A third of Palestinian prisoners go on hunger strike - IOF soldiers detain 4 citizens including former minister

A third of Palestinian prisoners go on hunger strike
[ 04/05/2011 - 09:32 AM ]

GAZA, (PIC)-- Palestinians held in four Israeli prisons began an open-ended hunger strike on Tuesday.

The prisoner affairs ministry in Gaza has put their number at 2,000, a third of all Palestinians detained in Israeli jails.

They are demanding an end to the prison authority's policy of isolating prisoners and improvements in living conditions.

The strike will gradually escalate, said the ministry's media director Riyadh al-Ashkar. New prisoners will join the strike later because of the effect that will have on pressuring the prison authority to respond to their humanitarian demands.

The Hadarim prison would be the first to join the strike followed by Ofer, bringing the count to more than 2,800 prisoners, Ashkar added. Supportive steps will also be taken at the Negev prison where most of the prisoners are.

Ashkar explained how the strike would progress. The prisoners will go on hunger strike every Saturday and Wednesday in May. The next month, they will boost the number of days fasted to three or four, and more prisons will join them. If the prisons fail to respond to demands, they will declare a comprehensive strike effecting all prisons in the last stage.

Ashkar said the ministry has been frequently and directly contacting prisoners to follow their circumstances. They said Tuesday morning that they have high spirits and are armed with will, determination, and the support of the Palestinians.

IOF soldiers detain 4 citizens including former minister

[ 04/05/2011 - 09:29 AM ]

AL-KHALIL, (PIC)-- Israeli occupation forces (IOF) rounded up four Palestinian citizens in Al-Khalil city and nearby Dora village including former minister of local government Issa Al-Jabari.

Eyewitnesses told the PIC that the IOF soldiers forced their way into the home of Jabari, 51, who was released from occupation jails less than six months ago and took him away.

The soldiers also detained a young man in the city while two others were arrested at a roadblock at the southern entrance to Dora.

In a separate incident, locals reported that IOF soldiers opened fire at a Palestinian car near Samu village, also in Al-Khalil, but the car sped away with no damage or injuries reported.



River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Bahar: Romanin arrest proves Israel in crisis

[ 04/05/2011 - 08:40 AM ]

GAZA, (PIC)-- Deputy speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council Ahmed Bahar has emphasized that Israel's policy of repeatedly arresting Palestinian figures ”has failed miserably”, and that attempts to eliminate their political and social action in the West Bank ”have ended without return”.

The statement came Tuesday, a day after Israel abducted Ali Salim Romanin, who represents the West Bank city of Jericho in the PLC. He was released from Israeli prisons just five months and some twenty days back after spending four and a half years in administrative detention without charge or trial.

Bahar suggested that the arrest reflects the depth of Israel's crisis and the extent of confusion that dominates decision-making circles in Israel.

Israel has failed to curb the steady effectiveness and influence of Palestinian lawmakers across the West Bank, despite all the plots devised to remove them from the community, Bahar said.

The senior PLC official condemned world silence over Israel's abuses of Palestinian elected officials, accusing UN agencies and rights groups of ”political hypocrisy”.

A statement by the PLC's Change and Reform bloc, asserted that the Romanin arrest was designed to torpedo Palestinian reconciliation efforts that culminated in the signing of a Hamas-Fatah unity deal on Tuesday in Cairo.

The unity deal means that the PLC would resume operating in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

For Israel : Hamas is merely a red herring to avoid peace

By Khalid Amayreh in occupied East Jerusalem

[ 03/05/2011 - 10:53 PM ]

Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu, have nearly lost their composure over the recently-reached reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas.

Some Israeli officials went as far as warning that Palestinian national unity was an ultimate red line for the racist apartheid entity. Some of the more jingoistic elements within the Netanyahu government, arguably the most hawkish in Israel's history, demanded the immediate "reoccupation" of the West Bank as if the occupied region were free from decades of Israel's colonialist occupation.

Israel's president, Shimon Peres, the "hero" of the Qana massacre in South Lebanon in 1996, said the restoration of Palestinian national unity made the prospects of peace in Palestine more distant. The elderly certified war criminal didn't explain his explicitly mendacious words. However, one doesn't have to be a great authority on the Israeli regime to understand that what Peres really meant was that reconciliation between the two largest political camps on the Palestinian arena would make the Palestinian people more resistant and more immune to Israeli repression and less willing to renounce its inalienable rights usurped by Israel.

In brief, Peres felt that Palestinian reconciliation would strengthen the Palestinian's bargaining position vis-à-vis Israel.

The more irate but equally dishonest Netanyahu called on the international community to reject and denounce the Egyptian-brokered reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas, ignoring the fact that Palestinian national unity is none of the international community's concern.

Ehud Barak, who bears on his dirty, murderous hands tons of spilt innocent blood, warned that Israel wouldn't negotiate with Hamas if the Palestinian Islamic liberation movement didn't stop "terror."

The fornication with words went on and on and on as Zionist leaders threatened to use an "arsenal of reprisals" against the Palestinians to force them to remain divided and disunited in deference to Israel's interests.

In this article, I will try to refute and demolish all Israeli arguments objecting to Palestinian reconciliation, including the possible inclusion of Hamas in a prospective national unity government.

Israel claims that it can't negotiate with Hamas since the latter doesn't recognize the "legitimacy" of Israel.

Well, Hamas whether inside or outside any Palestinian government won't take part in the so-called peace negotiations which are solely the responsibility of the PLO. Hamas is not a member of the PLO. Moreover, Israel has been negotiating with an often pliant PLO for nearly 20 years and the net result has been a gigantic zero as proclaimed by PLO official Ahmed Qrei'.

Hence, one would have to be extremely naïve to buy the Israeli argument that Palestinian reconciliation would significantly impede any genuine resumption of peace negotiations between the Zionist regime and the PLO.

Israel claims that since Hamas indulges in "terror," which is actually none other than a legitimate duty to resist a Nazi-like foreign occupier that is hell-bent on stealing Palestinian land and ethnically cleansing the indigenous Palestinians, Israel can't deal with any Palestinian government comprising, inter alia, Hamas.

This is again a mendacious and dishonest argument. Hamas, it is amply clear, has maintained the Tahdia'a or calm in the Gaza Strip in the face of murderous Israeli provocations and often at the expense of strong active opposition from a number of resistance factions. Hamas is still painstakingly observing calm in the Strip. However, instead of receiving recognition, the Islamic liberation group has been receiving vilification and demonization, in addition, of course, to murderous Israeli provocations.

A third point. Israel which continues to refuse, rather adamantly, to recognize a putative Palestinian state on the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, is demanding that Hamas recognize Israel, even without reciprocity on Israel's part. This is beyond Chutzpah.

The PLO recognized Israel in 1993 as part of the scandalous Oslo accords, even without obtaining a mutual Israeli recognition of a Palestinian state. However, instead of relating to this unconditional recognition of Israel by the PLO as an expression of goodwill, Israel continued to build settlements, demolish Arab homes and steal more and more Palestinian land, rendering the goal of establishing a viable Palestinian state unrealistic and virtually impossible.

In other words, Israel would like to see Hamas make the same blunder which the PLO had committed and cost the Palestinian people dearly.

Furthermore, it is abundantly clear that Israel continues to refuse to define its borders. Hence, one really wonders how under such circumstances any state or quasi-state would be able to recognize an amorphous entity without fixed borders!!

Finally, Israel argues that it would be very difficult to reach peace with a government (a Palestinian government) that includes extremist parties. Well, in making such spurious arguments, Israel actually sees only the supposed speck in Hamas's eyes, but fails to notice the log in her own eyes? After all, the current Israeli governments is, par excellence, a government of extremists, fascists and terrorists, to say the very least. It is not only the most hawkish government in the Zionist state's history; it is also a government of settlers, by the settlers, for the settlers.

This pornographic hypocrisy on the part of the Israeli government must not be allowed to go unnoticed by the international community, especially by those honest and conscientious elements in western governments.

In light, the world should dismiss Israeli ranting about Palestinian reconciliation for what that ranting really is, namely a ludicrous and cynical attempt to invoke the mantra of Hamas in order to avoid and evade real peace in Palestine, a peace that would consign to history Israeli apartheid, fascism and Nazism.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Mofaz urges Israel to boost assassinations of Hamas leaders

[ 03/05/2011 - 06:13 PM ]

NAZARETH, (PIC)-- Shaul Mofaz, former minister of Israel's military, has called on Netanyahu's government to increase assassinations against the leaders of Palestinian resistance forces after the US successfully killed Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Ladin in Pakistan.

“If terrorist attempts continue in the Gaza Strip, Hamas leaders must know that they represent a target for liquidation,” Mofaz, also a member of the Israeli Knesset, threatened. “This bears unquestionable legitimacy.”

Separately, another Knesset member from the Kadima party has stated that the United States had adopted Israel's strategy in the bin Ladin hit, which is to target leaders of alleged terrorist organizations, “a strategy proven efficient throughout the years”.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Gilad Atzmon: What Are They Afraid of?

UK Zionist network, together with half a dozen Sayanim* within the Jewish Palestinian solidarity network, seem to be strongly united this week.

Acting as a joint effort, they are trying to stifle freedom of speech: they seem to be horrified by the idea that a panel of intellectuals, journalists and an artist plan to explore the intriguing bond between Israel, Zionism and ‘Jewishness’, and thus far they have harassed panelists, threatened an academic institute and have spread lies, smears and defamation.

And yet in doing so they have unwittingly provided us with a tremendous glimpse into a contemporary Jewish secular tribal operation.

And what is at the root of their hysteria? For some peculiar reason, both Zionists and UK Jewish so-called ‘anti Zionists’, insist that discussing ‘Jewishness’ is a taboo which should never be explored, certainly not in public, and definitely never outside of the ghetto.

But isn’t it all just more than a little suspicious? After all, please consider that the Jewish ‘anti Zionists’ operate politically under a Jewish banner; they also clearly carry their Jewish identity with pride; and, like the ‘Jews only state’, they also run a ‘Jews only club’ -- yet they want to try to stop us from questioning what this club actually stands for. They want to take it further and even try to stop us from discussing and grasping what the Jewishness of Israel is all about.

Why are they so concerned about others questioning their ideology, an identity which they themselves are clearly and openly so proud of?

Is it that we are not allowed to question ideologies and political precepts? Should we, then, also have stopped Max Weber from looking into the role of Protestantism in the context of the rise of capitalism? And if Israel proudly defines itself as the Jewish State, then are we not entitled to also wonder what its Jewishness actually means?

And shouldn’t we also be entitled to refer the exact same questions to the UK Jewish ‘anti Zionists’?
It seems clear to me that we do have that right to know.

A few years ago I invented a spoof character. His name was Artie Fishel. Artie was a satirical, fictional Jewish American musician, a rabid Zionist, convinced that jazz was Jewish. He believed that jazz music also had nothing to do with America or Africa. He wanted it back, and thus founded ‘Artie Fishel & The Promised Band’.

Artie Fishel was obviously a parody of the Zionist enterprise: if we can take Palestine from the Arabs, then surely we can take jazz from the Americans.

To listen to Artie click here

The Jewish ‘anti Zionists’ here in the UK were the first to oppose the project. The first night on the road, we played in Nottingham. As the gig finished, a 'Jewish progressive' promoter (who was and still is a friend of mine) approached us. She stood there with tears in her eyes : “Everything you say is so true; but why do you have to share it with the Goyim,” she said, in a broken voice.

She wasn’t amused by the satirical Artie.

We realised that we must have touched a sensitive nerve.

Lipstick-Artie Fishel and the Promised Band by Gilad Atzmon

Jewish humour is based on self mockery; yet it is very clear to Jews where the boundaries of mockery are. Jewish comedians know where to stop. To a certain extent Jewish humour is a very sophisticated form of ‘discourse management.' It is there to define the template of self-reflection. In some regards, it openly admits to a certain level of Jewish cultural essentialism; but it insists that such a phenomena is nothing but charming.

Sadly enough though, I myself do not really find the Jewish State a ‘charming concept’: I cannot see what is so charming about a society that collectively supports carpet bombardment of civilians**.

I also fail to see what is so charming about relentless Jewish lobbying. And when I look at the reality of Jewish political dissidence here in the UK; and when I read about Jewish campaigners harassing a fellow Palestinian academic or solidarity activists ( in the ‘name of Palestine’ no less ) it really begins to make me feel sick.

I often ask myself : what is it that they are so afraid of ? Why are they so desperate to stop us from looking into the meaning of their flag?

I can think of two possible answers:

1. It could be that they may not even know themselves what their ‘Jewishness’ stands for -- but they are certainly clever enough to grasp that they had better not find out: they clearly realise that the concept may turn out to be a 'Pandora box'. Such an answer is consistent with Judaic teaching, for in Judaism, observance is primary; comprehension is secondary. In other words, Judaism demands blind acceptance.

2. It could also be that they know very well what ‘Jewishness’ means, yet they know how sinister it may look for the outsider. Hence they use different tactics, just to stop the rest of us from looking into it. If that is the case, such an answer might mean that their apparent attempt to stifle a debate may be inherent to their conception of ‘Jewishness’.

Yet, considering the crimes that are committed by the Jewish state, and considering the measures that are taken by some elements within the Jewish ‘anti Zionist’ network, the time is clearly overdue for us to look into the true meaning of Jewish ideology -- what does it stand for; what does it preach; what does it promise, and essentially, what does it insist to take away from us (namely, freedom of speech and expression)?

But here is the good news : it is apparent that many Jews, and even Jewish spiritual leaders are now breaking away from the Jewish ‘left’ in order to find a meaningful path into true universal empathy as equal and ordinary human beings. I know that is the case, because they ask to meet me. I know, because they talk to me. I know, because they ask questions, rather than repeating ready-made answers.

And most of all I know because I myself left the ghetto many years ago and I see them trying to do the same.

Panel Event: Zionism, Jewishness and Israel

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=160038250722935

Time: Tuesday, May 3 · 6:30pm - 8:30pm

Location: University Of Westminster - Cavendish Campus

A panel discussion examining Israeli Criminality in the wake of the Goldstone Retract.

Alan Hart, Gilad Atzmon and others

* Sayanim- Diaspora Jews subservient to Israeli interests. Ex-Mossad agent Victor Ostrovsky describes how Sayanim function in “By Way Of Deception”. ‘They are usually reached through relatives in Israel… They perform many different roles. A car Sayan, for example, running a rental car agency, could help the Mossad rent a car without having to complete the usual documentation. An apartment Sayan would find accommodation without raising suspicions, a bank Sayan could fund someone in the middle of the night if needs be, a doctor Sayan would treat a bullet wound without reporting it to the police.’

** At the time of Operation Cast Lead (2008-9), Israeli polls showed that 94 per cent of Israel's Jewish population backed the war and IDF tactics.

IOF soldiers damage Palestinian land in Jordan Valley

[ 02/05/2011 - 09:43 PM ]

JORDAN VALLEY, (PIC)-- Israeli occupation forces (IOF) destroyed tens of dunums of cultivated land in Wadi Al-Malih in the northern Jordan Valley on Sunday evening, local sources said.

They added that the solders deliberately destroyed 30 dunums owned by Mahmoud Anis, adding that the soldiers this time each year damage the crops in the same area in the hope to convince farmers not to cultivate their land again.

The sources noted that the troops did not leave the area after destroying it since last night.

Farmers in Wadi Al-Malih's Burj area are the constant target of attacks by the IOF soldiers and Jewish settlers who systematically burn or destroy their crops.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

VERA MACHT: THE HOUSE OF NASSER AND HIS CHILDREN WAS BOMBED

Sunday, May 1, 2011 at 9:27AM Gilad Atzmon

Thursday evening I got the call. From Inge, my ISM colleague, who is still in Gaza. "Nasser's house was bombed," she just said. "The paramedics are evacuating the family now. I'll keep you updated.” It took about an hour before I knew that all are alive. One hour, in which the images were passing behind my eyes, the days we spent purchasing all vital things for the family, the bright eyes of the children, when they saw their new stuff, the hope we were able to give all of them. We, and all of you who have donated. The hope that Nasser's family equally gave to all of us. Hope that also at a place like Gaza, a place where misery is found everywhere you turn, that also there there is something you can make okay. "I have never seen them so happy", Inge had told me in our last conversation, when I asked her about the children. "They played outside, and looked forward to the new house. "Gaza is not the place for happy endings", I was once told by a friend from Gaza. Gaza is no place for happy endings, I had this sentence in my ears when I got the terrible news.

Nasser's house was bombed. Four times. Four whole times. Everyone has survived, Inge told me after an eternal seeming hour, but little Maisa, 5 years old, and Ala, 10 years, had been buried under the rubble of the house. And with them everything we all had worked for for the past few months. For psychological support, the processing of the death of the mother, a stable livelihood, and above all – for a feeling of security. A little bit of childhood and joy amidst this hostile place. "Maisa was brave", said Inge. The small Maisa is always brave, and in her 5 years she has been through things you can’t get through at any age. Ala was in shock. Four bombs on a family house that is well known to the Israeli military. Such a blatant cruelty turns any sense of right and wrong in pain. Gaza is no place for a happy ending.

But all survived. Traumatized all over again, with a destroyed house, destroyed belongings, but all survived. And that means to look forward, over and over again. Gaza is not the place for a happy ending, we cannot and we aren’t allowed to give in to that. The psychological care will continue. We will build a new house, as planned. We will create a little happy end, also and especially in Gaza.

--------------------------------------------
April 30th 2011 Inge Neefs - ISM Gaza

*Family house shelled: two children, a woman and a man injured*


"I dreamt of my wife last night, she said the day would have a surprise in store for me". Nasser Abu Said (37) is pleased: an NGO has confirmed a 2000 dollar contribution to the construction of his new house. He often smiles, but his face is predominantly characterized with the traces of worries from his daily struggle for survival. I think how good it is to see him laugh, it reminds me of the happy family picture I saw of him with his wife and five children. That must have been shortly before last year's atrocity which has caused for physical and psychological displacement of his family. On July 13th 2010, on a warm summer evening that the Abu Said family was enjoying outside, the Israeli Occupation Forces attacked them. "Five tank shells and
a flechette shell", Nasser told me, again, two days ago, with blank expression. The flechettes riddled the body of his wife, and while ambulances were prevented from entering the area, she died. Her five children, aged 3 to 12, watched her succumb and saw how her body grew lifeless.


In the evening of April 28th, Nasser was still cherishing his dream of his wife, whilelaying in the bedroom, when all of a sudden, the Israeli

Occupation Forces attacked the house at 8:10 pm. Within five minutes, four shells were fired from a tank, stationed by an Israeli base by the border, 3 kilometers from the family house. The first one went straight through the bedroom wall, were Nasser was resting. The second and third shells passed through the corridor where three of his children were playing and the forth shell hit the bedroom a second time.

"It was dark, the electricity cut as soon as the attack began. I was afraid to move, even afraid to turn on the flashlight on my mobile. I was afraid that they would shell again if they would see any movement. But then I heard the cries of my children, calling out to me to get them out from under the rubble. I went into the corridor and saw Ala' under the stones, but could only see Maisa's hand sticking out from under the rubble", says Nasser. "It was terrible. I didn't know where my other children were and feared they had been killed."

After approximately 40 minutes of utter fear, it turned out that Jaber (3),Baha (7) and Sadi (9) were outside with their grandparents and were physically ok.

"Ala' saw how I was panicking and just answered that he was fine when I got him from under the rubble. It was only when the ambulances arrived that he told me of his injuries", says Nasser.

Both Maisa and Ala' had been injured by shrapnel and were taken to Al Aqsa Martyrs hospital in Deir al-Baleh, together with Nassers's brother, Mohammed Abu Said (43) and his wife Sana'. Mohammed has a crack in his skull, a swollen eye and his face is scratched, while Sana' has shrapnel in her foot.

Five year old Maisa, is sitting barefoot in her pink track suit at the end of the hospital bed. She looks pale, but then I realize that she is covered in dust of the stones that fell on her when the shells crashed through the
walls of her house. She puts on a courageous smile and shows me the shrapnel wound in her hand. She's staying in the hospital overnight as she has trouble breathing. Next to her lies her eldest brother Ala , who is
suffering; his eyes flicker around nervously. His face cramps when the doctor pushes his belly softly. He tries to turn his face, but realizes there's another wound in his neck and panics with tears in his eyes. His family members stand by in shock: "They are children! It's outrageous!"

The Abu Said family house is situated in Johr Al-Dik's farming land, exactly 340 meters from the border with Israel. Currently, 14 people live in the house: Nasser and his five children live on the second floor, with his
parents, while his brother lives on the ground floor with his wife, two children and his sister. Other families have evacuated the area in the past decade, because of the danger, but the Abu Said family lacks resources to relocate to a safer area. Incursions with bulldozers and tanks take place every month, while gunfire is heard on an almost daily basis. These bullets pose a direct danger: in the past year, the house has been shot at on different occasions, the children have been trapped by gunfire while playing and their grandparents have been shot at while doing nothing more threatening than drinking coffee and tea by the house.

After his wife was killed, Nasser pitched a tent, a couple of hundred meters away from the house, hoping for it to be a safer haven for his traumatized children. During last month's escalation, he moved back into the house, because how much protection can a tent offer against missiles and bombs?

Once things grew calmer, he and his children spent their nights in the tents again. But they moved out again after the children had caught two big black scorpions by their beds.

Nasser has been lobbying different organizations to build him a new house, because he isafraid of a new Israeli assault. Some of his requests have been negatively answered, but most have disappeared in the NGO's indigestible pile of bureaucracy. "Maybe they will help me now, now my house is destroyed. It's just a shame that my wife had to be killed again; all of her belongings are destroyed in this attack. It's very painful to lose the things she cherished."

*** It always seems impossible until it's done ** Nelson Mandela*

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Hunger strikes in Ashkelon, Beersheba prisons

[ 30/04/2011 - 08:42 AM ]

JENIN, (PIC)-- Prisoners in the Ashkelon and Beersheba prisons have begun a hunger strike to protest the treatment of the Israeli Prison Service, the Ahrar prisoner studies center reported on Friday.
Palestinians held at the Beersheba facility began fasting after several prisoners sustained injuries during a violent crackdown on section 10, said Ahrar director Fuad el-Khuffash.
Ashkelon prisoners refused two meals and also refused to leave to the recreation yard, Khuffash added. He added that prisoners have declared other steps due next week to pressure and protest the treatment of the IPS.
Khuffash said the IPS has boosted provocations against prisoners and deliberately lured them into direct confrontations in order to repress them and to drain their achievements.
Separately, Palestinian prisoners at Ashkelon have announced they are happy after the signing of the Palestinian reconciliation deal. They held celebrations at the prison yard where Fatah and Hamas affiliates distributed sweets to celebrate the deal signing.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

IOF troops use rubber-coated bullets and water cannons to disperse demonstrators

[ 29/04/2011 - 08:06 PM ]

RAMALLAH, (PIC)-- IOF troops used rubber-coated bullets, teargas and water cannons to disperse demonstrators participating in weekly anti-wall demonstrations on Friday in various West Bank villages.

The confrontations with the occupation troops resulted in the injury of one Palestinian child and dozens of participants suffering breathing difficulties as a result of inhaling teargas.

In the village of Bilin, villagers and international solidarity activists participated in the demonstration called for by the popular committee to resist the wall and settlement and marched the streets of the village chanting slogans calling for unity, holding onto the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, resisting the occupation and the release of all prisoners.

As the demonstrators marched towards the apartheid wall, they were met by IOF troops with stun grenades, rubber-coated bullets and teargas canisters. The IOF troops also used water cannons which were used to spray demonstrators with dirty water mixed with chemicals.
Demonstrators welcomed the reconciliation agreement between Hamas and Fatah and considered it a fulfilment of popular demand and a step in the right direction to enable the Palestinian people to confront the challenges.
In the village Nilin the residents held the Friday prayers on their fields close to the apartheid wall and the Imam praised, during his Friday sermon, the signing of a reconciliation agreement between Hamas and Fatah.
The Imam further said after Palestinians achieve unity, they should resist occupation united and confront occupation schemes to confiscate more Palestinian lands and to Judaize occupied Jerusalem.
After the prayers were over the participants marched peacefully towards the apartheid wall raising the Palestinian flag and the flags of Fatah and Hamas in an expression of support for the reconciliation and called on both movements to speed the implementation of the agreement on the ground.
As the demonstrators approached the apartheid wall, IOF troops fired teargas canisters towards them and live ammunition in the air to disperse them. Many demonstrators suffered breathing difficulties as a result of inhaling teargas.
Meanwhile, in the Ma’sarah village the IOF troops arrested Hasan Breijeyyah (41) and a foreign sympathiser who were participating in the anti-wall demonstration. A number of other participants suffered breathing difficulties as they inhaled teargas fired by the IOF troops.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Four Palestinians wounded in IOF shelling of Buraij refugee camp

[ 29/04/2011 - 09:57 AM ]

GAZA, (PIC)-- Israeli occupation tanks shelled on Thursday evening a house at the Johr al-Deek neighbourhood of the Buraij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip wounding four people including a child and a woman.

Security sources told PIC that IOF tanks fired six artillery shells at Johr al-Deek east of Buraij refugee camp resulting in the wounding of four people whose wounds were described as moderate to medium as a shell fell on their house.

Spokesman for the emergency services in Gaza said that four casualties, including a woman and a a child were brought into the Aqsa Martyrs hospital in Deir al-Balah.

PIC correspondent said that that targeted home belongs to Naser Abu Said and that the home lies only two hundred meters from the border with 1948-occupied Palestine.

The emergency services had to wait for an hour and a half to evacuate the wounded until arrangements were made through the Red Cross with the IOF as the house lies a short distance from an IOF military post.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian

Holding the World Hostage

The world has almost become desensitized to hearing horrible news; there isn't a day that passes without being bombarded with horrific reports; of some killed in a street in Pakistan, more are blown up in a village in Iraq, a drone dropped over a wedding in Afghanistan, a child shot in the back in Palestine, a bomb exploded in Libya, a "new and improved" version of an Israeli threat to Iran…etc…etc.

However, some types of news might still have some sort of an impact; the type that catches the eye causing it to flood with tears, the type that grabs the soul by the throat causing it to choke, the type that contains within an oxymoron; the kernels of extinction and the seeds of annihilation, the type that feels like throbbing, suffocating pain running through every cell of the body, the type that smells of burnt death, radiates with isotopes and gamma-rays and looks like dark smoky mushroom-cloud.

For example:

On 28 September 2010, the "Israeli" Newspaper Haaretz reported that a virus targeted a large nuclear facility in Iran

On 16 January 2011, Haaretz reported that Israel tested the destructive Stuxnet worm in Dimona nuclear plant

On 20 February 2011, Haaretz reported a further attack on 'Iran nuclear facilities in Natanz, Bushehr sites

On 27 April 2011, the Iranian Government computers were attacked yet again by the highly specialized aggressive computer virus, Stuxnet, a new generation of software programs that can fail entire production lines.


The German cyber-security expert Ralph Langner, has been working to unravel the mystery of the Stuxnet virus. In March this year, Langner told his audience that the Stuxnet worm could be used as a "weapon of mass destruction against targets in the West"

In his speech, Langner warned of "the plot behind Stuxnet" calling its mode of operation "creepy."

Langner called the programming of this virus a "rocket science". He elaborates: "It's way above everything that we have ever seen before".... The people behind it were "very professional, they knew all the bits and bytes... They probably even knew the shoe size of the operator" he added.

"The virus was designed to work stealthily" Langner added. It was meant to take over the uranium-enrichment cascades at Iran's plant "slowly and creepily" and "to drive maintenance engineers crazy."

"When we started our research on Stuxnet six months ago, it was completely unknown what the purpose of this thing was," he said. "We started to work on this around the clock because I thought, well, we don't know what the target is, it could be, let's say for example, a U.S. power plant or a chemical plant in Germany. So we better find out what the target is soon."

Langner continued to warn of the risks posed by Stuxnet; the virus could be used to fool the operators and to neutralize the security system causing the power plants to blow:

"The idea here is not only to fool the operators in the control room. It actually is much more dangerous and aggressive. The idea here is to circumvent a digital safety system.... when they are compromised, then real bad things can happen. Your plant can blow up and and neither your operators nor your safety system will notice it. That's scary. But it gets worse - and this is very important, what I am going to say. Think about this: this attack is generic. It doesn't have anything to do with specifics with centrifuges, with uranium enrichment. So it would work as well, for example in a power plant or in an automobile factory. It is generic. And as an attacker you don't have to deliver this payload by a USB stick, as we saw it in the case of Stuxnet. You could also use conventional worm technology for spreading. Just spread it as wide as possible. And if you do that, what you end up with is a cyberweapon of mass destruction."

"That's the consequence that we have to face," he said, as he showed a map that marked Western countries with green colour. "So unfortunately, the biggest number of targets for such attacks are not in the Middle East. They are in the United States, in Europe and in Japan. So all the green areas, these are your target-rich environments. We have to face the consquences and we better start to prepare right now." he added



At the end of the lecture he was asked if he thought Israel was behind the attack. His response was:

"My opinion is that the Mossad is involved, but that the leading force is not Israel, so that... the leading force behind that is the cyber superpower. There is only one, and that is the United States. Fortunately... fortunately... Because otherwise, our problems would even be bigger.

Langner, who only few months ago had named an unspecific "hacker underground" as the possible threat; at the end of his presentation, he appeared as if he was avoiding -to solely and directly- implicate the the most likely culprit, namely, "Israel".

He seemed to arguably play down the "Israeli" role behind this threatening danger as he hinted that "Israel" is ONLY PART of the danger rather than it -with all its known genocidal record, supremacist ideology and repeated threats- being the MAIN DANGER and the major concern for the entire planet.

Ever since the catastrophic rape of Palestine and the violent inception of the "Jewish state", by the sheer brutality and destruction that accompanied its illegitimate creation, and by its cruel and parasitic mode of "survival" to this day, many observers speculate that if the "Jewish state" were to face an existential threat, it would act as its biblical suicidal hero, Samson; which means that it would not hesitate to take the whole world down with it

The warning of the dangers of Computer worm and "Israel's veiled threat of Mass Destruction of the entire world is also reiterated in this article

Also, for more updated news about Stuxnet

Unfortunately, the story of the Stuxnet virus does not end there; on Oct. 5, 2010, several months before Japan's nuclear disaster, it was reported that the Stuxnet cyber-worm designed to attack off-line servers via USB memory sticks was found in Japan

Furthermore, it was confirmed recently, by Haaretz Newspaper that in fact an Israeli company had installed the security system at Japan's Fukushima nuclear power

Beautiful... isn't it! "Israeli" company had "secured" the security system at Japan's Fukushima nuclear power...!

What is the best way to protect your sheep? The logic of these days appears to be; of course you entrust them to the wolf.

Knowing the history of this terrorist state that was created by terror, that continues to exists by methods of terror, yet it somehow poses itself as an oasis of democracy, a beacon of morality, and a founder of civilization, that it fools and seduces the world into appointing her as the world's security guard is simply beyond belief.

Analysts have many reasons not to trust such an entity, and in fact some are already suggesting that Japan's catastrophe might be directly linked to the Stuxnet virus and that Japan's Nuclear plant was destroyed by Israeli Security Company Magna


Don't you wish it was only Palestine?!

By its violent acts of hostility and aggression against many sovereign countries, hunting people around the globe with impunity, behaving like a mad dog and acting like a “master” bully, the "Jewish state" systematically continues to terrorise the world and all its inhabitants.

Coercing individuals, organizations, and nation-states … Intimidating entire populations with annihilation... Threatening whole civilizations with destruction....... The “Jewish state” is holding the world hostage… and for what price, what ransom?

The ransom we pay is dear, it is the slaughter of all concepts of justice, equality, compassion, civilization and peaceful coexistence, basically everything developed and cherished by humanity through millennia of progress and evolution.


Should the world give up, bow down and pay the ransom?

Or should we seriously ask the daring questions:

Who will stand up to this monster?

Who will speak out against those mass-genocidal psychopaths?

Who will prevent those ideological-creeps from destroying what is left of our beautiful planet?

Who will dare to act and stop the mad Samsonists before its too late?

Egyptians demand severing relations with Israel

[ 28/04/2011 - 08:46 AM ]

CAIRO, (PIC)-- Dozens of Egyptian citizens demonstrated in front of the Israeli embassy in Cairo on Wednesday demanding an end to their country's relations with Israel and to exporting gas to it.

The rally was organized only hours after unknown persons blasted the pipeline in El-Arish that carries Egyptian gas to Israel and Jordan for the second time in three months.

The demonstrators chanted the people want an end to normalization with and an end to natural gas exports to Israel.

The leftist activist and a blogger, Husam al-Hamalawi, said that the rally was in response to Israeli president Shimon Peres's call on the Egyptian youth to normalize relations with Israel after praising their revolution that toppled Hosni Mubarak's regime.

He said that if the Egyptian government did not cut gas exports the people would do it.
The explosion occurred two weeks after the Egyptian authorities decided to re-consider all previous gas deals including that with Israel due to growing complaints that the deals sold Egyptian gas at low prices.

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IOF troops raid southern Gaza, round up 6 West Bankers - Savage Jewish settlers burn commercial stores in Al-Khalil old city

IOF troops raid southern Gaza, round up 6 West Bankers
[ 27/04/2011 - 10:27 AM ]

GAZA, (PIC)-- Israeli occupation forces (IOF) raided eastern Khan Younis, south of the Gaza Strip, on Wednesday morning amidst indiscriminate shooting at Palestinian residential quarters and agricultural land.

Local sources said that three IOF tanks escorted six bulldozers and advanced amidst random firing then bulldozed citizens' land.

Earlier at dawn Wednesday, IOF soldiers rounded up six Palestinians in various West Bank districts.

Locals said that soldiers broke into two homes in Tobas and questioned their inhabitants after searching them.

IOF soldiers also stormed Awarta village, southeast of Nablus, firing live bullets and sonic bombs in the process. They searched the homes of relatives of Amjad and Hakim Awad who were charged by Israel with killing five settlers in the nearby Itamar settlement in mid March before withdrawing from the village.

Savage Jewish settlers burn commercial stores in Al-Khalil old city

[ 27/04/2011 - 10:50 AM ]

Al-KHALIL, (PIC)-- Armed Jewish settlers attacked at dawn Tuesday Palestinian commercial stores with Molotov cocktails in Kazazeen souk (market) in the old city of Al-Khalil burning down four of them and all goods inside them.

Owners of these stores are Shaban Hashlamoun, Mohamed Al-Shalloudi, Atta Al-Shweiki and Abdelhameed Al-Natsha.

Firefighters from Al-Khalil municipal council tried to enter the old city to extinguish the fire, but the Israeli occupation forces (IOF) blocked their way at the pretext the area was a closed military zone.

Eyewitnesses said they saw armed Jewish settlers in Kazazeen souk dancing in circles, singing and shouting racist chants against Arabs before culminating their revelry with an arson attack on the stores.

"We know the settlers torched our stores in order to expel us from our old city and fully take it over, but they can never achieve that and we are staying in the city even if we get killed," one of the Palestinian store owners said.

"They offered us huge amounts of money to sell our stores, and one of their leaders told us, 'You have an open check,' but we kicked them out and we told them to leave along with their lackeys because our [Palestinian] land is more precious than our blood and they cannot take a grain of its soil," he added.

• IOA to build new settlement outpost in OJ

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NGO asks world help ahead of Israeli prisoner rights suit

[ 26/04/2011 - 05:44 PM ]

RAMALLAH, (PIC)-- The Mandela prisoner affairs organization in Palestine has asked for global backing as it proceeds to file a lawsuit against the Israeli prison authority over the continued isolation of Palestinian prisoner Ahmed Youssef Ahmed al-Maghrabi.

Maghrabi has been detained since May 27, 2002 and dealt 18 life sentences. He has not seen his wife one time since he his arrest. He was allowed a visit by his son who was born while he was behind bars for the first time during the only visit ever by his mother in 2005.

The prison has denied further visits by his now eight-year-old son claiming that he poses a threat to the state of Israel.

Separately, an Israeli court has sentenced an Al-Khalil man who suffers motor impairments in both his hands and feet to eight months in prison for allegedly trying to stab an Israeli, the Tadhamon human rights organization reported.

“When Tadhamon's lawyer visited [the man Nouridden Mohammed Ashour, 32] in the Ramle prison hospital to check his health status, it was apparent that the prisoner was physically disabled and suffered from paralysis in his hands and feet and couldn't hold a pen. So how can he plan to stab an Israeli?” Tadhamon researcher Ahmed al-Beitawi said in a fresh statement.

Beitawi said the Ramle prison hospital has not provided the prisoner special medication and said he has been receiving the same treatment he received in the Ofer prison before being transferred to the hospital.

Meanwhile on Tuesday, Israeli authorities returned a group of Palestinian as they tried to pass a checkpoint in Tulkarem district on their way to visiting family members held in Israeli prisons.

The authorities turned back three bus-loads of prisoner families who attained permits to visit family members in the Megiddo, Shata and Ramon prisons.

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Turkish FM warns Israel against repeating flotilla attack

[ 26/04/2011 - 04:08 PM ]

ISTANBUL, (PIC)-- Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu warned Israel against repeating the same mistake with the Gaza-bound flotilla scheduled to set sail next month, the Israeli daily Yediot Ahronot has reported.

 In an interview with the Sydney Morning Herald, Davutoglu added that it is Israel's responsibility not to implement the Gaza blockade. He added that a UN fact-finding mission has declared that the blockade is illegal.

The Turkish foreign minister further said: “'In the flotilla last year, people were killed 72 miles from the coast, so this was in international waters. The Mediterranean does not belong to any nation.”

Bulent Yildirim, who chairs the Turkish humanitarian relief fund (IHH) has confirmed that the Mavi Marmara, which was attacked in the first flotilla, will return to Gaza with a sequel international aid flotilla running under the same name set to sail late this May.

The move has caused Israel to ask the US and EU states to thwart the flotilla by discouraging their respective people from participation. Israel has also asked Turkey to stop it before some of the flotilla's ships leave its ports.

The Turkish FM said in the interview: ”Turkey will not stop the ships from setting sail from its ports, but it would continue to warn activists on board of the dangers they face.”

The Freedom Flotilla 2 coalition has announced the opening of registration to the siege-busting Gaza flotilla for Brits who desire to take part. The coalition said registration actually began two days ago on the group's website.

The Palestinian Forum in Britain has also added a feature on its website designed to inform about special arrangements made for the flotilla. The site also includes details how to sign up.

Preparations for the convoy are in full swing in participating ports in Europe, North America, North Africa, Asia, South America and Australia. About 15 ships loaded with humanitarian aid are expected to set sail simulateously by the end of May.

The convoy will carry more than a thousand passengers including reporters, human rights workers, technicians and activists.

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Israeli Police Terrorize Palestinian Prisoners (must watch)

Monday, April 25, 2011 at 2:16PM Gilad Atzmon

Mohamed Ashkar, a Palestinian prisoner, was murdered by the Israelis.

There is no limit to Israeli barbarism.



For English translation, click here  then hit the cc button.

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UNICEF: Israeli occupation affecting more than 1.9m Palestinian children

[ 25/04/2011 - 09:34 PM ]

GAZA, (PIC)-- The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) has said in a fresh report that more than 1.9m Palestinian children face the threat of death, injury, displacement, detention, psychological distress, and low educational attainment because of measures taken by Israeli forces in the occupied Palestinian territories.

The continued siege on the Gaza Strip and restrictions on movement in the West Bank threaten the livelihoods of households and their access to basic services, the report released Monday says.

The document confirms that the Israeli siege still exists and that Israel's alleged improvements have not contributed to the improvement of living conditions of the people of Gaza.

It says that although two years have passed since the war, 82 per cent of the damage inflicted on Gaza schools have not been repaired because the Israeli siege has caused a shortage in building materials.

The report adds that the estimated 500 Israeli checkpoints set up between West Bank cities have impaired children's access to schools.

This imposes additional difficulties to the already pressured educational condition, as the vast majority of schools work in shifts, UNICEF said.

The report also points out that the health care system in Gaza is unable to provide services adequate to the population's needs.

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