June 11, 2007

Global Days of Action, June 9-11

Occupation is a Crime! Viva Viva Palestine!

Across the world hundreds of thousands took to the streets June 9-11 to vigorously oppose the continued U.S.-Israeli occupation of Palestine and to support the heroic struggle of the Palestinian people for their national and social rights. They participated in rallies, demonstrations, marches, conferences, street theater, exhibitions, speak outs, and more to Say NO! to U.S.-Israeli Occupation! Salute the Palestinian Resistance! Peoples worldwide rejected the criminal U.S.-backed Zionist occupation of their lands and their genocidal aim to eliminate the Palestinians. They militantly united with the call for global actions issued by the International Coordinating Network on Palestine, with hundreds of organizations standing as one proclaiming statehood and independence for Palestine!

Washington, D.C.

A united and militant action was organized in Washington, D.C. to defend Palestine and demand that the U.S. act immediately to end all political and military funding of Israel. A broad section of the peoples participated, including Arabs, Jews, African Americans, Asian Americans and many anti-war and rights activists and organizations. Together they denounced the U.S. backing of Israel and stood with the Palestinians, chanting Occupation is a Crime! Viva Viva Palestine! They began the action at the Congress, denouncing the resolution passed by the House of Representatives endorsing Jerusalem as the “undivided capital of Israel.” This provocative and flagrant attack on Palestine and international law was opposed, as was all the U.S. backing and protection of Israel. Participants then marched to the Washington monument, ending their action near the White House. All along the route, with many Palestinian flags flying, they denounced the U.S.-Israeli war crimes and defended the rights of the Palestinians to return home and achieve statehood.

Palestine

In Palestine thousands took to the streets during the first week of June to vigorously condemn and oppose U.S.-Israeli genocide and to reaffirm the struggle for national and social liberation. Among many actions, on June 5, hundreds gathered in Al Manara Square in Ramallah to hold a demonstration. Conferences on Jerusalem, opposing Israeli moves to annex the entire city, were held June 5-7 in Jerusalem, Ramallah, and Haifa. On June 8 there were two central demonstrations from Bethlehem and Hebron towards Um Salamoneh. In addition, a demonstration was held June 9 at the entrance of the refugee camp in Qalandiya, Ramallah. Demonstrations also took place in Nablus and Bethlehem.

Israel

Thousands of people gathered in central Tel Aviv Saturday evening (June 9) to attend a rally protesting Israel’s continued occupation of Palestine. Protesters marched from Rabin Square to the Tel Aviv Museum, where they held a big rally. Participants shouted slogans against the occupation and raised signs saying, The Occupation - A Disgrace, and The Settlements - Israel’s Catastrophe. Numerous other actions were also held during the first week of June, including historical photo exhibitions on the Occupation, an Israeli-Palestinian demonstration near the Apartheid Wall separating Bak’ah Al Sharkiya in the West Bank from Bak’ah Al Gharbiya in Israel, and a Festival of Peace and Music with Israeli and Palestinian artists and groups, films and more at Tantur, on the border of Jerusalem and Bethlehem.

Arab World

The Arab League designated June 5 as a day of action throughout the region. Demonstrations and other solidarity events were held throughout the Arab world including the raising of black flags and the sounding of sirens followed by a minute of silence in protest against the U.S.-backed Israeli occupation.

Americas

In Canada, Thousands participated in actions organized in Toronto, Montreal, Calgary, and various other places. Protesters demanded an end to the occupation and that rights be defended and upheld. In Brazil, on June 9 people demonstrated in a large public square near the Sao Paulo Art Museum. The actions included speeches, followed by street theater performance “Boys and Stones,” and a dance performance (combination of Brazilian Indian dances, with Bedouin, and Arab folklore). Actions were also held in Argentina, and elsewhere.

South Africa

In Johannesburg on June 9, about 20,000 South Africans around the country participated in a number of activities, united in a single call: Free Palestine! End the Occupation. Major activities on Saturday included a march in Cape Town where 10,000 protestors braved the rain to march and listen to speakers calling for an end to the occupation and calling for boycotts and sanctions against Israel, followed by a symbolic ring of 350 cars around the U.S. Consulate. The Durban rally was also well attended. Saturday’s protests followed more than a week of activities as part of the “Week of Action” called for by a new coalition called End the Occupation Campaign. The activities included rallies, pickets outside supermarkets selling Israeli goods, sermons in mosques and churches, seminars, radio talk shows and two parliamentary debates (one in the National Assembly and one in the Western Cape Legislature).

India

A well-attended three hour conference titled “Indians for Solidarity with Palestine” was held on June 7 in Mamba to support the struggle of the Palestinian people. More than half a dozen groups sponsored the event.

Indonesia

More than10,000 Indonesians held a three-hour demonstration in Jakarta against Israel’s continued occupation of Palestine, calling on the government to continue its support for the struggle to liberate Al-Quds (Jerusalem) and on the general public to boycott products supported by Israel. Coming from several provinces outside of the capital city to gather at the National Monument Square, the action consisted of people from all walks of life. The demonstration was lively with mothers pushing strollers and fathers carrying children on their shoulders, punching the air every now and again to the repeated shouts of Down with Zionist Israel, Long Live Palestine! Speakers took turns leading the participants chanting condemnations against Washington and Tel Aviv, and to call for people around the world to come to the defense of Al-Quds.

Australia

Hundreds rallied in Town Hall Square, Sydney to oppose the occupation of Palestine. Demonstrators demanded peace for Israelis and Palestinians alike and brought out that such peace can only be built on justice, equality and freedom. They demanded that the Australian government stand up for international law and human rights. During the first week of June other actions in support of the Palestinian resistance were held in Victoria Square, Adelaide; Nara Peace Park, Canberra; Queen’s Park, Brisbane; and Bourke Street Mall, corner Elizabeth Street in Melbourne.

Belgium

Demonstrators in Brussels called for the end of the U.S. backed Zionist occupation of Palestine. “The Zionists have failed because their plan was to clear Palestine of its residents,” Leila Shahid, the Palestinian envoy to the European Commission in Brussels, told Al Alam newspaper. A member of the Union of Belgian Jewish Progressives also told Al Alam the group will fight for an end to the occupation, the clearing away of Zionist settlements and the formation of an independent Palestinian state throughout the occupied lands with Al-Quds as its capital.

Britain

Tens of thousands stood together in London’s Trafalgar Square to oppose U.S.-Israeli crimes and genocide against the Palestinian people. Palestine Liberation Organization representative Dr. Mustafa Al Burghouti and numerous other British parliamentarians were among the many protesters and speakers. Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh addressed the gathering by video. He stressed the need to support the Palestinian people’s right to liberation, independence, and peace.

Germany

Actions in support of Palestine were organized during the G8 protests and alternative summit in Rostock. These included a large international demonstration in Rostock with a Palestine bloc and various workshops on Palestine. Over 100,000 participated in actions opposing the G8 agenda of more poverty and violence against the world’s peoples. Rallies and vigils were also organized in Berlin, Hamburg, and Frankfurt on June 9.

Ireland

Almost a thousand people marched in Dublin on June 9 to protest the 40 years of the Occupation of the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, and the remaining parts of Jerusalem. On a day of brilliant sunshine, marchers from various human rights groups, trade unions, political parties, and Palestinian solidarity campaigns made their way through the city center.

Spain

More than 20 Spanish human rights organizations and parties in association with the Palestinian community in Madrid held a demonstration demanding an end to the occupation. The organizations called on all institutions, individuals, and humanitarian bodies to monitor and protest the dismal living conditions of the Palestinian people under the U.S.-Israeli occupation and reject U.S. refusal to recognize Palestine’s right to self-determination.

Switzerland

During the first week of June thousands of people from all walks of life participated in a variety of actions across the country to mark the 40th anniversary of the occupation. Actions were organized in Geneva, Lyon, Lausanne, Bern, and several other cities.

Many other countries, including Austria, France, Greece, Norway and Japan also rallied to defend Palestine and denounce the U.S.-Israeli occupation and genocide. Worldwide the united call was heard: End the Occupation Now! Viva Viva Palestine!

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All Out to D.C. June 10! Support the Resistance!

NO to U.S.-Israeli Genocide and Crimes Against the Palestinians!

LDG Commission on Rights

The leaflet below was widely distributed at the Washington, D.C. actions in English and Arabic, with a Spanish translation also done as part of the mobilization for the action.

On June 9-10, people across the globe will come -together to demand an end to the brutal and illegal U.S.-Israeli occupation of Palestine, a heinous crime that has continued for 40 years. The Lackawanna Discussion Group (LDG) Commission on Rights calls on all people to stand against the U.S. government’s backing of Israeli aggression and to join in supporting actions in Washington, D.C. on June 10. The U.S. government is fully responsible for the crimes against the Palestinians because it provides full financial, military and political backing for Israel to carry out state terrorism. We demand that the U.S. act to bring an end to the occupation of Palestine now! The occupation is unequivocally the source of violence and must be ended as a critical step toward achieving peace and security for all the peoples of the region.

During 40 years of occupation, egregious human rights violations, brutal crimes and collective punishment have been inflicted on Palestinians daily. The blood of many thousands of Palestinian people is on the hands of the U.S. and Israeli governments and we will not ignore these horrific killings, as well as many other crimes, such as constructing illegal settlements, massive arrests of Palestinians, demolishing more than 12,000 homes, and destroying more than a million olive trees. We also will not forget that the Palestinians suffered the Nakba or catastrophe, as hundreds of thousands of people were forcibly removed from their homes, towns and villages by the Zionist forces that established the State of Israel in 1948.

The actions of the U.S. and Israel are maintaining Palestine as a colony and attempting to crush the Palestinians’ right to chart their own course. Israel indiscriminately bombs Palestinian neighborhoods, killing innocent civilians, including children. The U.S. government refuses to recognize Hamas, the legitimately elected Palestinian government and enforces an economic blockade that is starving the Palestinian people. The U.S. has defied hundreds of U.N. resolutions that defend Palestine and call for an end to the occupation and uses its veto power in the Security Council to block actions to promote peace. This gives Israel the green light to ignore its responsibilities under the resolutions and violate international law.

As in the past, peoples around the world stand with the courageous -Palestinians. Worldwide demonstrations continue to take place to oppose U.S.-Israeli crimes. The LDG Commission on Rights fully supports the just struggle of the Palestinians to reject U.S. and Israeli dictate and defend their right to self-determination. The U.S. repeatedly labels Palestinians and other resistance movements as “terrorism” and “violence.” But people of different backgrounds know that the U.S. government has a history of acting with impunity and terrorizing people fighting for their rights, whether it is Native Americans, African-Americans, Puerto Ricans, Mexicans, or the peoples of Latin America. Standing for the dignity of all peoples and strengthening our organized resistance to defend the rights of all is the way forward. We call on everyone to go all out to support the actions in Washington, D.C. on June 10!

Defend Palestine’s Right to Self Determination! Defend the Rights of All!

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Our Rights Have to Be Recognized

Ismail Haniyeh, Palestinian Prime Minister, June 7, 2007

A first step to change this catastrophic climate is for the west to engage with the Palestinian National Unity government, which envisages the establishment of an independent state on all the Palestinian land occupied by Israel in 1967.

When the Israeli leaders launched their expansionist war in June 1967 they never envisaged that 40 years later they would still be haunted by the consequences. At the time, they were driven by one strategic objective: to end the conflict by seizing all that remained of Palestine and complete the process of ethnic cleansing that started in 1948. They did not realize the resolution of this conflict would take much more than military superiority.

The occupation of the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, the Golan Heights and the Sinai Peninsula was portrayed as the victory of David over Goliath. For the next two decades the Palestinian -experience was drowned out by the clamor of Israeli hubris. The world paid little attention to the expropriation of Palestinian land, the apartheid regime established by the occupation and the systematic destruction of Palestinian livelihoods.

It was only in 1987 that the world awoke to the reality of a popular Palestinian uprising — Intifada. A new generation had come of age, thirsty for freedom and peace with dignity in their own land. The two decades since have confirmed that my people will not repeat the mistakes of 1948. They will remain rooted in their land, whatever the price, and pursue their legitimate right to resist the occupation. That right is supported by, for example, UN Resolutions 2955 and 3034, which affirm the “inalienable” right of all peoples to self-determination and the legitimacy of their struggle against foreign domination and subjugation “by all available means.”

Israel’s fateful error was to underestimate the resolve of the Palestinians. Tens of thousands have been killed or wounded by the Israeli army since 1967. During 2006, the number of Palestinians killed reached 650. Since the beginning of the Israeli occupation in 1967, more than 650,000 Palestinians have been detained by Israel — about 40 percent of the male population. Today three-quarters of the Palestinian people are displaced, with 5 million Palestinian refugees throughout the world.

With the signing of the Oslo accords in 1993, we were told that things would get better. But life became more hellish as Israel accelerated settlement building and seizures of our land. Meanwhile, the world was fed the fallacy that Israel was defending its “threatened existence”. In reality, it is Israel, through the prosecution of colonial war that has threatened the Palestinians’ right to live in their land. And when they were most needed, the world’s most powerful states refused to ensure respect for the international law that “the acquisition of territory by force is inadmissible”.

In contempt of the will of the international community, Israel continues to build its annexationist apartheid wall across the West Bank. Which western state would, in the 21st century, accept that its citizens be literally caged and locked into cantons?

Undaunted by repression, my people have embraced democracy as a means of struggle and governance. Yet in response the world’s most powerful democracies have imposed an economic blockade against my people, while Israel continues to kill, expropriate and destroy with impunity. The humanitarian catastrophe in the occupied West Bank and Gaza is clearly designed to subvert the elected government and create a client authority that concedes every wish of the occupier. There can be no exit from the impasse without sanctions being lifted and Israel’s release of the hundreds of millions of dollars of our money it has seized.

In the 1967 war, Israel conquered the land of Palestine but it did not conquer the people. And in its attempt to debase and dehumanize my people, Israel has debased and degraded itself before the family of nations. The 1967 war has over 40 years engendered successive wars and destabilization of the Middle East. The increasing mistrust between the Arab-Muslim peoples and the western world is rooted in the conflict in Palestine.

The first step to change this catastrophic climate is for the west to engage with the Palestinian National Unity government, which envisages the establishment of an independent state on all the Palestinian land occupied by Israel in 1967, the dismantling of all the settlements in the West Bank, the release of all 11,000 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and the recognition of the right of all Palestinian refugees to return to their homes. If Israel is serious about peace, it has to recognize these basic rights of our people. The 1967 war remains an unfinished chapter. Nothing will stop our struggle for freedom and to have all our children reunited in a fully sovereign state of Palestine, with Jerusalem as its capital.

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Three Continents Come Together in Cuba

Worldwide Defense of Palestine

StopTheWall.org

In Cuba, the Executive Secretariat of the Organization of Solidarity of the Peoples of Africa, Asia and Latin America (OSPAAAL) called together a Tri-continental Platform in Solidarity with the Palestinian People. The meeting, held at OSPAAAL’s headquarters in Havanna on June 8, commemorated 40 years of Israeli Occupation in Gaza, the West Bank and the Syrian Golan Heights. It formed part of the Global Action Week, “The World says NO to the Israeli -Occupation.” Attendees included Marcos Rodríguez, vice minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Cuba; Oscar Martínez, second head of the International Relations Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba; Professor Rodrigo Álvarez Cambras, President of the Cuban-Arab Friendship Society; and members of the diplomatic corps accredited in Cuba as well as representatives of political parties, revolutionary organizations and social movements of more than 40 countries from Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Latin America and the Caribbean.

The meeting opened with a minute’s silence for the martyrs of the Palestinian struggle.

OSPAAAL General Secretary Alfonso Fraga Pérez spoke to the assembled delegates on the need to step up actions in solidarity with Palestine. He told the meeting: “All those in the world who, like us, love peace and justice are moved by the information we daily receive on the situation of the occupied territories along these 40 years. With the unconditional support of the United States, Israel has built illegal settlements in stolen Palestinian land — 11,620 square miles — to such an extent that today that heroic people lives in 18 percent of the territory of the historical Palestine; it has massacred tens of thousands; demolished 18,000 homes; arrested 650,000 Palestinians, many of whom have been submitted to brutal tortures and other vexations. They have exterminated more than one million Palestinian olive trees and have increased the number of refugees up to 5,200,000, which today make up for 70 percent of the total Palestinian population.”

Ambassadors from Namibia, Egypt, Algeria and Vietnam also spoke of their support for Palestine. His Excellency Luis Cabrera Gonzalez, Ambassador of Nicaragua conveyed a special message of support from President Daniel Ortega.

Jaime Rodriguez of the Party of Dominion Workers spoke on behalf of a number of Cuban political parties and social movements about the need to protect Palestine from the imperialist and Zionist “hawks.”

The meeting was closed by a speech from his Excellency Ibrahim Mohamed Alzeben, Palestinian Ambassador to Cuba. He thanked the delegates for their expressions of solidarity.

The Tricontinental Meeting was the climax of a week of activities to mark the 40 years of Occupation that included poetry reading, talks and film screenings.

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Statement of Bureau of Palestinian Rights Committee

June 7, 2007

The following statement was issued by the Bureau of the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People to mark 40 years of occupation by Israel of the Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem:

This week marks the fortieth anniversary of the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem. Following the end of the June 1967 hostilities, the Security Council in resolution 242 emphasized, among other things, the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war, and affirmed the need for a withdrawal of Israel from territories occupied in the conflict, and the right of every state in the area to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries. That resolution and many others adopted since June 1967 have not been implemented to date. The military occupation of the Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, unprecedented in modern history, continues to this very day.

The Bureau of the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People reiterates that the occupation of Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, is the root cause of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The occupation has prevented the Palestinian people from exercising their inalienable rights, namely the right to self-determination, national independence and sovereignty, and to return to their homes and property from which they had been displaced. A comprehensive, just and lasting peace in the region will remain elusive until the national rights of the Palestinian people have been realized.

The four decades of occupation have brought misery and dispossession to the Palestinian people. The Palestinians are subjected daily to abuse and harassment, collective punishment, the use of excessive and indiscriminate force, extrajudicial killings and destruction of property, civilian infrastructure and agricultural land. The occupation is marked by total disregard for international humanitarian and human rights law and relevant United Nations resolutions. For 40 years, Israel, the occupying power has continued to alter the Palestinian land by establishing and expanding settlements and, more recently, by constructing a wall in the West Bank, including around East Jerusalem. This situation has led to an ever escalating spiral of violence in the area, which the international community unequivocally deplores and condemns.

The Bureau of the Committee reminds Israel, the occupying power, of the need to fulfill its obligations under international law and fully adhere to the Geneva Conventions, as well as to the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice regarding the construction of the wall. Israel must cease and reverse all illegal actions in the Palestinian Territory it has occupied since 1967.

On this day, we are noting with great regret that the engagement of the international community has not brought about an end to the occupation. The situation on the ground continues to endanger international peace and security. It is incumbent on the Security Council to ensure a speedy and full implementation of its own resolutions. The Council should decide on effective steps to protect the civilian population, end hostilities and guide the parties, with the active involvement of the Quartet [U.S., -European Union, Russia and UN] and regional actors, to a negotiated settlement that will end the occupation and result in an independent, democratic, and viable Palestinian State living side-by-side in peace and security with Israel and its other neighbors. Until such a time and until the Palestinian people can exercise their inalienable rights, the Committee will continue to pursue the important mandate entrusted to it by the General Assembly.

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Palestinian Information Minister Al-Barghouthi

Oppose Israeli Efforts to Annex Palestine’s Fruit Basket and Expel Its Residents

International Middle East Media Center, June 12, 2007

Palestinian Information Minister, Dr. Mustafa al-Barghouthi, stated on Monday that Israel is totally isolating the Palestinian Plaines from their surrounding areas and is expelling the residents in an attempt to annex the rest of the Palestinian lands there. Dr. al-Barghouthi called for supporting the Palestinian farmers in that area which is considered the “fruit basket” of Palestine, while Israel is planning to annex it and maintain its closure over the whole area.

Dr. al-Barghouthi stated that Israel is digging tunnels, destroying the infrastructure, forcing the farmers out of their lands and is barring Palestinian residents from different Palestinian areas from entering the Plaines area in the West Bank’s Jordan Valley.

He added that Israel already isolated 70 percent of the areas there, dug an extended tunnel, bulldozed farmlands and annexed lands that include artesian wells in Tubas, Marj Al Na’ja, Al Zbeidat and several other areas and is ongoing with its settlement construction and efforts to expand the occupation.

Dr. al-Barghouthi added that since the beginning of the current Intifada in late September 2000, Israel isolated the Plaines area, closed all roads leading to the farmlands, and declared vast areas including agricultural and live stock farms as closed military zones while allowing the Israeli settlers to expand their settlements before the Israeli government officially announced its intension to build a new settlement in the area.

Dr. al-Barghouthi also slammed the Israel decision to bar the Palestinians from reaching the Dead Sea, and considered this decision another Israeli violation to the basic principles of human rights.

The International Middle East Media Center is a media collective based in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

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U.S. Promotes Israeli Impunity

Palestinians Call for International Pressure to End War Crimes

In a May 21 press release, Palestinian Minister of Information, Dr. Mustafa al-Barghouthi said that Israel is perpetrating war crimes in the Gaza Strip which cannot be tolerated. Al-Barghouthi said F-16 warplanes bombarded al-Shajaiyeh neighborhood in east Gaza on May 20 attempting to assassinate the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) member Khalil al-Hayya. This shelling killed 11, including nine civilians, and wounded another 25.

Al-Hayya, a prominent member of the Palestinian parliament, was not at home at the time of the attack. At the al-Shifa hospital, where the wounded were taken, al-Hayya said: “We will go ahead despite the challenges, despite the martyrs, despite the pain that I am suffering and my people are suffering.” Hamas spokesperson Fawzi Barhoum said the attack was a sign that Israel is targeting “everyone — civilians and leaders.”

Al-Barghouthi stressed that this Israeli crime was not only an attack on the PLC member, who played an important role in stopping internal fighting and building national unity, but that Israel has given itself the right to kill, destroy and target everything that is Palestinian, whether it be children, women or the elderly.

The Israeli Zionists have undertaken a weeklong campaign of illegal air strikes ostensibly in response to intensified rocket fire from the Palestinian resistance into Israel. These air strikes have killed at least 36. The rocket attacks have injured several and killed one woman, the first fatality from a rocket in six months.

Also on May 21, Ambassador Dr. Riyad Mansour, Permanent Observer of Palestine to the United Nations, called on the international community including the UN Security Council to bring an end to Israeli attacks against the Palestinian civilian population.

In a letter to Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, President of the Security Council of the United Nations, Mansour urged that necessary measures be taken to compel Israel to cease its unlawful actions and abide by all of its obligations under international law.

“Such action has become ever-more urgent at this critical time to stop the bloodshed and destruction and preserve the hopes for peace that have recently arisen but that are quickly diminishing with the refueling of the cycle of violence between the two sides. Serious action is needed to help steer this crisis situation away from disaster and instead towards the stability necessary to allow all concerned parties to seize the moment to work together for the achievement of a peaceful and final settlement to this prolonged conflict,” said Mansour.

“The overall dire situation that prevails is the cumulative result of all of the illegal policies and practices being carried out by Israel, the Occupying Power, against the Palestinian civilian population,” he added. “The constant and daily violation of their human rights and the suffocation and devastation of their economic and social life has caused grave humanitarian conditions and the steep decline of the situation throughout the entire Occupied Palestinian Territory. Moreover, all of this has undoubtedly helped to fuel the inter-factional turmoil that has tragically been plaguing the Palestinian people in Gaza at this time.”

Serious efforts are underway on the Palestinian side to resolve internal matters and put an immediate end to the fighting between factions via a comprehensive truce, Mansour said. However, what is sorely missing at this crucial time are efforts by the international community to address the illegal Israeli attacks against the Palestinian people, he said.

“At least 36 Palestinians, including children, have been killed by the occupying forces, most of them killed by targeted missile strikes from Israeli warplanes,” he added. “These attacks, which are being carried out following the decision of the Israeli -Government to intensify its military operations, have been launched against Gaza City, Beit Hanoun and the Rafah areas among others, causing extensive human and physical destruction and further terrorizing the Palestinian people.”

Mansour said, “Such attacks by the Occupying Power constitute grave breaches of the tenets of international law prohibiting military attacks against civilians and the wanton destruction of property. Along with the occupying Power’s military raids on towns and villages, its daily arrests and detentions, its continuing collective punishment of the Palestinian people, including by means of continuing severe restrictions on movement and closures, and its intensifying colonization campaign throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, these attacks are fueling the already-high tensions, constituting further incitement and provocation, and threaten to completely destabilize the extremely fragile situation on the ground.”

In a May 21 televised speech on Palestine TV, Prime Minister Haniyeh called on the Arab League, UN Security Council and other concerned parties to assume their responsibilities to stop the escalating Israeli aggression. He called on the Palestinian people to stand united and remain patient and courageous in the face of the Israeli aggression and plots, saying that the aggression would not sway them from their firm belief in victory and “the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital and the return of refugees and the release of tens of thousands of our detainees in the Occupation’s prisons.”

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U.S.-Backed Israeli Closures and Checkpoints Increase Palestinian Poverty

Poverty has dramatically increased in the Palestinian territories over the past year due to Israeli restrictions and closures, with workers facing continued intimidation and harassment, according to a new report by the International Labor Organization (ILO). “Closures are the main cause of the worsening socioeconomic situation of Palestinian women and men,” said the report.

The report brought out that the number of Palestinian households below the poverty line soared by 26 percent in the past year. About 2.4 million people — seven out of 10 households — live in poverty. Two out of three persons are unemployed with 24 percent of the labor force unemployed in December 2006. The report, based on missions sent to the occupied lands, Israel and Syrian Golan Heights to assess the situation in the territories, cited a 40 percent drop in the per capita gross domestic product (GDP) in 2006.

The Palestinian territories have been hard hit economically by the U.S.-backed Israeli freeze of Palestinian tax revenues and the U.S.-led Western aid cut since Hamas came to power in January of last year, greatly affecting the livelihood of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians.

The report said Israeli security measures, such as closing off the occupied territories and the expansion of illegal Jewish settlements, are the prime factors behind the grim plight of the Palestinian people. “There is territorial disintegration, with a tight network of closures, sophisticated controls and the expansion of illegal settlements,” it said. “Reducing and removing barriers to the mobility of persons and goods within the territories... is foremost among the measures that could avert the mounting economic and social crisis,” said the ILO report. Israel has regularly closed crossings in the occupied Palestinians territories, citing security concerns. The Israeli newspaper Haartez admits that Israel closes the Rafah crossing, Gaza’s only window to the world, to lay pressures on Palestinians.

A recent World Bank report said that Israeli restrictions are dividing the occupied West Bank into economically isolated enclaves, preventing the already sluggish economy from growing and denying Palestinians access to half of the Palestinian lands.

The report stated that Palestinian workers and employers were facing continued Israeli intimidation, harassment and discrimination. “Entrepreneurs, workers and independent producers and farmers suffer multiple discrimination in access to employment and markets,” said the report. It said access to the legal process in Israeli courts was often delayed and “costly for (Palestinian) workers who can ill afford it.” The ILO urged Israel, the Palestinian Authority and international donors to pay much more attention to the economic plight of the occupied territories. “This could contribute to fostering security and moving closer to a long-term negotiated solution to the (Palestinian-Israeli) conflict.”

Islam Online, June 1, 2007

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Provocation Defends Annexation by Israel

Jerusalem: Congress Endorses Conquest

Stephen Zunes

In a flagrant attack on the longstanding international legal principle that it is illegitimate for any country to expand its territory by military means, the U.S. House of Representatives, by an overwhelming bipartisan majority, passed House Concurrent Resolution 152 congratulating Israel for its forcible “reunification of Jerusalem” and its victory in the June 1967 war of occupation.

The resolution, passed by a voice vote on June 5 — the 40th anniversary of the Israeli conquest of East Jerusalem and other Arab territories — states that U.S. policy should recognize that Jerusalem is “the undivided capital of Israel.” There is no mention that Jerusalem — which has the largest Palestinian population of any city and which for centuries served as the commercial, cultural, education and religious center for -Palestinian life — should also be recognized as the capital of a future Palestinian state.

The resolution was sponsored by House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman Tom Lantos (D-CA), widely recognized as the Democratic Party’s chief foreign policy spokesman, and co-sponsored by such Democratic Party foreign policy leaders as Howard Berman (D-CA), Eliot Engel (D- NY), Robert Wexler (D-FL), Joseph Crowley (D-NY), and Middle East subcommittee chairman Gary Ackerman (D-NY).

Israel has formally annexed East Jerusalem and surrounding lands, unlike the rest of the West Bank, which is either under the control of Israeli military administration or the Palestine Authority. No government outside Israel recognizes this illegal annexation or supports the idea of a Jerusalem united under exclusive Israeli sovereignty. International organizations and leaders of major religious bodies throughout the world have repeatedly stressed the importance of not allowing Israel’s unilateral takeover to remain unchallenged. United Nations Security Council resolutions 252, 267, 271, 298, 476 and 478 — passed without U.S. objections during both Democratic and Republican administrations — specifically call on Israel to rescind its annexation and other efforts to alter the city’s legal status. Given that Article 5 of resolution 478 specifically calls on all UN member states not to recognize Israel’s annexation efforts, the Democratic-controlled Congress is effectively calling on the Bush administration to put the United States in direct violation of the UN Security Council.

Control of Jerusalem

Jerusalem has been conquered and re-conquered more than 37 times in its 3000-year-old history. Yet, with the establishment over the past century of clear international legal principles forbidding such military conquests and of international organizations with enforcement mechanisms, there has been a persistent hope that the fate of Jerusalem could — along with other territories seized by the Israeli armed forces — be resolved peacefully and with respect for international law. UN Security Council resolution 242, long seen as the basis for Arab-Israeli peace, emphasizes the “inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war.” Congress appears to think differently, however. […]

An overwhelming bipartisan majority of the U.S. House of Representatives, in a clear rebuke of initiatives [to peacefully resolve the issue of Jerusalem in a manner that defends the rights of the Palestinians] insists that the entire city be under exclusive Israeli control. […]

The United States, like all other nations with diplomatic representation in Israel, has its embassy in Tel Aviv pending resolution of the status of Jerusalem. However, the Lantos resolution calls on President Bush to unilaterally move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem prior to a peace settlement, despite the president’s recognition, like that of his predecessors, that doing so would sabotage U.S. diplomatic efforts and needlessly evoke enormous hostility throughout the Islamic world. In the eyes of the Democratic-controlled Congress, there is nothing to negotiate: Israel is the undivided capital of Israel by right of conquest.

Israel’s Occupation

Whatever the position of the U.S. Congress might be, however, the fact remains that the residents of East Jerusalem never voluntarily ceded sovereignty to Israel through a referendum or other methods; their part of the city was seized by military force. By any definition, this constitutes a military occupation.

To this day, Israeli occupation forces patrol the streets and engage in ongoing human rights abuses against residents who oppose Israeli rule continue. The Israeli government has confiscated or destroyed homes and other property belonging to longstanding Muslim and Christian residents of the city. Several UN bodies, along with Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and other reputable human rights organizations have frequently cited Israel for its ongoing violations of the Fourth Geneva Convention in East Jerusalem and surrounding areas. Despite this, the House resolution commends Israel for having “respected the rights of all religious groups” during its 40-year occupation. […]

Meanwhile, the Bush administration, like the Clinton administration, has refused to raise any objections to Israeli occupation forces banning access by most Palestinians to the schools, hospitals, businesses, and cultural venues of Palestine’s largest city. […]

There is more at stake here than Israeli-Palestinian peace. It is very dangerous, in this era of American military dominance, for such a large majority of Congress to go on record challenging the principles enshrined in the UN Charter that international boundaries be recognized on the basis of law, not the force of arms.

The American public must not allow the Democratic Party, given control of Congress by the voters last November, to squander its mandate by supporting resolutions that not only undermine the rights of Palestinians and the long-term security interests of Israel and the United States, but also undermine important and longstanding principles of international law.

Stephen Zunes is a professor of Politics at the University of San Francisco and the Foreign Policy In Focus Middle East editor.

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