Gaza fishermen refuse return of confiscated ships stripped of motors, equipment

After extensive correspondence between Palestinian human rights groups and the Israeli authorities, Israel agreed to return several fishing vessels confiscated off the coast of Gaza.

On 2 August, Israel brought the stolen ships to the Karem Abu Salem crossing with Gaza to return the ships to their owners. However, the boats had been stripped of their motors and fishing equipment; in some cases the missing equipment was worth thousands of dollars.

Israel also attempted to charge the boat owners for transportation fees to the Karem Abu Salem crossing — therefore the Palestinian fishermen refused the Israeli receipts for their vessels and returned to Gaza without their ships.

The Palestinian rights groups Adalah and Al Mezan released a statement on 4 August explaining that the returned boats had been confiscated from eight fishermen over the course of 18 months. The full statement by the rights groups is below.

The Electronic Intifada has continuously covered Israel’s repeated attacks on Gaza fishermen and the fishing industry. Israel has arrested fishermen, shot them dead and more recently attacked a small ship carrying human rights observers monitoring Israel’s harassment of fishermen.

In addition to physically attacking Gaza fishermen, Israel has prevented them from rightfully accessing deep sea waters — decimating the fishing industry, robbing Palestinians in Gaza of self-sufficiency and depriving Palestinians in Gaza from an affordable source of protein.

Israel’s attacks on the Gaza fishing industry takes place in the wider context of its systematic decimation of Gaza’s economy, through denying exports from the besieged territory, and through the bombardment of agricultural areas.

The full statement by Adalah and Al Mezan follows:

4 August 2011

Israeli Navy Releases Boats Confiscated from Gaza Fishermen without Equipment and Large Motors; Fishermen Refuse to take Boats

Adalah and Al Mezan continue to work intensively to secure the return of the boats and equipment belonging to fishermen from the Gaza Strip following its undue confiscation by the Israeli navy. The two human rights organizations are following the cases of eight fishermen whose boats were confiscated over the past 18 months

On 1 August 2011, after extensive correspondence, Adalah received a written response from the Israeli military prosecutor for the Israeli navy informing it that dozens of fishermen from Gaza would be permitted to go to the Karem Abu Salem (Kerem Shalom) crossing to collect small fishing boats (hasakat) that were confiscated from them by the Israeli navy over the course of the past 18 months. However, the military prosecutor also informed Adalah that any outboard motors over 25 horsepower on the boats had been dismantled and would not be returned to their owners, on the pretext that there was a legal prohibition against the export of such engines to Gaza.

When the fishermen arrived at the crossing to collect their boats on 2 August 2011, they were further shocked to discover that all they were given were the empty hulls of the fishing boats: in addition to larger motors, all of the fishing equipment and supplies that were onboard had been removed, in some cases worth tens of thousands of shekels. For example, on 26 April 2010, the Israeli navy raided the fishing boat of fisherman Mr. Fayyad Murtaji along the Gaza coast, arrested him and other people who were present on the boat, and impounded his vessel. The navy released the men soon afterwards but kept the fishing boat and equipment, which included fishing nets worth more than NIS 13,000 shekels, an outboard motor worth NIS 21,500, diving suits, fishing tackle, and search lighting, together worth thousands of shekels.

Furthermore, the fishermen were then required to pay the transportation fees for moving the boats from Israel to the Karem Abu Salem crossing, at a cost of between NIS 3,500 and 5,000 each. In addition, the fishermen are expected to pay for the transportation of the boats from the landlocked crossing to seaports. All the fishermen refused to take receipt of their boats and returned home without them.

The military prosecutor’s response follows extensive legal correspondence between Adalah - on behalf of the fishermen and Al Mezan Center for Human Rights - and the Office of the Navy Prosecutor over the past 10 months. In the correspondence, Adalah Attorney Fatmeh El-‘Ajou rejected the navy’s claims that the confiscation of the boats came in response to violations of security restrictions and for sailing in a closed military zone, arguing that the boats were impounded within the maritime areas of the Gaza Strip in permitted fishing zones.

As Adalah emphasized in a letter dated 20 July 2011, the refusal to permit the import of 25- horsepower outboard motors to Gaza on the basis of the Defense Export Control Law - 2007, which prevents the export of security equipment from Israel into the Gaza Strip - was illegal in these cases, which entail the return of illegally-seized goods from the Gaza Strip and not exported goods.

The military prosecutor for the Israeli navy conditioned the return of the fishing boats on written commitments from the fishermen that they would observe “the security restrictions in the maritime zone off the coast of Gaza and the orders of the Israeli army not to violate the security restrictions,” and “forfeit their right to compensation as a result of the lengthy duration of the impounding of the fishing boats.”

Adalah further argued, in a letter dated 8 September 2010, that the impounding of the fishing boats and the conditions imposed by the Israeli navy constituted a grave violation of the rights of Gaza residents to occupation and property under both Israeli domestic law and international law.

Attorney Mervat An Nahhal of Al Mezan stated that the confiscation of the fishing boats from Gaza comes within the broader context of the Israeli maritime blockade on the Strip, which is imposed by force of arms by the Israeli navy. Fishermen are exposed to serious rights violations that tread on their dignity and undermine their ability to work, even while fishing in permitted areas. Dozens of fishermen have been killed, injured and detained, their property has been illegally seized, and many of them have been driven into poverty and unemployment. Attorney An Nahhal argued that these practices constitute grave violations of international law, and form part of the collective punishment that is imposed on Gaza. They further violate the prohibition on targeting civilians and their livelihoods in the context of Occupation and armed conflict. She further stated that Adalah and Al Mezan would continue to work together on these cases to gain justice for the fishermen.

http://electronicintifada.net/blog/maureen/gaza-fishermen-refuse-return-confiscated-ships-stripped-motors-equipment

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Robert Fisk in Manama: Bahrain – an uprising on the verge of revolution

B

ahrain is not Egypt. Bahrain is not Tunisia. And Bahrain is not Libya or Algeria or Yemen. True, the tens of thousands gathering again yesterday at the Pearl roundabout – most of them Shia but some of them Sunni Muslims – dressed themselves in Bahraini flags, just as the Cairo millions wore Egyptian flags in Tahrir Square.

But this miniature sultanist kingdom is not yet experiencing a revolution. The uprising of the country's 70 per cent – or is it 80 per cent? – Shia population is more a civil rights movement than a mass of republican rebels, but Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa had better meet their demands quickly if he doesn't want an insurrection.

Indeed, the calls for an end to the entire 200-year-old Khalifa family rule in Bahrain are growing way ahead of the original aims of this explosion of anger: an elected prime minister, a constitutional monarchy, an end to discrimination. The cries of disgust at the Khalifas are much louder, the slogans more incendiary; and the vast array of supposedly opposition personalities talking to the Crown Prince is far behind the mood of the crowds who were yesterday erecting makeshift homes – tented, fully carpeted, complete with tea stalls and portable lavatories – in the very centre of Manama. The royal family would like them to leave but they have no intention of doing so. Yesterday, thousands of employees of the huge Alba aluminium plant marched to the roundabout to remind King Hamad and the Crown Prince that a powerful industrial and trade union movement now lies behind this sea of largely Shia protesters.

Yet Crown Prince Salman talks more about stability, calm, security and "national cohesion" than serious electoral and constitutional reform. Is he trying to "do a Mubarak" and make promises – genuine ones for the moment, perhaps, but kingly pledges do tend to fade with "stability" and time – which will not be met?

In an interview with CNN, he acknowledged the Belfast parallels, exclaiming that "what we don't want to do, like in Northern Ireland, is to descend into militia warfare or sectarianism". But the crazed shooting of the Bahraini army on Thursday evening – 50 wounded, three critically, one already pronounced brain dead – was a small-size Bloody Sunday and it didn't take long for the original civil rights movement in Northern Ireland to be outrun by a new IRA. Clearly, the royal family has been shocked at the events of the last week. Sultan al-Khalifa's admission that "this is not the Bahrain I know, I never thought I would see the day that something like this would happen" proves as much. But his words suggest that this huge manifestation of public fury was merely provoked by television pictures of the Tunisian and Egyptian revolutions. For the record, the Shia rebellion against the country's Sunni rulers has been going on for years, with hundreds of political prisoners tortured in four prisons in and around Manama, their tormentors often from the Jordanian army – just as many Bahraini soldiers come from the Punjab and Baluchistan in Pakistan. Yesterday, there were repeated demands for the release of political prisoners, banners carrying photographs of young men who are still in jail years after their original sentencing: they run into the hundreds.

Then there are the disturbing stories of the refrigerated trucks which reportedly took dozens of corpses for secret burial, perhaps in Saudi Arabia. These could be part of the carapace of rumour that has settled over the events of the past few days, but now some of the names of the disappeared – men who were present at the shootings near the Pearl roundabout last week – are known.

Twelve of their names have just been released. So where is 14-year-old Ahmed Salah Issa, Hossein Hassan Ali, aged 18, Ahmed Ali Mohsen, 25 and Badria Abda Ali, a woman of unknown age? And where is Hani Mohamed Ali, 27, Mahdi al-Mahousi, 24, Mohamed Abdullah, 18, Hamed Abdullah al-Faraj, 21, Fadel Jassem, 45, and Hossein Salman, 48? English residents of a nearby apartment block were warned before the shooting that if they took photographs of the soldiers, they would be shot.

Matar Ibrahim, one of 18 Bahrain Shia MPs, agrees that there is an increasing gap now between demonstrators and the official political opposition that is being sought out by Crown Prince Salman.

"We are waiting for an initiative from the Crown Prince," he told me. "He has not mentioned reform or constitutional monarchy and a fully elected parliament. If people have a properly elected government, including the prime minister, they will blame their representatives if things go wrong. Now, they blame the King.

"What we are suggesting is a removal of the barriers between the people and the ruling family. When Hillary Clinton came to Bahrain, I told her that we don't want to see the US 5th Fleet in Bahrain [its military headquarters] as an obstacle to change, but currently, Bahrain is the worst strategic ally for the US."

The head of the Alba factory trade union, Ali Bin Ali – who is a Sunni – warned that his members could go on strike if they wanted to. "Now that people have been shot down on the roads, we will be political," he said.

Which, of course, is not what the Crown Prince wants to hear.

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Libya protests: 140 'massacred' as Gaddafi sends in snipers to crush dissent

Snipers shot protesters, artillery and helicopter gunships were used against crowds of demonstrators, and thugs armed with hammers and swords attacked families in their homes as the Libyan regime sought to crush the uprising.

"Dozens were killed ... We are in the midst of a massacre here," a witness told Reuters. The man said he helped take victims to hospital in Benghazi.

Libyan Muslim leaders told security forces to stop killing civilians, responding to a spiralling death toll from unrest which threatens veteran leader Muammar Gaddafi's authority.

Mourners leaving a funeral for protesters in the eastern city of Benghazi came under fire, killing at least 15 people and wounding many more. A hospital official said one of those who died was apparently struck on the head by an anti-aircraft missile, and many had been shot in the head and chest.

The hospital was overwhelmed and people were streaming to the facility to donate blood. "Many of the dead and the injured are relatives of doctors here," he said. "They are crying and I keep telling them to please stand up and help us."

Saturday's new deaths are in addition to the 84 people believed to have been killed by Friday night, in the brutal government response, with fears that the eventual toll will prove much higher.

The five-day uprising in eastern Libya has been the greatest challenge to the 42-year rule of Col Gaddafi, the world's longest-serving ruler. With internet and phone lines to the outside world disrupted, it was unclear whether the revolt inspired by the revolutions in neighbouring Tunisia and Egypt was spreading from the impoverished east of Libya to the capital Tripoli, or whether it was being successfully extinguished.

It was centred on Benghazi, 600 miles east of the capital, where a human rights activist lawyer was arrested on Tuesday. Chanting crowds, tens of thousands strong, filled the streets and police reportedly fled or joined the protesters, as unrest spread to surrounding towns. Fighting also broke out in the cities of Al-Bayda, Ajdabiya, Zawiya, and Darnah, with witnesses reporting piles of dead. Hospitals made frantic appeals for blood to treat wards full of wounded people.

Libyan special forces launched a dawn attack on Saturday against hundreds of protesters, including lawyers and judges, camped in front of the courthouse in Benghazi. "They fired tear gas on protesters in tents and cleared the areas after many fled carrying the dead and the injured," one protester said by phone from the city.

Video clips on the internet showed jubilant crowds at the start of the protest smashing down concrete statues of their ruler's Little Green Book, containing his sayings, and fighting running street battles with security forces. There were smaller protests in Tripoli, a stronghold of the Gaddafi family whose population received a much better share of Libya's oil wealth.

Colonel Gaddafi himself was shown on state-run television driving in a motorcade through Tripoli, surrounded by cheering supporters pumping their fists in the air and chanting slogans of support.

The pro-government Al-Watania newspaper praised Colonel Gaddafi, who came to power in a bloodless coup in 1969, and insisted the people were uniting with the government against "traitors of the West". Foreign media were exaggerating the scale of the violence, it said.

Reports from Benghazi gave a very different picture of the crisis, describing how the city's residents battled brutal security forces sent from the capital. One man, who gave his name only as Mohammed, told the BBC: "The army are joining the people, the people are going out of their homes and fighting street by street and they are winning."

A Benghazi cleric, Abellah al-Warfali, said he had a list of 16 people who had been killed, most with bullet wounds to the head and chest. "I saw with my own eyes a tank crushing two people in a car," he said. "They didn't do any harm to anyone."

Source : http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/libya/8335934/Libya-protests-140-massacred-as-Gaddafi-sends-in-snipers-to-crush-dissent.html?sms_ss=facebook&at_xt=4d6160096b34e051%2C0

Libya ruling dictator has been in power for over 42 years and says he is for the people. The obvious lie is clear and his tactics against the protesters show how much he is there to serve the people.

Sending snipers and ordering to shoot to kill, many of the protesters consider him insane and libya is not the beautiful place Gaddafi wishes to display.

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Cairo protesters: 'we're not Muslim Brotherhood'

The Telegraph reports from Tahrir Square in Cairo where, despite the violence this week, Egyptian demonstrators are determined to continue their protest until they see the back of President Hosni Mubarak.



Adrian Bloomfield talks to the demonstrators about the motivations behind their protests to end President Hosni Mubarak's 30-year-rule why they are prepared to put their lives on the line to bring change to their country.

Egypt has now faced from 11 days of unrest and protests, with more than 100,000 anti-government demonstrators filling Cairo's giant Tahrir Square chanting after Friday prayers "today is the last day" for President Hosni Mubarak.

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Palestine: The Arrival of Zionism

Palestine: The Arrival of Zionism

Zionism arrived in Palestine in the late 19th as a colonialist movement motivated by national impulses.

The colonization of Palestine fitted well the interests and policies of the British Empire on the eve of the First World War.

With the backing of Britain, the colonization project expanded, and became a solid presence on the land after the war and with the establishment of the British mandate in Palestine (which lasted between 1918 and 1948).

While this consolidation took place, the indigenous society underwent, like other societies in the rest of the Arab world, a steady process of establishing a national identity.

But with one difference. While the rest of the Arab world was shaping its political identity through the struggle against European colonialism, in Palestine nationalism meant asserting your collective identity against both an exploitative British colonialism and expansionist Zionism.

Thus, the conflict with Zionism was an additional burden. The pro-Zionist policy of the British mandate there naturally strained the relationship between Britain and the local Palestinian society.

This climaxed in a revolt in 1936 against both London and the expanding Zionist colonization project.

The revolt, which lasted for three years, failed to sway the British mandate from a policy it had already decided upon in 1917. The British foreign secretary, Lord Balfour, had promised the Zionist leaders that Britain would help the movement to build a homeland for the Jewish people in Palestine.

The number of Jews coming into the country increased by the day - although even at that point, during the 1930s, the Jews were just a quarter of the population, possessing 4 percent of the land.

As resistance to colonialism strengthened, the Zionist leadership became convinced that only through a total expulsion of the Palestinians would they be able to create a state of their own.

From its early inception and up to the 1930s, Zionist thinkers propagated the need to ethnically cleanse the indigenous population of Palestine if the dream of a Jewish state were to come true.

The preparation for implementing these two goals of statehood and ethnic supremacy accelerated after the Second World War.

The Zionist leadership defined 80 percent of Palestine (Israel today without the West Bank) as the space for the future state.

This was an area in which one million Palestinians lived next to 600,000 Jews.

The idea was to uproot as many Palestinians as possible. From March 1948 until the end of that year the plan was implemented despite the attempt by some Arab states to oppose it, which failed. Some 750,000 Palestinians were expelled, 531 villages were destroyed and 11 urban neighbourhoods demolished.

Half of Palestine’s population was uprooted and half of its villages destroyed. The state of Israel was established in over 80 percent of Palestine, turning Palestinian villages into Jewish settlements and recreation parks, but allowing a small number of Palestinian to remain citizens in it.

The June 1967 war allowed Israel to take the remaining 20 percent of Palestine.

This seizure defeated in a way the ethnic ideology of the Zionist movement. Israel encompassed 100 percent of Palestine, but the state incorporated a large number of Palestinians, the people who Zionists made such an effort to expel in 1948.

The fact that Israel was let off easily in 1948, and not condemned for the ethnic cleansing it committed, encouraged it to ethnically cleanse a further 300,000 Palestinians from the West Bank and the Gaza strip.

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