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A living martyr

Rami Almeghari Shati' refugee camp, Gaza Strip 7 January 2008


“He insisted that we all take a photo; it was the first in the last 12 years since we got married, as if he was feeling his death was approaching,” says Ghada al-Khatib, widow of Awni al-Khatib at their home in al-Shati’ refugee camp in western Gaza City. Awni al-Khatib died a few days of the brain damage he suffered since 1990 when he was shot in the head by an Israeli-fired, rubber-coated steel bullet. Awni is one of thousands of Palestinians who sustained injuries from such bullets during the first intifada that broke out in 1987. EI correspondent Rami Almeghari reports from Gaza’s Shati’ refugee camp. 

In Memoriam: Dr. Ahmad Maslamani

7 January 2008


The morning of 7 January 2008, Dr. Ahmad Maslamani, a leading national figure in the Palestinian grassroots struggle against the occupation, passed away as a result of a heart attack. In 1985 he was a founder member of the Union of Health Work Committees, where he was director from 1992. From 2004, he was a member of the steering committee of the Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign. He was a member of the central committee of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. 

"Injustice every day": An interview with Leila Khaled

6 January 2008


One of the most legendary figures of the Palestinian struggle for national liberation, Leila Khaled was recently in the Palestinian refugee camps of northern Lebanon. Visiting for the first time since last summer’s battle between the non-Palestinian Islamist group Fatah al-Islam and the Lebanese army, during which the Nahr al-Bared camp was destroyed, Khaled sat down with EI editor Matthew Cassel to discuss Annapolis, Nahr al-Bared, and how the Palestinian movement must move forward. 

Closure forces two women to give birth in cars

6 January 2008


The village of ‘Azzun ‘Atmah is cut off from the rest of the West Bank by the separation barrier. State officials say the village was made into an enclave primarily to place the Sha’are Tikva settlement on the “Israeli” side of the barrier. The only way the residents can get to the rest of the West Bank is through a gate in the barrier that is open only part of the day. When it is closed, soldiers remain in the guard tower by the gate. When residents need to leave the village for any purpose, including medical treatment, they have to call to the soldiers and beg them to open the gate. 

Evidence of Israel's "cowardly blending" comes to light

Jonathan Cook 6 January 2008


It apparently never occurred to anyone in our leading human rights organizations or the Western media that the same moral and legal standards ought be applied to the behavior of Israel and Hizballah during the war on Lebanon 18 months ago. Belatedly, an important effort has been made to set that right. Jonathan Cook comments on a new report that unearths evidence that Israel committed war crimes not only against Lebanese civilians but also against its own Arab citizens. 

Christian Zionists gain Israel's inner sanctum

Bill Berkowitz 6 January 2008


OAKLAND, California, 3 Jan (IPS) - After raising more than two hundred million dollars for various projects in Israel, Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein and the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews (IFCJ), the organization he founded and is president of, has hit pay-dirt. In late December, the Jewish Agency for Israel, which helped found the state of Israel, announced that the IFCJ “will be declared a funding partner of the Jewish Agency … [and] Eckstein will … receive new voting powers that will include spots on the committees that oversee the agency’s budget and that meet with the prime minister and his Cabinet,” the Jewish daily Forward reported. 

Eight Gazans killed, 17 injured in ongoing Israeli attacks

3 January 2008


Israeli occupation forces (IOF) escalated their offensive against the Gaza Strip, killing eight Palestinians and injuring 17 others in various attacks throughout the Strip. The IOF carried out air strikes in different areas. It carried out an artillery attack on a house belonging to the Fayad family in Khan Younis, killing three brothers, their mother, and a fifth family member. Two civilian cars in northern and middle Gaza Strip were also bombarded, but no injuries were reported. 

Fatah-Hamas violence claims seven in Gaza

3 January 2008


Violence erupted after the government in Gaza banned celebrations to mark the 1 January anniversary of the establishment of the Fatah movement, in what appears to have been a response to the ban imposed by the government in Ramallah on Hamas marking the 14 December anniversary of the establishment of Hamas in the West Bank. In the lead up to the Fatah anniversary, police and Hamas gunmen in Gaza launched a campaign of arrests of Fatah activists and searched Fatah offices and the homes of people affiliated with Fatah.