{"article":{"id":171937,"heading":"Israel's war crimes continue unhindered in Lebanon and Gaza","author":"Arab Association for Human Rights","created":"2006-08-01 20:48:02","modified":"2006-08-02 04:38:06","last_modified":"Wed, 02 Aug 2006 11:38:06","article":"

Israel's war crimes continue unhindered in Lebanon and Gaza

Arab Association for Human Rights, 31 July 2006

Israel's military assault on Lebanon continues to violate international humanitarian law as Israel pushes forward an agenda awash in unabated violent massacres and war crimes. US diplomacy has only complied with these war crimes through granting Israel impunity, thereby giving Israel the impression that it has permission to continue. Finally, it is plain to see that the international community has failed miserably in its duty to ensure the protection of innocent civilians during time of war.

Israel's latest assault on Lebanon was Sunday morning's massacre in Qana which killed more than 60 civilians, the majority of whom were children. With this massacre, Israel's war on Lebanon has entered a new phase. This war crime is also testament to the UN Security Council's failure to impose an immediate ceasefire to ensure the protection of civilians and to halt war actions. Furthermore, if following the massacre all that is made is a verbal condemnation, then Israel can only interpret that as being a green light to assault more civilians and civilian infrastructure.

The massacre in Qana has brought the death toll to over 750 in Lebanon, the majority of who are civilians. In addition, as Israel's crimes of collective punishment in Gaza continue, more than 160 Palestinians, also chiefly civilians, have been killed. The Arab Association for Human Rights (HRA) makes an urgent appeal to the international community to act towards an immediate cessation of violence and for Israel to comply with its obligations to international law.

Lebanon

Since the start of Israel's military assault of Lebanon on July 12, over a third of the casualties in Lebanon have been children. Furthermore, Israel's bombardment of Lebanon has given rise to over 700,000 refugees. Civilian infrastructure and institutions have been deliberate targets of Israel's aerial attacks - airports, ports, power stations, roads and bridges have all been hit. As casualties mount, there is an increasing humanitarian crisis in Lebanon, particularly in the south.

Gaza Strip

In addition to the 160 Palestinians killed since June 25, at least 700 civilians have been wounded by Israeli army gunfire. In addition, Palestinian ministries and educational institutions have been destroyed, as has the plant that supplies nearly 50 percent of Gaza's electricity. Bridges, roads, dozens of homes, and hundreds of dunams of agricultural land have also been destroyed. Furthermore, 27 elected Palestinian ministers, including eight cabinet ministers have been detained without charge.

The United Nations Security Council is the UN's most powerful body whose chief responsibility is the 'maintenance of international peace and security'. However, despite its numerous meetings following the crisis, it has been unable to enforce a ceasefire, much less condemn Israel's blatant violations of international humanitarian law, including the killing of four UN observers.

The European Union also has a special role to play in the crisis because of the Association Agreements it has signed with Israel and Lebanon. Article 2 of this Agreement contains a human rights clause that states, 'Relations between the parties shall be based on respect for human rights and democratic principles'. Furthermore, the EU-Israel Action Plan clearly stresses 'Common values of democracy, respect for human rights and the rule of law and basic freedoms'. Surely, Israel's targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure, and its refusal to negotiate do not fall in line with these shared values.

The HRA believes that the failure of the UN Security Council to protect civilians in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip at a time when serious humanitarian crises face the two populations raises serious questions from civil society engaged in promoting international law and human rights principles, about the credibility of institutions and agreements that fail to stop war crimes against civilian populations. The failure of the EU to use existing agreements (Action Plan, Association Agreement) clearly resulted from a lack of political will by certain member states. This failure undermines the EU's credibility and its position in the region.

Through our work in the community, we receive clear signals that the EU and UN's failure to act and to apply agreements to protect civilians during war has been interpreted as having succumbed to the political interests of powerful states. This sends the negative message that these agreements will never be enforced to stop the daily human rights violations and discrimination that our community faces. This is viewed as a step backward, as people will look for alternatives outside the current system, which will only lead to more violence in the region.

The HRA strongly condemns Israel's war crimes and gross violations of international human rights law, international humanitarian law, and the Fourth Geneva Convention. We stress that Israel should not be allowed to stand above international standards and law.

We thereby urgently call on the EU and UN to firstly, take clear positions condemning the current breaches of international law; and second, to activate the existing mechanisms (Article 2 of the EU-Israel Association Agreement, Article 146 of the Fourth Geneva Convention) for an urgent and immediate international ruling to impose a ceasefire and to enable effective transfer of humanitarian aid to the needy. Third, given recent developments it is increasingly urgent that the UN establish an international commission for enquiry into the war crimes committed by Israel since its assault on Lebanon began on July 12.

In this moment, the want for international action is dire; at stake are not only the lives of innocent civilians but also the credibility of humanitarian morals and international values that have been held ransom by the belligerent forces of international politics and war machines.



<\/p>\n","contact":"","link":"","address":"","phone":"","parent_id":0,"mime_type":"text\/plain","summary":"In this moment, the want for international action is dire; at stake are not only the lives of innocent civilians but also the credibility of humanitarian morals and international values that have been held ransom by the belligerent forces of international politics and war machines.\r\n","numcomment":5,"fileurl":"\/uploads\/","filesize":null,"article_url":"\/news\/2006\/08\/171937.php"},"attachments":[],"comments":[{"id":171938,"heading":"Arab states must repudiate ties with Israel now","article":"Arab states must repudiate ties with Israel now\r\nAli Abunimah, The Electronic Intifada, 31 July 2006\r\n\r\n \r\nPalestinians demonstrate in the West Bank town of Ramallah against the Israeli offensive in Lebanon, 30 July 2006. An Israeli air strike on Qana killed more than 54 people, 37 of them children, in south Lebanon. (MaanImages\/Mushir Abdelrahman) \r\n\r\nThe scenes of carnage from Qana, where ten years after an almost identical massacre, rescue workers are pulling the broken bodies of children from the rubble, break the heart and generate a deep and boiling anger. But it is not enough to point the finger at Israel's war criminal government which carried out the atrocity, nor the United States administration, which encourages Israel, funds and arms it. We must also demand that all those with the power to act do so immediately. \r\n\r\nOver the past two decades, "moderate" (pro-American) Arab governments including Egypt, Jordan, the Palestinian Authority, Morocco, Tunisia, Qatar and Oman have established ties with Israel, their public rationale being that integrating Israel into the region and normalizing it will encourage moderation on Israel's part. Egypt, Jordan and the Palestinian Authority have formal agreements with Israel; the other states various official and unofficial ties. At the 2002 Arab League summit in Beirut, Arab governments unanimously reached out to Israel offering full peace in exchange for a full Israeli withdrawal only from the territories Israel occupied in 1967, allowing it to maintain its hold on all the land Zionist militias seized from the Palestinians whom they ethnically cleansed in 1947-48. Israel is giving its answer to the Beirut offer by destroying Beirut and all of Lebanon.\r\n\r\nIsrael has rejected all Arab peace initiatives, no matter how far-reaching and generous, in favor of continued colonial expansion and occupation. It has taken these peace moves as signs of Arab weakness and as a license for further aggression. The Israeli public (except for Palestinian citizens of Israel) almost unanimously supports Israel's massacres in Lebanon and Palestine, and until Israelis start to feel there is a price in terms of international isolation, we cannot expect that to change. And as long as Israeli colonialism remains unchallenged by supine governments, millions of people will see 'non-state actors' like Hizbullah and Hamas as their best option to protect their most fundamental interests, and the power and popularity of such groups will grow as governments consign themselves to irrelevance. Israel and its allies need to ask themselves why demonstrators are shouting the name of Hizbullah leader Hasan Nasrallah from Cairo to Ramallah to Doha, and stop deluding themselves that millions of people are merely puppets of some Syrian-Iranian conspiracy. \r\n\r\nArab states must publicly break their ties with Israel, not merely as an expression of the overwhelming outrage and grief of their own citizens, but as a strategic message to Israel that it will face total and permanent isolation if it does not change course. Arab governments should also support the growing global civil society campaign for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel.\r\n\r\nDays after Israel began its premeditated rampage in Lebanon, using the July 12 Hizbullah operation against Israeli military forces on the border as a pretext, Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia condemned the Israeli actions. But what attracted attention was their apparent laying of the blame at Hizbullah's doorstep. Egypt and Jordan issued a joint statement on July 14 warning against "the region being dragged into 'adventurism' that does not serve Arab interests." Just the day before, a Saudi official had used the same word when he told the SPA news agency that, "It is necessary to make a distinction between legitimate resistance (to occupation) and irresponsible adventurism adopted by certain elements within the state."\r\n\r\nThe common interpretation both in the Arab and western media was that these three US-allied governments had implicitly joined up with the American-Israeli axis to take on "radical" and popular forces in the region, specifically Hizbullah and Hamas, that resist Israeli colonialism. The Washington Post, citing "senior Israeli and U.S. officials" reported on July 16 that, "Israel, with U.S. support, intends to resist calls for a cease-fire and continue a longer-term strategy of punishing Hezbollah, which is likely to include several weeks of precision bombing in Lebanon." The same report stated that, "Whatever the outrage on the Arab streets, Washington believes it has strong behind-the-scenes support among key Arab leaders also nervous about the populist militants -- with a tacit agreement that the timing is right to strike." ("Strikes Are Called Part of Broad Strategy; U.S., Israel Aim to Weaken Hezbollah, Region's Militants," The Washington Post, 16 July 2006).\r\n\r\nYet as Israel failed to achieve the quick victory that its generals promised, and as Hizbullah fought stubbornly and skillfully, gaining support and respect from every corner of the region, calculations started to change rapidly. The New York Times reported that Saudi Arabia and Jordan which "were initially more worried about the rising power of Shiite Iran, Hezbollah\u2019s main sponsor, are scrambling to distance themselves from Washington." ("Tide of Arab Opinion Turns to Support for Hezbollah," The New York Times, 28 July 2006)\r\n\r\nSaudi Arabia hurriedly announced a $1.5 billion aid package to help rebuild Lebanon and Jordan made a public show of sending humanitarian aid. But the damage was already done. "Tent after green tent stands just off one of Beirut's fashionable shopping areas, part of a field hospital sent by Jordan to treat Lebanese wounded," Reuters reported on July 28. "Jordanian soldiers sit idly in the shade nearby and a peek into one tent reveals the beds are empty. Lebanese casualties are rejecting aid from Jordan in protest at what they view as its failure to press for an end to Israeli air strikes in the 17-day-old war against Hizbollah." A Lebanese worker near the field hospital stated, "They've been here three days and we have seen no casualties treated here... They cannot give the green light for this strike against us and then show up to treat us. We don't want their sweetness or their bitterness." ("Lebanese wounded turn cold shoulder on Jordan aid," Reuters, 28 July 2006)\r\n\r\nHours after the Qana massacre, Jordan's King Abdullah II released a statement which "strongly condemned the ugly crime of the Israeli forces in Qana" The statement reiterated Jordan's calls for "an immediate ceasefire."\r\n\r\nSuch statements are welcome and necessary but unlikely to be sufficient. Israel, as it has shown time and again, is not swayed by words. On the contrary, it deliberately twists and misinterprets them whether from friend or foe. Following the failure of last week's Rome summit Israel claimed it had a "green light" from all the participating states to continue bombing Lebanon. (Although Israel certainly does have a green light from the United States, which is rushing more bombs to kill Lebanese civilians to Israel, this public boasting by Israel was embarassing enough to the U.S. that State Department spokesman Adam Ereli termed it "outrageous.")\r\n\r\nArab states must end their long forbearance which sends the message to Israel that the lives of their citizens are cheap. Action is required no less for the best interests and domestic and international standing of these governments as for the region as a whole. In Jordan's case it would only be exercising rights and responsibilities that are contained within its 1994 peace treaty with Israel and thus could not even be interpreted as violating the treaty's spirit or letter. The peace treaty was supposed to be one element in a wider regional peace that has failed to materialize due to Israel's aggressive construction of new colonies on occupied Palestinian land and refusal to withdraw from occupied Lebanese and Syrian territory. The preamble to the treaty states that Israel and Jordan aim at "a just, lasting and comprehensive peace in the Middle East based on Security Council resolutions 242 and 338 in all their aspects." In Article 2 of the treaty, both states commit themselves to "respect and recognize the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of every state in the region."\r\n\r\nIsrael's continued and deepening occupation of Palestinian, Syrian and Lebanese territory, violations of their sovereignty, blatant interference in the internal affairs of Palestinians and Lebanese, and its mounting atrocities which have claimed Jordanian and Egpytian as well as thousands of Lebanese and Palestinian lives are not only crimes against humanity but violations of Israel's treaty commitments. Jordan and Egypt have a right and obligation to respond.\r\n\r\nArab governments have a slim chance to play a genuine leadership role and prove that their earlier positions were simply being misinterpreted and exploited. Breaking off relations may seem like a small step in the current circumstances, but it is the minimum they must do and it will set an example for other international actors such as the EU and the UN who have also failed in their international responsibilities, siding with the aggressor against the victim and thereby enabling Israel's unspeakable crimes.\r\n\r\nAfter Qana, Jordan's foreign minister Abul-Ilah al-Khatib urged the international community "take a firm stand against the aggression." Amman and Cairo should lead the way with more than words.\r\n\r\nRelated Links\r\n\r\nBY TOPIC: Israel attacks Lebanon (12 July 2006-)\r\n\r\nAli Abunimah is co-founder of The Electronic Intifada and author of "One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse."\r\n\r\n","author":"Ali Abunimah, The Electronic Intifada,","parent_id":171937,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2006-08-01 20:49:58","modified":"2013-11-11 00:43:16","fileurl":""},{"id":171948,"heading":"Syria in the Gunsight?","article":"A Nice Little War\r\nIn the Gunsight: Syria\r\n\r\nBy URI AVNERY\r\n\r\nIt is the old story about the losing gambler: he cannot stop. He continues to play, in order to win his losses back. He continues to lose and continues to gamble, until he has lost everything: his ranch, his wife, his shirt.\r\n\r\nThe same thing happens in the biggest gamble of all: war. The leaders that start a war and get stuck in the mud are compelled to fight their way ever deeper into the mud. That is a part of the very essence of war: it is impossible to stop after a failure. Public opinion demands the promised victory. Incompetent generals need to cover up their failure. Military commentators and other armchair strategists demand a massive offensive. Cynical politicians are riding the wave. The government is carried away by the flood that they themselves have let loose.\r\n\r\nThat is what happened this week, following the battle of Bint-Jbeil, which the Arabs have already started to call proudly Nasrallahgrad. All over Israel the cry goes up: Get into it! Quicker! Further! Deeper!\r\n\r\nA day after the bloody battle, the cabinet decided on a massive mobilization of the reserves. What for? The ministers do not know. But it does not depend on them anymore, nor on the generals. The political and military leadership is tossed about on the waves of war like a boat without a rudder.\r\n\r\nAs has been said before: it is much easier to start a war than to finish one. The cabinet believes that it controls the war, but in reality it is the war that controls them. They have mounted a tiger, and can't be sure of getting off without being torn to pieces.\r\n\r\nWar has its own rules. Unexpected things happen and dictate the next moves. And the next moves tend to be in one direction: escalation.\r\n\r\n* * *\r\n\r\nDAN HALUTZ, the father of this war, thought that he could eliminate Hizbullah by means of the Air Force, the most sophisticated, most efficient and the generally most-most air force in the world. A few days of massive pounding, thousands of tons of bombs on neighborhoods, roads, electricity works and ports - and that's it.\r\n\r\nWell, that wasn't it, as it turned out. The Hizbullah rockets continued to land in the north of Israel, hundreds a day. The public cried out. There was no way round a ground operation. First, small, elite units were put in. That did not help. Then brigades were deployed. And now whole divisions are demanded.\r\n\r\nFirst they wanted to annihilate the Hizbullah positions along the border. When it was seen that that was not enough, it was decided to conquer the hills that dominate the border. There, the Hizbullah fighters were waiting and caused heavy casualties. And the rockets continued to fly.\r\n\r\nNow the generals are convinced that there is no alternative to occupying the whole area up to the Litani River, about 24 km from the border, in order to prevent the rockets from being launched from there. Then they will find out that they have to reach the Awali River, 40 km inside - the famous 40 km which Menachem Begin talked about in 1982.\r\n\r\nAnd then? The Israeli army will be extended over a large area, and everywhere it will be exposed to guerilla attacks, of the sort Hizbullah excels in. And the missiles will continue to fly.\r\n\r\nWhat next? One cannot stop. Public opinion will demand more decisive moves. Political demagogues will shout. Commentators will grumble. The people in the shelters will cry out. The generals will feel the heat. One cannot keep tens of thousands of reserve soldiers mobilized indefinitely. It is impossible to prolong a situation which paralyzes a third of the country.\r\n\r\nEverybody will clamor to storm forwards. Where to? Towards Beirut in the North? Or towards Damascus, in the East?\r\n\r\n* * *\r\n\r\nTHE CABINET ministers recite in unison: No! Never ever! We shall not attack Syria!\r\n\r\nPerhaps some of them really don't intend to. They do not dream of a war with Syria. Definitely not. But the ministers only delude themselves when they believe that they control the war. The war controls them.\r\n\r\nWhen it becomes clear that nothing is helping, that Hizbullah goes on fighting and the rockets continue to fly, the political and military leadership will face bankruptcy. They will need to pin the blame on somebody. On who? Well, on Assad, of course.\r\n\r\nHow is it possible that a small "terror organization", with a few thousand fighters altogether, goes on fighting? Where do they get the arms from? The finger will point towards Syria.\r\n\r\nEven now, the army commanders assert that new rockets are flowing all the time from Syria to Hizbullah. True, the roads have been bombed, the bridges destroyed, but the arms somehow continue to arrive. The Israeli government demands that an international force be stationed not only along the Israeli-Lebanese border, but on the Lebanese-Syrian border, too. The queue of volunteers will not be long.\r\n\r\nThen the generals will demand the bombing of roads and bridges inside Syria. For that, the Syrian Air Force will have to be neutralized. In short, a real war, with implications for the whole Middle East.\r\n\r\n* * *\r\n\r\nEHUD OLMERT and Amir Peretz did not think about that when they decided 17 days ago in haste and light heartedly, without serious debate, without examining other options, without calculating the risks, to attack Hizbullah. For politicians who do not know what war is, it was an irresistible temptation: there was a clear provocation by Hizbullah, international support was assured, what a wonderful opportunity! They would do what even Sharon did not dare.\r\n\r\nDan Halutz submitted an offer that could not be refused. A nice little war. Military plans were ready and well rehearsed. Certain victory. The more so, since on the other side there was no real enemy army, just a "terror organization".\r\n\r\nHow hotly the desire was burning in the hearts of Olmert and Peretz is attested by the fact that they did not even think about the lack of shelters in the Northern towns, not to mention the far-reaching economic and social implications. The main thing was to rush in and gather the laurels.\r\n\r\nThey had no time to think seriously about the war aim. Now they resemble archers who shoot their arrows at a blank sheet and then draw the rings around the arrow. The aims change daily: to destroy Hizbullah, to disarm them, to drive them out of South Lebanon, and perhaps just to "weaken" them. To kill Hassan Nasrallah. To bring the captured soldiers home. To extend the sovereignty of the Lebanese government over all of Lebanon. To establish a new-old Security Zone occupied by Israel. To deploy the Lebanese army and\/or an international force along the border. To rehabilitate deterrence. To imprint into the consciousness of Hizbullah. (Our generals love imprinting into consciousnesses. That is a wonderfully safe aim, because it cannot be measured.)\r\n\r\n* * *\r\n\r\nTHE MORE the nice little war continues, the clearer it becomes that these changing aims are not realistic. The Lebanese ruling group does not represent anybody but a small, rich and corrupt elite. The Lebanese army cannot and will not fight Hizbullah. The new "security zone" will be exposed to guerilla attacks and the international force will not enter the area without the agreement of Hizbullah. And this guerilla force, Hizbullah, the Israeli army cannot vanquish.\r\n\r\nThat is nothing to be ashamed of. Our army is in good - or, rather, bad - company. The term "guerilla" ("small war") was coined in Spain, during the occupation of the country by Napoleon. Irregular bands of Spanish fighters attacked the occupiers and beat them. The same happened to the Russians in Afghanistan, to the French in Algeria, to the British in Palestine and a dozen other colonies, to the Americans in Vietnam, and is happening to them now in Iraq. Even assuming that Dan Halutz and Udi Adam are greater commanders than Napoleon and his marshals, they will not succeed where those failed.\r\n\r\nWhen Napoleon did not know what to do next, he invaded Russia. If we don't stop the operation, it will lead us to war with Syria.\r\n\r\nCondoleezza Rice's stubborn struggle against any attempt to stop the war shows that this is indeed the aim of the United States. From the first day of George Bush's presidency, the neo-cons have been calling for the elimination of Syria. The deeper Bush sinks into the Iraqi quagmire, the more he needs to divert attention with another adventure.\r\n\r\nBy the way: One day before the outbreak of this war, our Minister of National Infrastructures, Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, took part in the inauguration ceremony of the big pipeline that will conduct oil from the huge Caspian Sea reserves to the Turkish port of Ceyhan, just next to the Syrian border. The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline avoids Russia and passes through Azerbaijan and Georgia, two countries closely aligned with Israel, like Turkey itself. There is a plan to bring a part of the oil from there along the Syrian and Lebanese coast to Ashkelon, where an existing pipeline will conduct it to Eilat, to be exported to the Far East. Israel and Turkey are to secure the area for the United States.\r\n\r\n* * *\r\n\r\nMUST THE sliding into a war with Syria happen? Is there no alternative?\r\n\r\nOf course there is. To stop now, at once.\r\n\r\nWhen President Lyndon Johnson felt that he was sinking into the morass of Vietnam, he asked his friends for advice. One of them answered with five words: "Declare victory and get out!"\r\n\r\nWe can do that. To stop investing more and more in a losing business. To be satisfied with what we can get now. For example: an agreement that will move Hizbullah a few kilometers from the border, along which an international force and\/or the Lebanese army will be deployed, and to exchange prisoners. Olmert will be able to present that as a great victory, to claim that we have got what we wanted, that we have taught the Arabs a lesson, that anyhow we had no intention of achieving more. Nasrallah will also claim a great victory, asserting that he has taught the Zionist Enemy a lesson it will not forget, that Hizbullah remains alive, strong and armed, that he has brought back the Lebanese prisoners.\r\n\r\nTrue, it will not be much. But that is what can be done to cut losses, as they say in the business world.\r\n\r\nThat can happen. If Olmert is clever enough to extricate himself from the trap, before it closes entirely. (As folk wisdom says: a clever person is one that gets out of a trap that a wise one would not have got into in the first place.) And if Condoleezza gets orders from her boss to allow it.\r\n\r\n* * *\r\n\r\nON THE 17th day of the war , we must recognize that soon we will be faced with a clear choice: to slide into a war with Syria, intentionally or unintentionally, or to get a general agreement in the North, that will necessarily involve also Hizbullah and Syria. At the center of such an agreement will be the Golan Heights.\r\n\r\nOlmert and Peretz did not think about that in those intoxicating moments on July 12, when they jumped at the opportunity to start a nice little war. But then, were they thinking at all?\r\n\r\nUri Avnery is an Israeli writer and peace activist with Gush Shalom. He is one of the writers featured in The Other Israel: Voices of Dissent and Refusal. He is also a contributor to CounterPunch's hot new book The Politics of Anti-Semitism. He can be reached at: avnery@counterpunch.org.","author":"Uri Avery","parent_id":171937,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2006-08-01 21:35:02","modified":"2006-08-01 21:35:02","fileurl":""},{"id":172008,"heading":"OLMERT THE BUSH OIL NAZI ON WAR CRIMES BY IDF IAF NAZIS","article":"OLMERT THE BUSH OIL NAZI: "Sorry to Oil the Intentional Targeting of Lebanese Civilians and the Crimes Against Humanity by IDF IAF Nazis \/ Likud Terrorist \/ Irgun Zvai Leumi Brownshirts but Oil comes First. Fill her Up ???????"","author":"OLMERT THE BUSH OIL NAZI","parent_id":171937,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2006-08-02 04:38:06","modified":"2006-08-02 04:38:06","fileurl":""}]}