israel to commit more genocidal crimes against the helpless Palestinians and other peoples of the Middle East. After all, crime unpunished is crime encouraged.

In any case, the British government, including Foreign Secretary David Milliband who reportedly described the arrest warrant against Livni as “insufferable” will find itself in an unviable situation, having to defend Israel’s Nazi-like behavior against the people of the Gaza Strip.

First, the British government would have to prove beyond doubt that the 21-day onslaught against Gaza, during which all weapons of death, including white phosphorus, precision missiles and laser-guided bombs were used against the nearly totally unprotected inhabitants of Gaza, didn’t constitute war crimes or crimes against humanity.

However, a claim as such wouldn’t be viewed seriously as it has been established beyond doubt by the UN-mandated investigating commission headed by judge Richard Goldstone that what Israel did in Gaza in last December and January did constitute war crimes and crimes against humanity.

However, if the government does accept the Goldstone report, but still refuses to allow the British justice system to prosecute the diabolical lady because of certain diplomatic and political considerations, then it will be showing extraordinary flaccidity toward Israel and utter contempt for the entire system of justice in the UK.

After all, a justice system that is selective in applying justice, is not a true system of justice.

This is why, the British government should not cower before the Israeli bully or be intimidated by Israeli threats such as the often-made threat that Israel wouldn’t allow the UK to take part in the so-called “peace process” in case Israeli war criminals were arrested or prosecuted for war crimes before British courts.

Britain must not allow itself to be bullied by this bullying criminal entity whose very existence is based on murder, ethnic cleansing, land theft and lying.

A last word to those known and unknown soldiers who monitor the movement of Israeli war criminals. You are God’s means to make these hateful criminals realize that murdering innocent people has a price.

So, chase them wherever they go, hound them, narrow their horizons, and try to get them apprehended and arrested.

We owe it to these innocent children, who were mercilessly annihilated by the Nazis of our time, to seek justice for them and their families. We betrayed them when they were alive by failing to protect them from the Nazis of our time, we must not betray them again by denying them justice, even as they are dead.

* Khalid Amayreh a journalist based in the Occupied Palestinian town of Dura. He obtained his MA in journalism from the University of Southern Illinois in 1983.

When celebrating Christmas, it would be a good idea to think about the birthplace of Jesus. What is like in the Holy Land under the Israeli occupation, injustice and racism? How does Christmas feel when the Holy Land is under siege?

Help bring joy to the Holy Land.
Help break the siege.
Support the Freedom March to Gaza, Holy Land (Palestine).
http://www.gazafreedommarch.org/

Video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9esPiCxLDZk

By Haitham Manna'
Translated from Arabic by Saja

Haitham Manna - Member of the Arab Commission for Human Rights

The delegation, which was appointed by the Human Rights Commission, stated that the absence of a persuasive Israeli excuse for what had taken place in Beit Hanoun lead the delegation to the possible conclusion that the bombardment was a war crime. It recommended that Israel compensate the victims. Israeli delegate Aharon Leshno-Yaar [i] commented as follows before the Council [ii]:

"The report presented today will take its place in the vast library of UN reports on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The resolution that it will spawn will take its place on the lost list of one-sided resolutions that this Council has passed against Israel so far."

On that day, the Arab Committee for Human Rights and Palestinian NGO's demanded presentation of the issue before international courts. However, due to American pressure in the last days of the Bush administration and a weak European stance, the Tutu report entered the United Nations' archive as the Israeli delegate had expected - with no follow-up or accountability whatsoever.

One year later, I sat in the upper balcony of the Human Rights Council in Geneva, observing and listening to various delegations discussing the Goldstone report, the best report submitted to the Human Rights Council since its establishment on March 15, 2006. On his left was another judge from South Africa, the Honorable Nafi Bilai. To his right was the committee that accompanied him on this difficult and sensitive journey, Hina Gilani, Professor Kristen Chenkin and Colonel Desmond Travers.

It did not occur to me that the Israeli delegate would call the Goldstone report a "shameful report", or that the committee chair would not call to order. It was unfortunate that the "ex-partner" in "Human Rights First", Michael Bosner, adopted the Authority's language and defended "human rights last" in his speech. As he spoke about the children of Gaza and the existence of a double standard, it sounded as if Gaza's children were a superpower.

We, a group of citizens of the world, have been gathered since January 2009 in an international coalition to denounce the absence of accountability, support the internationalization of Palestinian non-governmental demands for the filing of claims with the International Criminal Court, and to activate criminal prosecution in the Middle East. Lack of accountability has made war a legitimate method of political work per the law of the jungle. We know the extent of independence the Ramallah-based Palestinian authority enjoys. We have seen with our own eyes how Israel has destroyed Palestinian infrastructure in over forty years of occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, and how it has denied Palestinians the ability to sustain themselves due to the ongoing war on the environment, industry, agriculture, commerce and humanity.

International justice must restore people's faith that Israel cannot remain above law and accountability and that it cannot, even for petty electoral reasons, transgress upon everything in the name of self-defense. It was cautious optimism, but we were certain that there were more than thirty votes in favor of the Goldstone report when we were shocked by the Palestinian Authority's request that its delegate in Geneva postpone voting on the report for six months. I saw much anger as I headed at noon on 2/10/2009 to the Aljazeera studio in Monpreneurs in the French capitol. "I feel like I've been poisoned. Nobody has the right to tamper with the victims' right to justice," "Abu Mazin, let international justice defend your people." I received hundreds of messages and phone calls from the Palestinian territories, both Gaza and Ramallah; Hamas and Fatah; and from several Palestinian and Arab human rights organizations. Within seven days, an intifada (uprising) of Palestinian human right against the postponement decision was launched in addition to marches and demonstrations in Palestinian cities, daily rallies for the victims and overall discontent on part of human rights organizations and civil resistance. There was also debate within the circles of Palestinian decision-making regarding peaceful resolution and absence of accountability and the symbolic role that the Human Rights Council played, and the importance of the Goldstone recommendations. For the first time in its history, the Human Rights Council and international justice became at the forefront of mainstream Arabic media until the Palestinian Authority succumbed before the demands of the human rights movement and the "International Coalition to Prosecute War Criminals": "a Human Rights Council urgent session, a special United Nations session, to pursue the Palestinian case before the International Criminal Court immediately." The Palestinian Minister of Justice arrived in Paris on Monday morning and we met in order to proceed in three directions: The Hague, Geneva and New York.

A Palestinian committee for investigation was formed and I immediately submitted my testimony. Progress was made towards international recognition of what had taken place by parties keen to give international justice a voice in a world that had become a jungle ruled by the powerful following years of secret prisons, Guantanamo and arbitrary laws. But again, an over-cautious optimism, as the Israeli Prime Minister said on the evening of Monday 12/10/2009 that Israel is above punishment and that "self defense" and the "Jewish character of the state" are existential Israeli issues. He said he would refuse jurisdiction over any Israeli who defended Israel and that he would do everything in his power to prevent the Goldstone report from returning to the Human Rights Council. This language transformed war crimes and crimes against humanity to legitimate methods for self defense. It is the major product of violence in the Middle East. It obstructs the creation of a broad civil current that defends peace. Peace is a word that has been stripped of all meaning by agreements, from Oslo to Washington. On the day Oslo was signed, there were about one hundred thousand settlers in the West Bank. Today there are over a quarter million. There were around 22 checkpoints. Today there are 600 checkpoints. The apartheid wall didn't exist, and resources of self-sustenance for Palestinians citizens were three times as high as today. In the collective memory, Oslo is a disaster for the Palestinian and his national and citizenship aspirations. What peace, Mr. Nobel for Peace, if you cannot stop settlements? What peace when the British Foreign Secretary considers the Israeli war a democratic decision by a democratic state? What peace when European Union countries have refrained from voting to form an investigation delegation, a mere delegation to investigate the murder of 1,400 Palestinians, three quarters of whom were civilians? We are before a western ethical crisis. These countries, which teach daily lessons on the independence of the judiciary and human rights and the importance of accountability, stand naked at Israeli checkpoints, incapable of demonstrating even minimal credibility. International justice in Belgium retreated before Sharon. In Spain, it retreated before the generals of "Operation Cast Lead". We have no idea where else in the aging continent (as Rumsfeld calls it) it will retreat. Has the Israeli war criminal become stronger than judicial buildings that are over two centuries old? This is the question before judicial, national, regional and international institutions today.

* Haitham Manna' is a member of the Arab Commission for Human Rights

[ii] Translator's note: Israeli delegate's comments transcribed verbatim from http://www.un.org/webcast/unhrc/archive.asp?go=080918

ALSO AVAILABLE IN ARABIC ON TLAXCALA: http://www.tlaxcala.es/pp.asp?reference=8979&lg=ar

Source: Palestine Think Tank

Adapted from the Amnesty International Report: http://bit.ly/13b6o4

Military Justice in Israel - Ben Heine © Cartoons

• Salwa Salah and Sara Siureh, two 16-year-old girls, were arrested at night from their homes in June and were still held in administrative detention at the end of 2008.
• Mohammed Khawajah, aged 12, was arrested by Israeli soldiers at his home in Ni’lin village at 3am on 11 September. He was beaten and detained with adults in an army detention camp until 15 September, when he was released on bail. He was charged with throwing stones at soldiers and sent for trial before a military court.
• Dozens of Hamas members of the Palestinian parliament and ministers in the former Hamas-led PA government remained detained without trial, up to two years after their arrest. The Israeli authorities held them apparently to exert pressure on Hamas to release an Israeli soldier held in the Gaza Strip by Hamas’ armed wing since 2006.

Almost all Palestinian detainees were held in prisons in Israel in violation of international humanitarian law, which prohibits the removal of detainees to the territory of the occupying power. This made it difficult or impossible in practice for detainees to receive family visits.

Read full report here: http://bit.ly/13b6o4

Strange!

Oh... He is Israeli war criminal... that's why!?

Police feared 'airport stand-off'

An Israeli general wanted for alleged war crimes escaped arrest in the UK because British police feared an armed confrontation at Heathrow airport.

02.19.2008 | BBC News
By Dominic Casciani

Documents seen by BBC News reveal how Major General Doron Almog managed to fly back to Israel when police failed to board his plane in September 2005.

He stayed on board for two hours after a tip-off that he was facing detention.

Police were concerned about a potential clash with Israeli air marshals or armed personal security on the plane.

Maj Gen Almog had flown to the UK for social and charitable visits to Jewish communities in Solihull, in the West Midlands, and Manchester.

Lawyers acting for Palestinian campaigners lobbied the Metropolitan Police to act over allegations he had ordered the destruction in 2002 of more than 50 Palestinian homes in the Gaza Strip.

Campaigners say the homes were destroyed by the Israeli army as retribution for a Palestinian militant attack, in contravention of the laws of war protecting civilian property. Israel says destruction of Palestinian houses is among the necessary measures it takes to protect its citizens.

The Met initially refused to get involved, citing massive pressures on counter-terrorism teams in the wake of the London bombings.

But the legal representatives successfully applied to a judge for an arrest warrant for a private prosecution.

Decisions log

A decisions log prepared for the Independent Police Complaints Commission, which has investigated the incident, shows officers decided to detain the general at Heathrow's immigration control.

They then planned to take him to a police station to consider executing the warrant.

However, news of the warrant leaked to the Israeli Embassy.

Officials tipped off the general and he and his wife refused to leave the El Al flight for the two hours it sat at the London airport's terminal.

The documents now show Det Supt John MacBrayne, a senior counter-terrorism officer who was responsible for the operation, could not get confirmation that his team had the right to board the plane.

El Al, Israel's national airline, had refused permission.

In his log, he wrote: "Another consideration [was] that El Al flights carried armed air marshals, which raised issues around public safety.

"There was also no intelligence as to whether Mr Almog would have been travelling with personal security as befitted his status, armed or otherwise."

The officer concluded there were real risks to the police and public and also had concerns about the "international impact of a potentially armed police operation at an airport".

Apology to Israel

When Maj Gen Almog arrived back in Israel, the planned arrest caused a minor diplomatic storm, with Israeli foreign minister Silvan Shalom describing the incident as an "outrage".

In turn, the then UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw apologised to his counterpart for any embarrassment caused.

Hickman and Rose, lawyers for the Palestinians, demanded an inquiry.

A spokesman for the Independent Police Complaints Commission said its review had not identified the source who leaked details of the planned arrest.

It also concluded police had not broken rules by failing to board the aircraft to execute the warrant.

John O' Connor, a former head of Scotland Yard's flying squad, told BBC One's Breakfast programme: "All they needed to do was to stop the plane from taking off and negotiate through the Foreign Office."

He said he felt the arrest had been "written off", putting "British justice is in the dock."

[Hat tip: Black Looks]

Israeli Justice: Israeli policeman gets community service for shooting, paralyzing Palestinian

A Tel Aviv Court on Sunday sentenced a Border Policeman who shot and paralyzed a Kafr Qasem resident to six months of community service and a one-year suspended prison term.

In 2003, Haim Castro shot Salah Amar from a distance of a half a meter, claiming that his life was in danger and he acted in self defense. The court dismissed this claim and ruled there was no threat to Castro's life.

Since the shooting, Amar has been listed as 100 percent disabled...read on!