A ceasefire came into force in the Gaza Strip in the early hours of Friday morning after Efypt and Qatar brokered an agreement between Israel and Hamas to hal 11 days of conflict. In fact, this isn't really a "ceasefire". It never is. Israel will continue to kill Palestinians by land, sea and air in the coming days, weeks and months, as it has done with every "ceasefire".
« Ceasefire » = temporary halt to the mass slaughter and
a return to the lower intensity violence of Israeli occupation, ethnic
cleansing and apartheid that deprives Palestinians of freedom, dignity,
security, and perspective of a future for themselves and their children. We
remain far from justice.
Palestinians deserve more than not to die. They deserve to live free. A ceasefire only guarantees the former — continued focus on Washington's rule in funding and supporting the occupation will help achieve the latter.
The first thing UN member states should do is to mandate an international commission of inquiry to investigate systematic discrimination and repression based on group identity in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and Israel. Let's see what Russia and China can do about it.
Israel finally accepted to stop pounding the Palestinians in Gaza. But only because Tel Aviv and Washington were totally caught off-guard by the massive Palestinian uprising and international civil society actions against their crimes. They hope the Gaza "ceasefire" will calm protests.
Palestinian groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad then confirmed the
ceasefire in a statement, saying it would come into force at 2:00am on Friday
(23:00 GMT on Thursday).
Thousands of people in Gaza and the Palestinian occupied territories poured
onto the streets to celebrate the ceasefire, waving flags and flashing ‘V’
signs for victory.
More bodies are being pulled out from Gaza rubble, but so far, at least 243 Palestinians - including 66 children and 39 women - have been reported killed
in the Israeli bombardement. Around 2000 were seriously injured.
On the Israeli side, 12 people, including two children and soldiers (one of them, in the occupied West Bank), have been killed. Around 300 wounded.
The
WHO says Gaza prison is facing a public health crisis after 12 days of
Israeli bombing. 24 heath facilities are destroyed. 3 water plants out of
service. Hospitals facing fuel/power shortages.
Israel meant to cause an intentional de-development.
And China stepped in, backed by Russia. China will send assistance to help treat the injured and find new accommodation for those left homeless as a result of the Israeli air attacks on Gaza, state media reported, citing Tian Lin, a spokesperson for the China International Development Cooperation Agency (CIDCA).
Meanwhile, Palestinians living in the flashpoint neighbourhood of Sheikh Jarrah in occupied East Jerusalem say they have been placed “under a siege” by Israeli authorities. Recently Israeli police have been preventing non-residents from entering the neighbourhood, which has been closed off.
The United States has provided Israel with the necessary military
means and diplomatic cover to defeat Hamas in Gaza, while devastating the
livelihood of more than two million Palestinians, in what qualify as war
crimes.
The Biden administration has covered for Israel at the United
Nations and lied about it. Its denial of having obstructed a
mere statement by the UN Security Council (UNSC) calling for a ceasefire, makes
it look foolish, disingenuous and weak.
Washington has stood alone among the members of the council
in its opposition to consensus on a ceasefire, not once, not twice, but three
times in the past few days.
The White House spokesperson insisted that the US is
pursuing an “effective” approach of “quiet, intensive, diplomacy”, but as it
turns out, President Joe Biden has been merely buying Israel time to get on
with “finishing the job”.
According to a New York Times report, the US president told
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he might not be able to deter
growing international and domestic pressure for much longer, with the mounting
death and destruction caused by days of pounding Gaza.
When Biden finally asked Netanyahu to start winding down the war,
the arrogant Israeli premier rebuffed him, insisting instead on
taking his time to realise his objectives in the war, come what may.
Israel has concluded from the previous three Gaza offensives that
it could no longer accept a “strategic tie” with Hamas; that its military
victory must be quick, real and resounding; that Palestinians and other
regional nemeses must learn that they cannot achieve by force what they failed
to achieve through diplomacy; and that Israel will do what it must to win,
regardless of how long or how much the world whines.
On that basis, Israel is making an example of Gaza, sadistically
destroying its administrative, municipal and economic infrastructure, including
electricity, water and sewerage systems, setting it back years if not decades.
The images from Gaza speak louder than words.
Netanyahu is making Gaza suffer in a cynical ploy to satisfy his
vengeful ultra-nationalist base and continue to maintain his grip on power.
If he loses his premiership, he is likely to end up in jail, like
his predecessor Ehud Olmert, on any one of the three serious charges he now
faces in court – fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes.
Netanyahu was in dire straits only days before his fascist allies
began to run amok in occupied East Jerusalem, terrorising its residents. He had
failed yet again to form a coalition government and was finally forced to stand
trial after repeated postponements.
But, lo and behold, as soon as the escalation got under way, his
opponents failed to form a government, and as the escalation worsened, his
chances to remain in office improved dramatically, with smaller right-wing
parties like Yamina rallying behind him.
One has to wonder if any of this is in the US national interest.
The short answer is no, none of it. Nada. Zilch.
Indeed, the ensuing grave humanitarian crisis and the deepening
hatred for Israel and its enablers in the region and beyond is damaging to US
credibility and national interest.
This is especially true when the Biden administration claims to
put human rights at the centre of its foreign policy, while its spoiled brat of
a client takes advantage of its sympathy and support to commit war crimes.
Even the much-touted war on the Islamist movement, Hamas, is not
in the US best interest, not when it destabilises the region, and not when the
alternative is a negotiated settlement that could achieve peace and security –
peace for Israel and security for the Palestinians – based on freedom and
justice.
Unlike other pan-Islamic groups that threatened the US and Western
security, Hamas is a national liberation movement with religious undertones,
and like countless liberation movements, it uses force to achieve its
objectives.
Like it or hate it, Hamas has consistently limited the scope of
its activities and objectives to freeing Palestine from Israeli colonialism,
and it has long entrusted the negotiations to the Palestine Liberation
Organization.
For its part, Washington has negotiated an agreement with the
Islamist Taliban, which it has also long accused of terrorism and which proved
far more radical and less compromising than Hamas, in order to bring
peace to Afghanistan.
All of which begs the question: Why is the Biden administration did
Netanyahu’s dirty bidding, instead of helping to reach a similar agreement in
Palestine?
Netanyahu’s answer is simple: “America is a thing you can move
very easily, move it in the right direction.” This is what he said in 2001,
while assuring Israeli settlers that Israel could destroy the Palestinian
Authority and continue with illegal settlement building, regardless of the US
position.
In his view, Washington is gullible, and in the rare case when its
government plays hardball, Israel can deploy its influential lobby to whip it
into submission.
With the Democrats’ razor-thin majority in the Senate, Biden
cannot afford to alienate a single pro-Israel Democrat if he is to pass his
ambitious legislative agenda, not when the Republicans are blindly following
Netanyahu.
Israel could also count on the overwhelming backing it enjoys in
Congress and in the US in general, which is so substantial that Netanyahu aptly
called it, “absurd”. Paradoxically, the two senators leading the effort for an
immediate ceasefire, Bernie Sanders and Jon Ossoff, are Jewish.
More disturbingly, Netanyahu’s views reflect a general “disdain”
among Israelis for Americans, whom they reckon are “inherently dupable people”,
according to a report in the Jewish American publication, The Forward.
Over the years, the US has provided Israel with close
to $150bn in direct assistance only, and in return they are
rewarded with insult, for Israelis basically think the Americans, who long
showered them with money and weapons, are suckers.
But then, these are the same Israelis who willingly made an
infamous, cheating, deceiving, liar their country’s longest serving prime
minister, heading not one, not two, but five governments – and counting.
It is no coincidence that, after engaging five US administrations
over a quarter of a century, Netanyahu behaves so arrogantly towards US
leaders. Not only has he gotten away with almost anything, even things contrary
to US interests, he has also been rewarded for it.
Insane.
Netanyahu called US President Bill Clinton “radically pro
Palestinian”, even though the US president helped improve Israel’s regional and
international standing in the 1990s, when foreign investment skyrocketed, the
economy prospered, and trade increased while illegal settlement expanded.
Netanyahu’s chutzpah is best illustrated by his humiliation of US
President Barack Obama, lecturing him on the Middle East, denouncing him on the
Iran deal and his opposition to settlements, and snubbing
him in his talk directly to the Congress.
And Obama’s defeatism is best illustrated by his absurd rush in
the last months of his presidency to reward Netanyahu
with a $38bn military aid package.
Such military assistance may have been justifiable during the Cold
War, but today rich Israel is no longer a strategic asset; it is a strategic
liability for the US. Israel may have served US strategy in the past, but
that strategy proved bad for the US and the Middle East.
At any rate, if that was not weird enough, Netanyahu stalled,
insisting on $45bn, before finally signing on it. Bizarrely, other Israeli
leaders also complained about this “single largest pledge of military
assistance in US history”.
Wait, there is more.
Shortly after signing the deal, Netanyahu lashed out at the
Obama-Biden administration for abstaining during a UNSC vote on Israel’s
illegal settlements that Washington long opposed, calling it a “shameful
anti-Israeli ploy”.
And then came Donald Trump, the gift that kept on giving
concession after concession to Netanyahu. Among others, Trump recognised
Israeli annexation of Jerusalem and the Syrian Golan Heights, as well as
hundreds of illegal settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories.
It was no coincidence that Netanyahu made clear his support for
Trump during the elections, but after becoming president, Biden
resumed the relationship with the ungrateful premier, as if
nothing had happened and even provided him with the diplomatic cover
to fight his ugly war.
As Netanyahu plunged Palestine into another dark and tragic
chapter of violence, and rejected Biden’s appeals to de-escalate the violence
in order to reach a ceasefire, the Biden administration is rewarding him with a
$735m arms sale that includes precision-guided weapons.
But it is never enough, alas.
Expect Binyamin Netanyahu to ask for more in return for de-escalation, including more money and arms, and an invitation to Washington before Israel’s fifth elections in two years. Netanyahu or Binyamin (Benny) Ganz, who was in command of this round of « mowing the grass » in Gaza.
« Louis
Chabonneau, UN DirectorThe latest outbreak of violence in Gaza is depressingly
familiar. Scores of civilians, including children, have been killed and
injured. As usual, Israeli airstrikes in heavily populated areas of Gaza have
claimed the most victims, although Hamas rockets launched into Israel have also
killed and injured civilians.
As we try to grapple
with a new cycle of bloodshed and apparent war crimes by Israeli
authorities and Palestinian armed groups, it’s worth recalling what sparked the
latest violence: a dispute over the eviction of Palestinian families in East
Jerusalem.
The plan is to replace
these Arab Palestinian residents with Israeli Jews. Such evictions are all too
familiar — they’re part of the discriminatory oppression that the Israeli
government imposes throughout the Occupied Territories.
Human Rights Watch
issued a 213-page report in
April that helps put the recent bloodshed in its proper context. It
details the crimes against humanity of persecution and apartheid that
Israeli authorities are committing against millions of Palestinians.
The report’s
publication whipped up a storm of reactions. But we weren’t the first to make this determination — and we aren’t likely to be the
last. The growing recognition that apartheid is a reality today should push the
international community to question the assumptions that have long underlined
the conversation about Israel and Palestine.
Defining
‘Apartheid’
The years-long focus
on ceasefires and the “Middle East peace process” has led governments to
overlook or minimize the unbearable status quo on the ground. Meanwhile,
Israeli authorities have pursued policies aimed at ensuring the continued
domination of one group over another. There’s nothing to suggest that Israel’s
government views its 54-year-old occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip as
temporary.
International law, as
codified in two treaties, defines
the crime of apartheid. It was initially inspired by the South African
experience, but it’s been abstracted to capture other severe and structural
examples of discrimination intended to favor one group at the expense of
another.
The crime requires
three elements: an intention to maintain a system of domination, systematic
oppression, and inhumane acts committed as part of that project.
Human Rights Watch
found that Israeli authorities have demonstrated an intent to maintain a system
of domination across all the territory they control and carried out systematic
oppression and inhumane acts in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. The related crime of
persecution involves the intentional and severe deprivation of fundamental
rights by reason of the identity of the group and requires discriminatory
intent.
Israel has legitimate security concerns. However, Human Rights Watch has documented a range
of inhumane acts that had nothing to do with security but instead reflected
solely a desire to control land and demography. Others had a security
basis but authorities had failed any reasonable test to address those concerns
in a focused manner that balanced them against the human rights of the
population harmed.
For decades, there
have been unrelenting land grabs, unchecked expansion of illegal settlements in
the Occupied Palestinian Territory, regular home demolitions, and confinement
of many Palestinians to under-resourced and overpopulated enclaves. In a stark
illustration of entrenched discrimination, Israel vaccinated all of its Jewish
and Palestinian citizens. But in the West Bank, excluding East Jerusalem, it
vaccinated Jewish settlers while denying responsibility
for vaccinating most Palestinians.
What Can the United
Nations Do?
The United Nations
played a central role in
undoing South Africa’s system of apartheid. It should do that again with the
crimes of apartheid and persecution, globally and in Israel-Palestine.
But how?
The first thing UN
member states should do is to mandate an international commission of inquiry to
investigate systematic discrimination and repression based on group identity in
the Occupied Palestinian Territories and Israel.
Given its history of involvement in the South Africa case — and the
fact that none of the 193 UN member states has a veto — the General Assembly is
well placed to take this up. And it is arguably the closest thing we have to a
world parliament. The UN Human Rights Council could also create a commission of
inquiry, as it has with other cases of widespread human rights abuses.
Another option is the
Security Council, although it has long been deadlocked due
to the U.S. government’s use of its veto power to shield Israel from criticism.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres could also appoint a commission of
inquiry, but he has consistently refused to use his authority to establish
international investigations on a number of topics — such as the murder of the
Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi or
the use of chemical weapons in Syria — that involve powerful member states or
their close allies.
Taking a Global
Approach
We’re also calling for
the appointment of a global UN envoy for the crimes of persecution and
apartheid with a mandate to push for the end of these crimes wherever they
occur.
For instance, Human
Rights Watch recently found that
the Myanmar authorities are committing the crimes of persecution and apartheid
against hundreds of thousands of ethnic Rohingya Muslims. Myanmar authorities’
system of discriminatory laws and policies that make the Rohingya in Rakhine
State a permanent underclass because of their ethnicity and religion amounts to apartheid in violation of international law.
Human Rights Watch has said that Myanmar officials responsible for these
policies should be prosecuted for crimes against humanity of apartheid and
persecution.
A global UN envoy
could draw attention with regular public reports to UN member countries on
other countries where the crimes of apartheid and persecution are either in
full swing or on the verge of being committed.
Apartheid and
persecution have become the forgotten crimes against humanity, as a colleague
of mine wrote recently. A
UN global envoy could help end that neglect by pushing for greater awareness of
where and how those crimes are being carried out and identifying avenues for
accountability.
The UN can also offer
a forum for discussing these crimes. Various UN bodies and committees around
the world organize hundreds of meetings on a wide range of topics every year,
including Israel and Palestine. Those meetings offer an excellent opportunity to
regularly raise these issues and push the international community to
acknowledge the reality on the ground — a first step to changing it.
UN member states can
mobilize the UN system to pressure Israeli authorities to end these abuses. The
world should stop pretending that these crimes aren’t happening. It should also
not tolerate depriving millions of Palestinians of their fundamental rights in
order to preserve the possibility of a peace deal that isn’t coming anytime
soon.
We need to end the abuses and crimes against humanity now. And the United Nations can help the world do it. » By Louis Charbonneau. UN Director.
Gaza Fights for Freedom
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