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United Nations aids victims of sewage spill in Gaza

28 March 2007


United Nations relief agencies are responding to the needs arising from the bursting of a sewage reservoir in an emergency filtration basin at the waste water treatment plant in Beit Lahia in Gaza. According to latest reports, waste flooding into the nearby Bedouin village of Um Al Nasser killed four people and injured 18, while 11 people remain missing. Ninety-six homes were destroyed or damaged. Between 250 and 300 families have been relocated to a temporary camp situated on higher ground between the Bedouin village and the former Israeli Nissanit settlement. 

Palestinian journalist's letter to Alan Johnston

Sami Abu Salem Gaza Strip, Palestine 28 March 2007


Dear Alan: From the depth of our hearts, I would like to say that we are really shocked and terribly sorry for what has been happening to you. Three years ago, the first time I met you at the French Cultural Centre when you were covering an art activity, I realized that you were the journalist the Palestinian people are in need of. The journalist who does not cover only bloodshed, violence and politics, but also knocks on all doors in Gaza: occupation, art, love, religion and all areas that show the entire world that we are human too. 

'Israel's right to exist': Is it a real issue?

Jeff Handmaker and Gentian Zyberi 28 March 2007


There are many aspects of the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians in urgent need of legal scrutiny as part of a much-needed critical dialogue. One such issue is Israel’s claim towards Hamas to acknowledge that it has a ‘right to exist’. This claim has not only been uncritically taken on board by the Quartet. It has become one of the top conditions to be fulfilled by Hamas for receiving aid by the Quartet and other international donors. At the risk of stating the obvious, we argue that this position lacks any basis under international law and will serve no constructive political purpose in seeking to resolve the conflict. 

Um El-Naser Environmental Disaster Victims Increase to Five

28 March 2007


The victims who were killed in yesterday’s environmental disaster in Um El-Naser (Bedouin) village increased to five after rescue crews recovered the body of Fatima Habban Abu Safra (70) yesterday afternoon. The body was found under the rubble of her house that was flooded by sewage water. It is noted that earth barriers around a sewage pool that was constructed last September broke and flooded the village. The pool was constructed by a joint council of municipalities in the northern Gaza Strip. Rescue teams recovered four bodies in earlier rescue operations. All of them were drowned by the sewage flood. 

Environmental disaster in Gaza, Sewage basin collapses

27 March 2007


In the most serious environmental disaster to hit the northern Gaza Strip, earth barriers in the sewage disposal pools broke, killing four Palestinians and rendering hundreds of families homeless in the bedouin village of Um El-Naser. Many remain missing. The Palestinian Center for Human Rights calls upon the international community and the Palestinian Authority to provide emergency shelters for the victims. As a result, sewage water flooded from the pool flooded the village, and the effect was more devastating due to the fact that the pool’s elevation was higher than the village, giving the flood more power and destructive force. 

Human Rights Council calls for fact-finding missions to probe alleged Israeli abuses

27 March 2007


The United Nations Human Rights Council today adopted a resolution without a vote which called for two urgent fact-finding missions to be dispatched to the occupied Palestinian territory, voicing concern that previous attempts to investigate potential human rights abuses had been hindered by Israel. The Council noted with regret that Israel had not cooperated with two previous resolutions which dispatched the missions. 

Palestinians call upon Arab Summit: "Protect Palestinian Refugees and Work for their Right of Return"

27 March 2007


“Recent Israeli statements claiming readiness to engage with the Arab Initiative, if Arab states dropped the clause on the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes in accordance with UN Resolution 194, is nothing but yet another attempt to deceive Arabs and Palestinians and obtain free concessions … Any compromise of the rights of the refugees stands for the continuation of the Nakba (catastrophe) inflicted upon the Palestinian people since 1948 and perpetuates the conflict with Israel,” say Palestinian civil society organizations to Arab leaders convening today, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, for the summit of the Arab League. 

Call for boycott against the Israel Medical Association

27 March 2007


We, the undersigned, Palestinian Medical and Health institutions in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, call on world medical and health institutions to immediately end cooperation with, and refrain from participation in, any form of collaboration or joint activities with the IMA; advocate for the condemnation of the IMA; support Palestinian medical and health institutions directly without requiring them to partner with Israeli counterparts as a condition for such support. IMA’s medical ethics record on torture has been well documented and the institution has never denounced or seriously confronted the Israeli government’s use of torture. 

UN meeting on Middle East peace urges support for new Palestinian Government

26 March 2007


The international community has an obligation to support the new Palestinian National Unity Government without preconditions and to lift the aid restrictions imposed on it, according to participants in a United Nations meeting on Israeli-Palestinian peace. The UN International Meeting in Support of Israeli-Palestinian Peace, held at the Rome headquarters of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) on 22-23 March, welcomed the formation of the Government and voiced the hope that the development would allow the international community to restore much-needed economic and humanitarian aid and help to move the peace process forward. 

Israel, Palestinians must both take steps on path to peace, Ban Ki-moon says

26 March 2007


It is crucial that both Israel and the Palestinians take steps to reduce tensions in the Middle East in order to advance the peace process, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in Jerusalem today after meeting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. “The long-term safety and security of Israel and the creation of a Palestinian State go hand in hand,” he added, a day after holding talks with Mahmoud Abbas, noting stressed the need to give some “political space” to the new Palestinian government formed by Hamas and Fatah. “We must use the weeks and months ahead to advance the political dialogue, since the alternative is renewed stagnation, which only means more extremism and violence,” he said.