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Jewish state idea mired in confusion

Khalid Amayreh 20 June 2005


Since the collapse of the Oslo accords nearly five years ago, Israeli leaders have been demanding that the Palestinian Authority recognise Israel as a Jewish state in any prospective settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Some Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, have even used the concept of “state of the Jewish people”, with the connotation that Israel belongs not only to its citizens, but to Jews all over the world, including potential future converts. The idea, Israeli academics and intellectuals say, occupies “centre-stage” in Israel’s Zionist collective thinking. 

Security Council briefed on situation in the occupied territories

17 June 2005


Despite the serious nature of various incidents, a prolonged breakdown of the calm prevailing in the Middle East over the past four months had been averted, Kieran Prendergast, Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, told the Security Council this morning in his briefing on the situation in the region, including the Palestinian question. There had been a resumption during the reporting period of the Israeli practice of targeting from the air Palestinian militants.  Both sides were reminded of the need to take special care to protect innocent civilians, in accordance with international and humanitarian law. 

Warning bells are ringing

Atef Saad 19 June 2005


On June 4, dozens of attorneys refused to show up to courtrooms in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, in what they called a “one-day warning strike”. In a statement released by the Palestinian Bar Association, the lawyers said they were protesting assaults on what they described as “the three arms of justice”: the judges, public prosecuting attorneys, and defense lawyers. The statement decried legal professionals’ “unsafe working environment” blamed on increased vigilantism and the failure of the Palestinian Authority’s legislative and executive branches to protect the judicial system. 

Free Adnan Abdallah!

Nina Mayorek 19 June 2005


Only a few of the 420 Palestinian prisoners recently released numbered among the nearly 700 prisoners currently serving administrative detention orders. Adnan Na’im ‘Abdallah, age 31, is married without children and has been held in detention without charge or trial by the Israeli army for two and a half years. Nina Mayorek started a campaign to release Adnan. Adnan lives between 9m cement walls in the Negev desert. The detention camp is divided into cages with 120 prisoners living in tents inside each cage. Adnan’s cage separates him from the world. 

Palestinian Authority must restore rule of law and respect human rights

16 June 2005


The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights is gravely concerned at the continued deterioration in internal security as a consequence of the escalation in the misuse of weapons and security chaos. Seven Palestinians, including a 12-year-old boy, were killed in less than one week of internal fighting in the Occupied Palestinian Territory. PCHR reiterates its calls for the Palestinian National Authority to restore law and order and respect human rights. The latest of these incidents took place on Tuesday, 14 June 2005, when four persons, including a father and his two sons, were killed in an exchange of fire during a family dispute. 

History's Greatest Reoccuring Hoax: Colonization "For Security Reasons"

Rima Merriman 16 June 2005


In Gaza and north of the West Bank, the Israelis are taking down what should never have been put up in the first place (their illegal settlements), all the while muttering, “they haven’t made us do it; we are doing it on our own”. On the West Bank, the Israelis are busy constructing what must in future be taken down and the US taxpayer is footing the bill! Day by day, what will have to be dismantled grows, concrete slab by concrete slab, what has to be “withdrawn” proliferates, and there is no one to stop it or even to protest against it. 

NYC Activists Take Message Against Caterpillar to �Business and Sustainability� Conference

15 June 2005


NYC activists on behalf of Palestinian rights brought their message to the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel this morning, where an executive from Caterpillar was scheduled to appear on a panel social responsibility and sustainability. The spirited rally excited police attention but no arrests. Later, while the CAT exec’s talk was underway, an activist was arrested attempting to make a presentation to the same audience on CAT’s role in Israel’s ongoing campaign to destroy Palestinian homes, while another activist leafleted the conference attendees. 

Israelis will use U.S. Tax Dollars on Illegal Border

15 June 2005


A document recently published by the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs entitled “Israeli Assistance Steps and Humanitarian Measures Towards the Palestinians,” reveals that the $50 million their congressional agents in Washington scrounged from the $200 million Palestinian aid package will go for the construction of high-tech processing terminals that will be located on the “separation lines” between Israel and Palestine. In other words, the money will be spent along the path of the Separation Wall that the Israelis have unilaterally constructed in the last two years and that lie within Palestinian territory. 

The Case for Israel, a Critical Review

Feroze Sidhwa 15 June 2005


The Case for Israel lacks objectivity, to say the least. Dershowitz treats evidence in much the same way Joan Peters does in From Time Immemorial, and the results are similar. Like Peters, Dershowitz selects facts to suit his theses. He employs distortion and fabrication while contending elsewhere that he knows the evidence he presents is distorted and falsified. He misconstrues sources in a tendentious manner. He draws hard conclusions from tenuous evidence. He adduces evidence that in no way supports his claims, even omitting “inconvenient” portions of quotations without inserting ellipses. He quotes sources completely out of context. 

A better strategy for the Palestinian Authority

Hasan Abu Nimah 15 June 2005


In Palestinian-Israeli politics, Israel remembers that there are certain mutual understandings used to manage the troubled relationship only when Palestinians take actions that anger the Israelis. Only in such circumstances does Israel complain of threats to the roadmap, the Sharm El Sheikh understandings, or even the entire peace process. When the Palestinians do whatever they are asked, however, such understandings and frameworks suddenly cease to exist. EI contributor Hasan Abu Nimah looks at current Palestinian Authority strategy and considers alternatives.