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Travel Warning: Bethlehem & Jerusalem, Occupied Palestine

11 December 2006


This Travel Warning is being issued to update information on the general security environment in Israel, Jerusalem, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip, and to reiterate threats to foreign nationals, especially American citizens. Although the situation in Israel is seemingly calm, the fact of the matter remains that Israel continues to aggressively violate International Humanitarian and Human Rights Laws daily. A disconcerting development is the Israeli practice of denying entry of Palestinian Christians and Muslims to the Holy Land; embodying religious discrimination during the high holy season. As Palestinians, we have always looked forward to your being with us during Christmas, Easter and other holiday feasts. 

Divide and conquer

Daoud Kuttab 11 December 2006


A strange phenomenon has been taking place over the past few years. Israel has been carrying out a systematic plan to try and separate Gaza from the West Bank. Little attention has been given to this effort separating people — and a country — using administrative measures. This phenomenon began in the late 1980s with the launch of the Palestinian intifada, was accelerated in the beginning of the second intifada in 2000, and has been accelerated even more since the unilateral Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, causing a critical human and economic crisis. 

$450m humanitarian appeal for Palestinians

8 December 2006


United Nations agencies and NGOs have launched a US$450 million emergency appeal for humanitarian aid for the Palestinians – the biggest-ever for the Palestinians and the third-largest in the world. So much money is needed because two-thirds of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip have fallen into poverty, said Kevin Kennedy, the UN’s humanitarian coordinator. The international boycott on the Hamas-led Palestinian government has crippled the Palestinian economy. International donors say they will only give money directly to the Palestinian people if Hamas recognises Israel’s existence, renounces violence and abides by previous agreements between Israel and the Palestinians. 

Amnesty and Israel clash over arms and human rights

10 December 2006


The London-based human rights organisation Amnesty International has asked the European Union (EU) to block arms sale to Israel and Palestinians so as to stave off impending disaster in Israel and the Palestinian territories. However, Israel has reacted negatively to the proposal. In an open letter to the EU on International Human Rights Day on Sunday, Amnesty’s secretary general Irene Khan said worsening human rights abuses in Israel and the Palestinian territories would lead to catastrophe. “We see a downward spiral of human rights abuses and entrenched impunity, sowing the seeds of a disaster with catastrophic consequences for ordinary people,” she wrote. 

No solutions for newly homeless

11 December 2006


The F-16 fighters and Apache gunships may now be absent from the Gaza skies - but that doesn’t help Omar Mohammed Mamlouk and his 18-strong family, living in a tent amid the rubble of their home. The family fled their house in Gaza City’s Yarmouk Street after Mamlouk was called on his mobile by the Israeli military, an officer telling him a missile strike was to be launched on his house. “That phone call haunts me - I think about it 24 hours a day. We are now in the street. We have no shelter. I don’t know where are the human rights organisations or whether they can help us,” he told IRIN. 

Annan calls on donors to make up for shortfall in UN funds for Palestinian refugees

11 December 2006


Secretary-General Kofi Annan today called on international donors to make up “the current, worrying shortfall” in the budget of the United Nations agency that tends to the needs of millions of Palestinian refugees, with an operational deficit of over $100 million already looming. “Such efforts merit strong support from the international community,” he said in a message delivered by UN Deputy Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process Kevin Kennedy to the second annual meeting of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) host authorities and donor governments in Amman, Jordan. 

Amnesty International head sends open letter to EU heads of state

Irene Khan 10 December 2006


I am writing to you from Jerusalem on International Human Rights Day on the eve of the forthcoming European Council meeting to ask you to take urgent action to address the extremely serious human rights situation in Israel and the Occupied Territories. The current truce in the Gaza Strip is extremely fragile but it provides an opening which the international community must seize to encourage dialogue towards a political solution. However, no political initiative will succeed if it does not address, as a matter of priority, the underlying human rights concerns. 

Human rights organizations respond to Gaza shooting

11 December 2006


The undersigned Palestinian human rights NGOs strongly condemn the horrible murder committed in Gaza City on Monday morning, 12 December 2006, which killed 3 children and the driver of the car, in which they were traveling to school. The car, in which the victims were traveling, were fired at by unknown gunmen. The undersigned human rights NGOs express their deep concerns over the unprecedented deterioration in the state of security chaos and misuse of weapons prevailing in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), especially in the Gaza Strip, in light of the failure of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) to take effective measures to ensure protection for the lives and property of people. 

One-sided collective punishment legislation passed by U.S. House

9 December 2006


Despite our best efforts, the Senate version of the Palestinian Anti-Terrorism Act of 2006 (S. 2370) passed the U.S. House of Representatives yesterday by voice vote, clearing the way for the bill to reach the White House. No amendments were allowed, no vote was recorded and no one other than the three members who rose in support of the bill could be seen in the House chamber. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) and Tom Lantos (D-CA), the bill’s sponsors, lamented the fact that they could not send their original text on to the president and instead had to settle for the Senate’s less draconian but nonetheless damaging language. 

Disregard for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories

10 December 2006


Today the United Nations (UN) observes the 58th International Human Rights Day, commemorating the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) by the UN General Assembly, on 10 December 1948. On this occasion, Al-Haq is compelled to note the stark contrast between the fundamental standards enshrined in the UDHR, and the situation of Palestinians living under Israeli occupation in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip.