Israel to expand settlement projects in West Bank

This file photo shows the settlement of Ariel in the West Bank.

Israel has planned to expand its settlement projects in the occupied West Bank despite international calls to stop illegal constructions.

The new project with 2100 housing units will be implemented in Ariel, the Palestinian WAFA news agency reported on Saturday.

The expansion project is set to be carried out in two phases and the new units will be built in the northern West Bank governorates of Qalqiliya and Tulkarem.

The first phase includes the building of 700 housing units and the second one includes the building of 1400.

The settlement of Ariel is considered among the largest Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

The international community regards all the Israeli settlements across the West Bank as illegal under international law.

Nearly 500,000 Israelis live in more than 100 settlement units built since the 1967 Israeli occupation of the West Bank and East al-Quds (Jerusalem).

(www.presstv.ir / 21.05.2012)

Syria violence spillover into Lebanon raises concerns

Lebanese activists say “No to War” in a protest in downtown Beirut’s Martyrs Square on Monday after residents of a Beirut suburb fired heavy machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades at each other during the night.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed concern on Monday that violence in Syria could spill over into neighboring Lebanon and reiterated fears it could also develop into a full-blown civil war.

Following a meeting with new French President Francois Hollande on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Chicago, Ban said the world was at “a pivotal moment in the search for a peaceful settlement to the crisis” in Syria.

In a statement released by his office, the U.N. chief said he was “extremely troubled about the risk of an all-out civil war (in Syria) and was concerned about the outbreak of related violence in Lebanon.”

Derek Plumbly, the U.N. special coordinator for Lebanon, expressed concern over the latest violence and urged dialogue between the rival parties in Lebanon.

“Differences must be addressed through dialogue, not resort to violence,” he said in a statement.

Two people were killed and at least 18 others were wounded in the clashes that erupted late Sunday and continued early on Monday, Al Arabiya reported.

The clashes involved pro- and anti-Assad regime groups.

The violence erupted hours after reports emerged that Lebanese soldiers had shot dead Sheikh Ahmad Abdul Wahid, a prominent anti-Syrian regime Sunni cleric, and his bodyguard, when their convoy supposedly failed to stop at a checkpoint in north Lebanon on Sunday.

Washington also expressed concern over the killings and urged restraint.

“We welcome the commitment of the Lebanese government and the Lebanese Armed Forces to conduct a swift and transparent investigation of the shooting incident,” U.S. State Department deputy spokesman Mark Toner said.

“And we call on all parties to exercise restraint and respect for Lebanon’s security and stability,” he said.

The U.S. embassy in Lebanon advised its citizens of the potential for continued demonstrations, road blockages and violence during the three days of mourning called for Wahid’s death.

Amid fears the situation might deteriorate, four Gulf countries – Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and United Arab Emirates – have warned their citizens against travel to Lebanon.

Sheikh Nabil Kaouk, a high-ranking member of Hezbollah, hit out at the opposition on Monday accusing it of transforming the north of the country into a rear base for Syrian rebels.

“The opposition has intentionally dragged Lebanon into the Syrian crisis and transformed it into into a corridor and base for armed Syrians,” he told a rally in the eastern city of Baalbek.

Last week Syria’s U.N. Ambassador Bashar Jaafari sent a letter to Ban and the U.N. Security Council accusing some Lebanese factions of “incubating” al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood and helping them to take root along the Syrian border in order to launch attacks on Syria.

He also accused Turkey and Libya of arming Syria’s opposition battling the forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad for more than a year.

Containing the crisis

Lebanese newspapers on Monday morning carried ominous headlines warning of civil strife.

The circumstances surrounding Sunday’s shooting death of Sheikh Abdul-Wahid remained unclear but the state-run National News Agency said the cleric and his bodyguard appeared to have been killed by soldiers after their convoy failed to stop at an army checkpoint.

A judicial official said that 21 soldiers, including three officers, were being questioned by military police in relation to the sheikh’s death.

The Supreme Islamic Legislative Council, the top Sunni religious body in Lebanon, issued a statement describing Abdul-Wahid’s killing as an “assassination crime par excellence” and urged self-restraint.

It also called for referring the killing to the Judicial Council, which is charged with cases seen as destabilizing national security.

The streets in the capital were calmer by Monday morning but some shops remained closed and many parents kept children home from school.

The violence in Beirut’s neighborhood of Tariq Jadidah erupted hours after Sheik Abdul-Wahid and his bodyguard were shot dead.

Police commander Maj. Gen. Ashraf Rifi toured the neighborhood Monday and told reporters that “things will be getting better.” He said police and army forces sent patrols into Tarik Jadidah to “reassure the people.”

The fighting underscores how the bloodshed in Syria, where President Bashar Assad’s regime is cracking down on an uprising against his rule, can fuel violence across the border.

Lebanon has a fragile political fault line precisely over the issue of Syria.

Lebanon and Syria share a complex web of political ties and rivalries, which can easily turn violent. Last week, clashes sparked by the Syrian crisis killed at least eight people and wounded dozens in the northern city of Tripoli.

The Lebanese opposition has accused Assad of seeking to sow chaos in Lebanon in order to relieve the pressure on his embattled regime.

Syria long held sway in Lebanon politics and had troops stationed in the country for 29 years until it was forced to withdraw them in 2005 following the assassination of ex-premier Rafiq Hariri.

More than 12,000 people, the majority of them civilians, have died in Syria since an anti-regime revolt broke out in March last year, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

( english.alarabiya.net / 21.05.2012)

Islamic Jihad: PA detained 5 members

BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) — Palestinian Authority security forces on Monday detained five Islamic Jihad members in the West Bank, the party said,

Islamic Jihad said in a statement that forces from the Fatah-led PA detained Khaled Abu Zeina from his home in Jenin even though he fell unconscious during the raid. Abu Zeina suffers from heart disease and high blood pressure, the movement said.

PA forces also surrounded the Jenin home of Bassam al-Saadim, who is detained in Israel, and arrested his three sons Izz ad-Din, 25, Fathi, 18, and Yahia, 16, as well as his brother Ahmad, Islamic Jihad said.

In Burqin village, near Nablus, PA forces raided the home of Ahmad al-Saadi but he was not at home, the Islamist party said.

Islamic Jihad demanded the immediate release of all its members and held PA security forces responsible for the Abu Zeina’s life.

(www.maannews.net / 21.05.2012)

Children as political prisoners in Bahrain

Zahra J - Believe it or not, this group of innocent children are considered political detainees in Bahrain! They were arrested after breaking into a house, then detained for some hours and after two days they were taken to the public prosecution. Note that the oldest one among them is barely 11 years old. This is a typical case of many cases of abuses against children committed by the government of Bahrain.

(www.europeanphoenix.com / 21.05.2012)

Israel’s prison regime can no longer go unnoticed

The Israeli government could not have contained the outrage had any hunger striking prisoner died.

Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev would have us believe that Israel willingly and graciously conceded the demands of 2,000 hunger-striking Palestinian prisoners in the name of peace, and as an act of good faith towards Palestinian Authority presidentMahmoud Abbas. But neither Abbas nor the Israeli government could have contained the ensuing uproar had any of the prisoners died.

It was only in the last 10 days of the month-long mass hunger strike (four prisoners had passed the 70-day mark, seven had passed 50 days) that it gained visible media coverage. Israeli officials were quick to invoke security grounds.

In a interview with CNN on 7 May, Regev said: “These groups have put suicide on a pedestal and now I’m afraid they’ll kill themselves to instigate more violence.”

“These groups” are Palestinians, young and old, from an array of different backgrounds, arrested from their homes and at checkpoints: students, sportsmen, engineers, journalists, health workers. For weeks they fasted, their flesh consumed by their own bodies, nervous systems shutting down, organs giving way. They were denied family visits, placed in solitary confinement, some reportedly beaten in prison hospital, emaciated limbs shackled to their beds, teetering on the brink of death.

A struggle reduced by Regev to a ploy meant to instigate reprisal.

The Israeli Prison Service eventually approved the prisoners demands — basic rights they were owed under international law and conventions — including an end to the policy ofadministrative detention, ending solitary confinement, and allowing family visits.

Israel’s “Guantanamo Bay” policies

This hard-won victory however, is only the tip of the iceberg. The deeper issue of contention lies in the adjudication process employed by Israeli forces towards Palestinian prisoners, which mirrors that of the US State Department toward Guantanamo Bay detainees.

Under Military Order 378, the Israeli military courts are granted extraordinary powers over Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip and even outside them, criminalizing many aspects of ordinary life. Basic guarantees for due process and a fair trial, the right to call witnesses and not to self-incriminate, required by international law are absent, and a detainee is effectively deemed guilty unless proven innocent — in a system with a near 100 percent conviction rate. These and many other documented abuses are in no way exceptional. They are the norm in a system where all the judges and prosecutors are officers of the Israeli army and all the defendants are Palestinians (see “Presumed Guilty: Failures of the Israeli Military Court System: An International Law Perspective,” Addameer, November 2009).

Those are issues that concern Palestinians who are actually “charged” and “tried.” On top of this there are the hundreds of so-called “administrative detainees,” who are held without charge or trial based on “secret evidence” which is kept from the detainees and their lawyers.

Israel moreover refuses to recognize Palestinians as prisoners of war, denying them the protection of the Third Geneva Convention, to which Israel is a signatory, while in some cases using the “Unlawful Combatant law” to detain Palestinians indefinitely under administrative detention.

This follows the example of George W. Bush, who afforded the legal status of “Illegal Enemy Combatants” to Guantanamo Bay detainees.

And lastly, thousands of cases of torture, using internationally banned methods, have been recorded by Palestinian, Israeli and international human right organizations over the years.

This includes sleep and sensory deprivation, subjection to extreme heat and cold, food and drink deprivation, solitary confinement that can last for years, various forms of physical suffering including breaking bones and electrocution, sexual assault, and strappado, a medieval technique revived by Israeli security agents, known as “Palestinian security hanging” in modern day terms. This method involves tying detainees’ hands behind their backs and hanging them from their bound hands for hours or even days, causing excruciating pain, dislocated joints and the feeling that their body is being pulled apart.

Systematic violations of Palestinian rights

Nearly two hundred] Palestinian prisoners have died in Israeli jails since 1967 due to torture and mistreatment, an average of approximately four prisoners each year. Thousands have suffered illness and debilitation over the years (“On the occasion of Palestinian Prisoners’ Day, PCHR issues a report on Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails,” PCHR, 17 April 2006).

Systematic violations of Palestinian prisoners’ rights have been explained away in the past in the same way as they were during the hunger strike. Again, Mark Regev was quoted by the Associated Press as saying:

“This strike is being led by hardcore Hamas and Islamic Jihad, the leaders of this strike are people who’ve been directly responsible for brutal acts of terror against innocent civilians, people who have blown up people in pizza parlors, in coffee shops, on school buses.”

What a characteristically misleading statement. In reality only 5 percent of indictments of Palestinians in Israeli courts are for causing or attempting to cause death — less than the percentage of indictments of Palestinian prisoners for traffic offences (incidentally, many of which are treated as threats to Israeli security according to military order 378, Section VI) (“Presumed Guilty: Failures of the Israeli military court system (Page 9), Addameer, November 2009).

Another Israeli prime minister spokesperson, Ofir Gendelman, stated on Twitter: “6 of the 1600 prisoners on hunger strike are administrative detainees, the rest were tried and convicted of terrorism.”

Also a misleading statement, taking into account the nature of terrorism offenses as defined by Israeli military orders, which constitute Israel’s legal basis for its control over the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Israel has drafted numerous military orders pertaining to the detention and prosecution of Palestinian prisoners.

For example, military order 101 states that attending protests, waving flags without a permit, sitting in a cafe if the Israeli military commander has ordered it closed, displaying political symbols, printing and distributing material “of political significance,” assembly of ten or more Palestinian political characters without a permit from Israel, and attempting to influence political opinion (deemed political incitement), are some of the offenses considered “Hostile Terrorist Activity.”

Political parties, those under the Palestine Liberation Organization, with which Israel signed a peace deal in 1993, and others, are illegal. It is an act of terror to associate with members of “illegal” parties. It is illegal to invite them into your home, be present at their functions, be in possession of their literature, et cetera. Israel currently holds 27 democratically-elected Palestinian members of parliament in administrative detention, among thousands of activists and political figures.

Section 3 of military order 378 criminalizes affiliation to any group any of whose members committed or plans to commit a security offense. Moreover, so much as talking to someone Israel merely suspects could be its enemy, immediate relatives included, is a crime.

Another clause states that an Israeli soldier can order any townsperson or villager to remove obstructions in the road, including nails and glass. It is a criminal offense to refuse.

This order also allows Israel to prosecute Palestinians who commit offenses inside the West Bank and Gaza Strip..

Military order 1650, among other things, criminalizes what is defined as “infiltration,” which includes the presence of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip in the West Bank without an Israeli-issued permit, including those born in the West Bank but have a registered address in Gaza. The culprit can face up to twenty years in jail.

Given the wide range of Palestinian political, civic, cultural and social activities criminalized by Israeli military orders, it makes sense that 90 percent out of all Palestinian prisoners who are charged are convicted.

No longer going unnoticed

In his CNN interview, Israeli spokesperson Mark Regev said, “Israel gives our prisoners treatment above and beyond what international standards demands we give, if you look at some of their demands it is really for the extras above and beyond what international law requires.”

This statement bears no semblance to the truth. Denial of the appalling conditions of imprisonment endured by Palestinians, and reported by organizations such as theInternational Committee of the Red Cross, raises doubts concerning Israel’s commitment to improving these conditions as stipulated by the prisoners’ agreement.

Israel’s military “justice” system further propagates the definition of what Palestinian right should be, according to parameters and rhetoric that have proved time and again to be fabricated and no longer relevant.

Lucky enough, Israel’s unjust treatment of Palestinian prisoners is no longer going unnoticed.

Safa Joudeh is a freelance broadcast journalist and writer from the Gaza Strip, reporting from Gaza and Egypt. Follow her on Twitter (@SafaJoudeh).

(electronicintifada.net / 21.05.2012)

Netanyahu: ‘Fatal mistake’ to concede sacred sites

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (R) and Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat arrive to a special cabinet meeting marking Jerusalem Day at Ammunition Hill in Jerusalem May 20, 2012.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday it would be a “fatal mistake” ever to give up control over Jerusalem’s holy sites.

His remarks, in a parliamentary speech, went a little further than Israel’s longtime policy of viewing Jerusalem, a city at the heart of Middle East conflict, as its “indivisible capital”.

Addressing a debate marking 45 years since Israel captured and annexed the city’s eastern sector, in a move never recognized internationally, Netanyahu said:

“Whoever proposes we take the heart of Jerusalem, the Temple Mount, and take it out of our hands, and that this would bring about peace, I say not only is this a mistake but a fatal mistake.”

Netanyahu said that sites holy to Judaism, Islam and Christianity enjoyed a “wonder of inter-religious peace that is maintained thanks to Jerusalem’s unity under Israeli sovereignty.”

“The Temple Mount is in our hands and … it shall remain in our hands,” Netanyahu added.

The Temple Mount, a site in Jerusalem’s old walled city, is revered by Jews as the place where two biblical temples once stood. The area also houses two of Islam’s holiest shrines, the al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock.

Israel denies millions of Palestinians access to the city’s Muslim and Christian holy sites.

Palestinians want east Jerusalem as capital of a future state in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, territory Israel also captured in a 1967 war.

Western-sponsored negotiations hit deadlock months ago in a dispute over Jewish settlement building in the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem.

In a related development, Israel’s parliament passed a law on Monday granting tax incentives to organizations seen as encouraging settlement in Israel and occupied territory, in addition to tax breaks already offered to settlers in the past.

(www.maannews.net / 21.05.2012)

Dutch officials, people discriminate against Muslims: Poll

File photo shows a police officer in Oslo, Norway taking down the details of a Muslim woman.

A recent opinion poll indicates widespread religious intolerance against the Muslim community in the Netherlands.

The survey conducted by Maurice De Hond pollster found more than half of Muslim immigrants in the country complain about religious discrimination.

Fifty-eight percent of the respondents believed that the behavior of the Dutch government and people to Muslims is discriminatory in comparison to immigrants of other religions.

Two percent of the participants said they did not know whether such discrimination exists while 40 percent said the government and people of the Netherlands treated Muslim immigrants fairly.

The poll questioned 700 Muslim adults face-to-face and by the telephone from April 22-25, 2012 and was published on May 4.

The Muslim community in the Netherlands comprises mostly of workers from Morocco and Turkey who have moved to the European nation through legal channels.

The foreigners are normally granted Dutch citizenship after a five-year-long stay in the country, and enjoy the right to take part in local elections.

Muslim immigrants, however, seldom take an active role in elections due to the discriminatory behavior of the Dutch public and government.

On April 24, Amnesty International released a report, criticizing the Netherlands for discrimination against Muslims, particularly when it comes to education and the labor market.

Belgium, France, Spain and Switzerland have also come under fire over the issue. Switzerland has banned the construction of minarets, while schools in Belgium, France and Spain have banned religious and cultural symbols, including the headscarf.

According to Amnesty, these bans conflict with the principles of freedom of expression and freedom of religion and run counter to European anti-discrimination legislation.

(www.presstv.ir / 21.05.2012)

De islamitische utopie

Elke dag lees ik islamitische teksten voorbij komen waarin de utopische gedachten van de islam beschreven worden. Men schrijft over hoe de islam geweldig is, hoe prachtig de islamitische gemeenschap er uit ziet die volgens de Koran handelt en de vrede op aarde die de islam kan brengen… Je mag de rest zelf invullen.

In feite ben ik die retoriek al jarenlang meer dan zat. Op een of andere manier willen moslims niet beseffen dat ze in grote problemen zitten en dat de oplossing niet in het beschrijven van de utopie van de islam te vinden is, maar dat ze de realiteit onder hun ogen moeten zien en van daaruit naar een de oplossing moeten werken. Mensen overtuig je niet door middel van het vertellen hoe geweldig de islam is. Zeker niet als mensen met hun hoofd ergens anders zitten. Vooral een moslim met problemen, zoals gezinssproblemen of financiele problemen en dergelijk, die kan je niet opvrolijken met het beloven van het paradijs of hem te bestormen met teksten uit de Koran om vervolgens te verwachten dat hij dan de oplossing heeft gevonden. Wie nog niet begrijpt wat ik tot nu toe heb gezegd verwijs ik naar mijn eerder artikel:

Gebrek aan emotionele ontwikkeling staat moslims in de weg

Wij moslims hebben te kampen met een hoop problemen in zowel Nederland als in de rest van de moslimwereld die hoogdringend vereisen dat we actie moeten ondernemen in plaats van lezingen te geven die te veel accent leggen op het theoretische beeld van de islam.

De vraag die wij onszelf moeten stellen is: is de islam een religie van realiteit of een religie van idealisme? Het antwoord hierop is natuurlijk de realiteit. Maar toch als we elkaar onderwijzen, zonder enig besef, leggen wij nadruk meer op het ideale beeld van de islam, dan op de toestand van de moslims waarin ze zitten. Als je goed stil zou staan naar al die moslimactiviteiten die vandaag de dag worden verricht, dan merk je al gauw dat waarschijnlijk de meesten meer bezig zijn met dromen dan daadwerkelijk onderwerpen aankaarten die gericht zijn tot het aanpakken van de problemen.

Begrijp me niet verkeerd. Ik zeg niet dat de activiteiten die moslims verrichten fout of verkeerd zijn, integendeel. Waar ik me zorgen over maak is dat we te veel een eenrichtingsverkeer volgen. Laten we meer accent leggen op de problemen die er zijn. Geen mooi weer spelen. Niet alleen onderwerpen behandelen die alleen maar vrolijk overkomen. Ieder moslim weet inmiddels dat de islam een geweldige religie is, maar zijn probleem is niet het geloven daarin. Zijn probleem is dat hij de utopie van de islam die je hem preekt, niet weet te relateren met het gene waar hij zelf mee zit. De problemen van de moslimgemeenschap los je niet op, door ze te roepen naar de moskee te gaan om te bidden. Het woordje al-iemaan (God’s bestaan beseffen) is geen toverdrankje dat je denkt een moslim daarmee te kunnen betoveren en verwachten dat hij opeens gelukkig wordt.

Hoe vaak wel niet kwam ik dit soort retoriek tegen? Waarin wordt verteld tegen iemand dat als hij gewoon al-iemaan heeft, bidt en komt de zuilen van de islam na et cetera, dat dan voorspoed hem zal treffen en dat alles weer goed komt. Dit zie ik niet anders dan valse hoop geven die bij velen uiteindelijk enkel leidt tot teleurstelling in hun eigen medegelovigen en weleens zelfs het vertrouwen opgeven in hun geloof,  waardoor ze niet meer praktiserend worden of niet meer bewust leven naar het geloof.

Voorwaar, God verandert de toestand van een volk niet, totdat zij zichzelf veranderen (Koran 13: 11)

De verandering moet duidelijk van binnenuit komen en dat krijgen we pas voor elkaar als we onze tekortkomingen erkennen. Dat doen we als we zelfkritisch zijn in plaats van mooi weer te spelen. Vertellen hoe geweldig de islam is, is goed, maar er is meer nodig dan dat. Bespreek meer de toestanden waarin individuen of  waarin moslims in het algemeen zitten om te werken aan het oplossen van de echte problemen die er toe doen. Wij romantiseren de islam meer dan hoe het in de werkelijkheid aan toe gaat.

Om je een concreet voorbeeld te geven van wat ik bedoel, zie dit artikel Moslims Ontwaak!. Ik geef het als voorbeeld om te laten zien waar het o.a. omgaat als het komt tot wereldproblemen. Maar een ander voorbeeld is simpelweg op lokaal niveau, zoals het aanpakken van de jeugdproblematiek en de jeugdcriminaliteit vanuit een islamitische perspectief. Hoeveel imams of moskeebesturen of moslimactivisten of islamitische organisaties hebben aangeklopt bij de overheid voor samenwerking? Is het niet te triest voor woorden dat ik meer (salafistische) teksten tegenkom waarin wordt gewaarschuwd voor vriendschap met ongelovigen, dan teksten waarin we elkaar zouden moeten aansporen voor samenwerking en het streven naar het gene wat in het belang is van de gehele bevolking?

Wees realistisch en niet idealistisch!

(badryouyou.wordpress.com / 21.05.2012)