Category Archives: Palestine

Israeli cities ban Gaza documentary film

0,,18585752_404,00.jpg

Pressure from right-wing activists led two mayors in southern Israel to cancel screenings of a Dutch film dealing traumatized Gazan heath workers. The film’s director said people in the cities could relate to the movie.

via Israeli cities ban Gaza documentary film.

East Jerusalem youth find escape in drugs | Middle East | DW.COM | 15.07.2015

Tamer Zakkak, director of a counseling center situated in the old city, claims over 5,000 children aged 12-17 years are using drugs in East Jerusalem. The center, run by the charity Caritas Jerusalem, has noticed that more children are being drawn toward drugs at increasingly younger ages.

“In the past we were working with children, 16, 17, 18, who were dealing with drug addiction,” Zakkak said from his office, just outside the old city walls. “In some cases we are now dealing with 13- and 14-year olds.” Zakkar refers to his most recent case as an example: a 13-year-old homeless boy hooked on marijuana and ecstasy.

Children as young as nine begin on what appear to be harmless legal highs, but before they know it they are craving a much bigger hit, says Zakkak. He is referring to synthetic marijuana. Packed with potent chemicals that can induce psychotic episodes, it is cheap, readily available, addictive – and a hit with the youth. “Some people leave school age eight or nine and start working in the streets, learning from adults and other youth in the streets about drugs,” Zakkak adds. “Heroin is the second level.”

via East Jerusalem youth find escape in drugs | Middle East | DW.COM | 15.07.2015.

ASIA/HOLY LAND – “New” jihadist acronym threatens Christians in Jerusalem

Jerusalem – Some leaflets containing threats to Christians in Jerusalem and signed by an unknown organization calling itself “Islamic state in Palestine” – with the clear intention of showing their affiliation or proximity to the Islamic State – were found on Thursday evening, June 25 in some Arab neighborhoods in the eastern part of the Holy City. According to reports by the Israeli media, in the leaflets the Christians in Jerusalem are threatened with death if they do not leave the city before 18 July, the day in which the feast of Eid al Fitr falls this year, at the end of the holy month of Ramadan. In the message – that also contains threats against Palestinian Authority President Mahmud Abbas – Christians are called “agents of Israel”.
The message of intimidation contained in the leaflets caused immediate reactions by Michel Sabbah, Patriarch Emeritus of Jerusalem of the Latins, and Archbishop Theodosios of Sebastia, of the Greek-Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem. “No one knows who distributed the leaflets”, says to Agenzia Fides Fr. Raed Abusahliah, Director General of Caritas Jerusalem. “Of course the episode has spread concern among some Christians. Some of them ask themselves: how can these fools have come this far?”. Father Raed points out that “Muslims reacted before Christians: many Muslim leaders have condemned the threats contained in the leaflets and said they will be the first to defend their Christian brothers, if something happens.
While many faithful Christians have said they will never leave the land of Christ, where they were born, before any threat”. The Director of Caritas Jerusalem also notes that “these acronyms and such groups are most probably supported and infiltrated by forces acting in the shadows. Maybe now some want to show that Christians are fragile and need some kind of ‘protection’ “.

via ASIA/HOLY LAND – “New” jihadist acronym threatens Christians in Jerusalem.

NCP: G4S in violation of human rights

PNN/Bethlehem

Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) released a statement Thursday night stating that global prisons company G4S has been found to be in violation of human rights obligations as specified by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

 

The indictment of G4S is in regards to its Israeli contracts and was presented yesterday evening by UK National Contact Point (NCP), part of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills). The finding comes after the G4S annual meeting was dominated by pro-Palestine activists demanding an end to G4S’s contracts with the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF), police and prison service.

Chair of PSC Hugh Lanning said: “Last week I, along with other campaigners and shareholders, attended the G4S AGM and listened to the claims of its Chief Executive that G4S was complying with human rights guidelines.

“Today those claims have been blown out of the water with this landmark ruling.”

The ruling from NCP was in response to a complaint submitted by UK legal charity, Lawyers for Palestinian Human Rights, and is the culmination of a year-long investigation.

NCP found that G4S has not complied with OECD guidelines to “respect the internationally recognised human rights of those affected by their activities” in Israel and Palestine. It also ruled that G4S was failing to fulfill its obligations by not minimalising “adverse human rights impacts” linked to their business operations in Israel and Palestine.

As part of its contracts with the Israel Prison Service, G4S installs and maintains security systems in prisons within Israel and the West Bank. Palestinians, including children, are detained in these prisons, often without charge or trial, and many are tortured.

G4S also services baggage scanning equipment and metal detectors in checkpoints throughout the Palestinian West Bank, some of which are also used in the apartheid wall, severely restricting Palestinian freedom of movement.

Lanning stressed NCP’s recommendation to G4S to comply with its human rights obligations, saying, however, that: “G4S’ complicity with the human rights violations being carried out by the Israeli state against the Palestinian people will not end until it finally terminates its Israeli contracts.

“All companies should take note of today’s ruling and be aware of the toxicity of entering into contracts with an Israeli state that refuses to abide by international law and which systematically violates Palestinian human rights.”

via NCP: G4S in violation of human rights.

Al-Aqsa mosque faces collective settler attacks for Revelation of the Torah

His Eminence Sheikh Ikrima Sabri told PNN that the settler groups exploit their religious occasions to break into Al-Aqsa mosque, adding that the situation was becoming more nervous and intense day by day.

Israeli occupation forces this morning imposed curfew on Al-Aqsa mosque and restrictions on the worshipers, preventing them from entering, in addition to closing down the markets around the mosque while the Israeli settlers were allowed into the mosque.

The settlers were escorted by the Israeli police and private units, physically attacking the Palestinians, of whom one woman and one youngster were arrested.

via Al-Aqsa mosque faces collective settler attacks for Revelation of the Torah.

Settlers Raise Israeli Flag over Hebron’s Al-Ibrahimi Mosque

Israeli settlers raised the Israeli flag on the walls and over the rooftop of al-Ibrahimi Mosque, also known as Cave of the Patriarchs, today in Hebron.

The reconstruction committee in Hebron condemned, in a press statement, this measure and considered it a continuation of ongoing Israeli attempts to alter the character  of the mosque and annex  it to the list of Jewish heritage sites.

The committee slammed this Israeli measure as a provocative act and an assault against Muslims in general and Palestinians in particular.

It called on all relevant human rights and humanitarian organizations to take the necessary actions to protect the mosque.

Al-Ibrahimi Mosque is located in the old city of Hebron, few hundred meters away from the part of the city illegally occupied by around 400 extremist settlers, who are protected by about 1,500 Israeli soldiers.

Since 1967, al-Ibrahimi Mosque, like all other Muslim holy sites in Palestine, became a target for the Israeli occupying forces and Zionist settlers, reported the Hebron Rehabilitation Committee.

In 1994, Israel divided al-Ibrahimi Mosque between Muslims and Jews, after an Israeli settler gunned down 30 Palestinians during dawn prayer.

via Settlers Raise Israeli Flag over Hebron’s Al-Ibrahimi Mosque.

Israeli Forces Target Journalists in West Bank | Inter Press Service

Tear gas canisters, which under Israeli law are meant to be shot from a safe distance in an upward arch so as not to endanger life, have also been shot directly at journalists from close range even when the journalists were out of the line of fire.

The rising trend of Israeli security forces using live ammunition against Palestinian protesters has expanded to include journalists as well.

via Israeli Forces Target Journalists in West Bank | Inter Press Service.