In June, 1942, in reprisal for the assassination of the Nazi commander Reinhard Heydrich, the Germans carried out a murderous rampage of murder and terror throughout Czechoslovakia. The small Czech village of Lidice bore the brunt of the German revenge, with the SS killing all the men, deported all women and children and razed the village to the ground.
Similarly, in March 1944, thirty-three German soldiers were killed when members of an Italian resistance group set off a bomb close to a column of German troops who were marching on via Rasella in Rome. Adolph Hitler got furious and ordered that within 24 hours, ten Italians were to be shot for each German soldier that had been killed. Herbert Kappler, the local German commander, quickly compiled a list of 320 civilians who were to be assassinated as vengeance. On March 24, the victims were transported to the Ardeatine caves where they were summarily executed by the SS.
Numerous other ‘pacification operations’ were carried out by the Nazi armies against civilians throughout Nazi-occupied Europe, in which men, women and children were brutally killed to avenge the death of German occupation soldiers by local resistance fighters.
Now what is the difference between these Nazi atrocities and what Israel, the “only democracy in the Middle East” is doing in the Gaza Strip, where “the most moral army in the world” is slaughtering babies as young as six-months’ old? I know that many Jews, especially Zionist Jews, have developed almost instinctive knee- jerk defensive reactions to any comparisons between Israel and Nazi Germany. However, the truth must be proclaimed aloud, irrespective of how many Zionists will get angry.
Israel claims that it doesn’t murder innocent civilians deliberately. But this is a big, obscene lie, of which even most Israelis are aware. Mistakes happen a few times, but when the wanton slaughter of children occurs each day and every day of the year, it means it is policy.
In addition, when the number of victims, especially innocent victims, as in Gaza, even intent itself becomes irrelevant.
In the final analysis, murdering knowingly is murdering deliberately, regardless of the prevarication and the verbal juggling.
Hence, Jews around the world, especially those who support Israel, should be willing to bring themselves to recognizing that what their wonderful state is doing to these helpless Palestinians is a virtual holocaust or at least a holocaust in the making.
How else can any honest person relate to these phantasmagoric images that keep coming from Gaza, haunting the conscience of every human being?
True, Israel had not introduced gas chambers in Beit Hanun and Khan Younis or Rafah. But we have F-16s raining down bombs and death on sleeping children and women and innocent civilians.
If Jews who support this satanic entity are not willing to call the spade a spade and recognize a holocaust as a holocaust, then they should be viewed as active accomplices in this wanton rampage of murder and terror.
This is not a war. Calling the current Israeli onslaught on Gaza a war is like fornicating with words. Wars occur between armies and states.
What is happening in Gaza is actually a merciless and brutal rampage of murder and terror waged by a Wehrmacht-like army against a blockaded, beleaguered and starved people who want to survive and be free, very much like Jews did under the Nazi occupation of Europe.
Indeed, when Israel murders a hundred Palestinian, mostly innocent civilians, for every Israeli killed, there is a name for that, it is massacre.
It is conscionable that honest people around the world, including many conscientious Jews who can’t bear watching the heinous crimes Israel is committing in their collective name, must call the spade a spade. A holocaust, after all, doesn’t become lesser when perpetrated by Jews. There is no such a thing as a kosher holocaust or kosher massacres.
Vilnai
Now, once again, human decency is being affronted and insulted by this reptile terrorist Matan Vilnai, Israel’s deputy defense minister, who has gone as far as threatening the thoroughly tormented Gazans with a holocaust.
Speaking to the Israeli army radio Friday morning, 29 February, Vilnai said “the more Qassam rockets fire intensifies and the rockets reach a longer range, the Palestinians will bring upon themselves a bigger holocaust because we will use all our power to defend ourselves.”
Well, if Israel thinks that carrying out a holocaust against its victims in Gaza and Rafah and Khan Younis can be justified, then why blame Hitler for effecting a holocaust against his own respective enemies? Is Vilnai vindicating the holocaust?
I think Jews should realize that this criminal state, with its manifestly intransigence and bellicosity, is forcing them to make a moral judgment. In the face of evil, and Israel is a clear embodiment of evil, one can’t be neutral. It is either one stands with evil or stands against it.
Today, people around the world, including millions of Jews, are watching the pornographic slaughter in Gaza live on their TV screens. And no amount of spin, lie, or hasbara will make the images of mutilated babies look innocuous.
Finally, the people of the world will not be duped by the propagandistic lies about so-called rocket attacks on Israeli towns, which are meant first and foremost to create an artificial equation between the wanton extermination of Gazans and the mainly psychological discomfort experienced by some Israeli citizens as a result of the fall of these nearly innocuous fire-crackers, fired by some desperate Gazans in order to deter Israel from killing more of their children.
This is because Israel knows very well how calm and peace can be restored for both the people of Gaza and Israelis across the border: Lift the criminal siege on Gaza, allow Gazans to access food and to travel, allow them to export and import, and stop these daily massacres. And then not a single Qassam will be fired onto Israel.
Monday, January 12, 2009
The Gaza Holocaust
by Elizabeth Molchany (source: CASMII)
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Israeli dissent: ‘Israel is like the abused child who grows up to be the abuser.’
The 1967 war between Israel and Egypt, Jordan, and Syria was born out of a lie that Israel had to wage a pre-emptive attack to defend itself, much as George Bush had to wage a pre-emptive attack against Iraq because it had weapons of mass destruction.
Declassified documents in recent years by Israeli Minister of Defense Moshe Dayan reveal the contrary. Since then, in violation of more than 100 UN resolutions and the Geneva Conventions, not to mention the international standard of unlawful aggression the US held Iraq to as justification for the first Gulf War in 1991, Israel has retained control of the Occupied Territories it captured in 1967 and committed numerous atrocities reported in its own media, to which the US is complicit in its American-made, Americanpaid DC9 Caterpillars, F16s, and Apache helicopters, among other weapons.
The Occupied Territories includes the Gaza Strip, a small 25 x 6 mile area bordering the Eastern Mediterranean Sea, inhabited by 1.5 million Palestinians, 20 percent of whom and their forefathers have lived there for centuries. Eighty percent are refugees created when 750,000 Palestinians were forced or fled in fear from their homes in what is now Israel in April 1948, before the first Arab-Israeli war. They and their forefathers had lived there for 1600 years since the 7th century.
For 42 years, Israel has had tight control over Gaza, making it the world’s largest prison. No one may leave or enter without an Israeli permit. When its troops left in 2005, Israel left 44 acres of massive rubble when it demolished Jewish-only housing rather than leave it for the Gazans to use as an act of good faith since it had illegally occupied the land so long.
But Israel retained control of Gaza’s air, land, and sea, and the money they earn on produce and other products, and imposed a blockade on food, fuel, water, electricity, medicine, even ink and paper and parts and supplies necessary for a viable economy.
Because of this, thousands of Palestinians are starving, hopeless, and helpless. It is the middle of winter, they are freezing and without fuel, food or money. In an open and democratic election in 2005, Hamas was elected.
Hamas has refused to recognize Israel’s right to exist based on Israel’s refusal to accept the existence of a Palestinian state and their rights to human dignity, freedom and security. Despite this, Hamas immediately offered Israel a 10-year ceasefire and acceptance of a 2-state solution if Israel would agree to return to the 1967 borders. Israel refused. Hamas abided by its own 18-month unilateral truce.
In June 2008, Hamas and Israel agreed to a 6-month truce during which Israel was to relax its blockade. Israel immediately breached that part, and would not even allow Gazans to fish within 3 miles of their own coast without a permit, stringently enforced.
On November 4, Israel again breached the truce by entering Gaza, killing 6 Palestinians, and sealing the borders, denying food and all necessities, foreign journalists and dignitaries, including President Carter. On Dec 27, Israel launched its massive assault despite the fact that not one Israeli had died during the past year from a Qassam Rocket. Hamas responded with its only weapons, Qassam Rockets, killing 4 Israelis. Since Israel’s attack with American weapons, hundreds of Palestinians have been killed, 3,000 wounded, and their entire infrastructure destroyed or seriously damaged, including homes, the American school, the university, dormitories, stores, markets, fishing boats, the Gaza mental heath center. This massacre, planned six months in advance, is not about Hamas or rockets but about Israel’s upcoming elections and denying the right of a Palestinian state. Israel’s own human rights organization, B’tselem, describes it as a crime against humanity.
Had Israel wanted peace, it would have returned the occupied territories to the Palestinians, the rightful owners under international law; it would have accepted the Saudi peace initiatives offered in 2002 and 2007, which all 21 Arab states signed, recognizing Israel and offering it permanent peace in return for an Israeli withdrawal from lands captured in 1967, establishing a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital and a just solution to the issue of Palestinian refugees.
Each time, Israel said no, contradicting the notion Israel alone seeks a just and peaceful solution to regional issues. http://tinyurl.com/SA2007PlanHaaretz and http://tinyurl.com/JPAcceptInitiative
Please do not rely on the mainstream US media - you will not find the truth there. Research the alternative media on the Internet and other sources, such as Link and Free Speech TV’s “Democracy Now” daily news show, online sources such as Jewish Voices for Peace, the Electronic Intifada, or England’s print media The Independence and The Observer, which are also available online, as are the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz, and Israeli organizations such “Gush Shalom,” “B’tselem” and “Breaking the Silence: Israeli Soldiers Talk About the Occupied” - the latter at www.shovrimshtika.org/index_e.asp
As one Israeli conscientious objector recently stated in a “Democracy Now” interview after being released from prison, “At least in Israel there is debate over the actions of the right-wing government, in the US you don’t even get that.”
Elizabeth Molchany is an attorney in private practice in Front Royal, VA. Ms. Molchany is a long-time student of the crisis in the Middle East. She can be reached at: emmolchanylaw@embarqmail.com
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( filed under: News and Editorials )
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Israeli dissent: ‘Israel is like the abused child who grows up to be the abuser.’
The 1967 war between Israel and Egypt, Jordan, and Syria was born out of a lie that Israel had to wage a pre-emptive attack to defend itself, much as George Bush had to wage a pre-emptive attack against Iraq because it had weapons of mass destruction.
Declassified documents in recent years by Israeli Minister of Defense Moshe Dayan reveal the contrary. Since then, in violation of more than 100 UN resolutions and the Geneva Conventions, not to mention the international standard of unlawful aggression the US held Iraq to as justification for the first Gulf War in 1991, Israel has retained control of the Occupied Territories it captured in 1967 and committed numerous atrocities reported in its own media, to which the US is complicit in its American-made, Americanpaid DC9 Caterpillars, F16s, and Apache helicopters, among other weapons.
The Occupied Territories includes the Gaza Strip, a small 25 x 6 mile area bordering the Eastern Mediterranean Sea, inhabited by 1.5 million Palestinians, 20 percent of whom and their forefathers have lived there for centuries. Eighty percent are refugees created when 750,000 Palestinians were forced or fled in fear from their homes in what is now Israel in April 1948, before the first Arab-Israeli war. They and their forefathers had lived there for 1600 years since the 7th century.
For 42 years, Israel has had tight control over Gaza, making it the world’s largest prison. No one may leave or enter without an Israeli permit. When its troops left in 2005, Israel left 44 acres of massive rubble when it demolished Jewish-only housing rather than leave it for the Gazans to use as an act of good faith since it had illegally occupied the land so long.
But Israel retained control of Gaza’s air, land, and sea, and the money they earn on produce and other products, and imposed a blockade on food, fuel, water, electricity, medicine, even ink and paper and parts and supplies necessary for a viable economy.
Because of this, thousands of Palestinians are starving, hopeless, and helpless. It is the middle of winter, they are freezing and without fuel, food or money. In an open and democratic election in 2005, Hamas was elected.
Hamas has refused to recognize Israel’s right to exist based on Israel’s refusal to accept the existence of a Palestinian state and their rights to human dignity, freedom and security. Despite this, Hamas immediately offered Israel a 10-year ceasefire and acceptance of a 2-state solution if Israel would agree to return to the 1967 borders. Israel refused. Hamas abided by its own 18-month unilateral truce.
In June 2008, Hamas and Israel agreed to a 6-month truce during which Israel was to relax its blockade. Israel immediately breached that part, and would not even allow Gazans to fish within 3 miles of their own coast without a permit, stringently enforced.
On November 4, Israel again breached the truce by entering Gaza, killing 6 Palestinians, and sealing the borders, denying food and all necessities, foreign journalists and dignitaries, including President Carter. On Dec 27, Israel launched its massive assault despite the fact that not one Israeli had died during the past year from a Qassam Rocket. Hamas responded with its only weapons, Qassam Rockets, killing 4 Israelis. Since Israel’s attack with American weapons, hundreds of Palestinians have been killed, 3,000 wounded, and their entire infrastructure destroyed or seriously damaged, including homes, the American school, the university, dormitories, stores, markets, fishing boats, the Gaza mental heath center. This massacre, planned six months in advance, is not about Hamas or rockets but about Israel’s upcoming elections and denying the right of a Palestinian state. Israel’s own human rights organization, B’tselem, describes it as a crime against humanity.
Had Israel wanted peace, it would have returned the occupied territories to the Palestinians, the rightful owners under international law; it would have accepted the Saudi peace initiatives offered in 2002 and 2007, which all 21 Arab states signed, recognizing Israel and offering it permanent peace in return for an Israeli withdrawal from lands captured in 1967, establishing a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital and a just solution to the issue of Palestinian refugees.
Each time, Israel said no, contradicting the notion Israel alone seeks a just and peaceful solution to regional issues. http://tinyurl.com/SA2007PlanHaaretz and http://tinyurl.com/JPAcceptInitiative
Please do not rely on the mainstream US media - you will not find the truth there. Research the alternative media on the Internet and other sources, such as Link and Free Speech TV’s “Democracy Now” daily news show, online sources such as Jewish Voices for Peace, the Electronic Intifada, or England’s print media The Independence and The Observer, which are also available online, as are the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz, and Israeli organizations such “Gush Shalom,” “B’tselem” and “Breaking the Silence: Israeli Soldiers Talk About the Occupied” - the latter at www.shovrimshtika.org/index_e.asp
As one Israeli conscientious objector recently stated in a “Democracy Now” interview after being released from prison, “At least in Israel there is debate over the actions of the right-wing government, in the US you don’t even get that.”
Elizabeth Molchany is an attorney in private practice in Front Royal, VA. Ms. Molchany is a long-time student of the crisis in the Middle East. She can be reached at: emmolchanylaw@embarqmail.com
login to post comments | email this page | printer friendly version
( filed under: News and Editorials )
Gaza school attack only hit civilians
UN: Gaza school attack only hit civilians
Posted by webadmin in Arabic Articles, Latest News on 01 8th, 2009 | no responses
The United Nations has dismissed Israeli claims that its bloody attacks on schools were directed at killing Palestinians fighters.
Christopher Gunness, spokesman for the UN refugee agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) said with high confidence on Wednesday that there were no combatants or combative activities in the schools and school compounds targeted by Israel on Tuesday.
“We are calling for an independent investigation to establish the facts,” he said, calling for those who broke the rules of war to be brought to justice.
Israeli forces attacked three UN-run schools in the Gaza Strip, killing at least 45 civilians, most of whom were Palestinians who had taken refuge in the buildings to escape the raining Israeli fire on Gaza.
Israeli officials had tried to justify the incident as an attack on a militant stronghold.
Israeli ground forces began a full-scale invasion of Gaza on Saturday after pounding the region with airstrikes for a week.
According to Tel Aviv, the war on Gaza is aimed at ending rocket attacks against Israeli settlers, toppling Hamas and preventing the resistance group from rearming.
Hamas, however, demands a cessation of Israeli attacks and the opening of the Gaza border — which has been closed due to the 18-month blockade imposed on the strip by Tel Aviv.
So far the Israeli aggression has killed over 660 Palestinians, half of whom are women and children. More than 2,950 others have been wounded and many are feared to be under the rubble.
MRS/AA
Posted by webadmin in Arabic Articles, Latest News on 01 8th, 2009 | no responses
The United Nations has dismissed Israeli claims that its bloody attacks on schools were directed at killing Palestinians fighters.
Christopher Gunness, spokesman for the UN refugee agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) said with high confidence on Wednesday that there were no combatants or combative activities in the schools and school compounds targeted by Israel on Tuesday.
“We are calling for an independent investigation to establish the facts,” he said, calling for those who broke the rules of war to be brought to justice.
Israeli forces attacked three UN-run schools in the Gaza Strip, killing at least 45 civilians, most of whom were Palestinians who had taken refuge in the buildings to escape the raining Israeli fire on Gaza.
Israeli officials had tried to justify the incident as an attack on a militant stronghold.
Israeli ground forces began a full-scale invasion of Gaza on Saturday after pounding the region with airstrikes for a week.
According to Tel Aviv, the war on Gaza is aimed at ending rocket attacks against Israeli settlers, toppling Hamas and preventing the resistance group from rearming.
Hamas, however, demands a cessation of Israeli attacks and the opening of the Gaza border — which has been closed due to the 18-month blockade imposed on the strip by Tel Aviv.
So far the Israeli aggression has killed over 660 Palestinians, half of whom are women and children. More than 2,950 others have been wounded and many are feared to be under the rubble.
MRS/AA
Gaza school attack only hit civilians
UN: Gaza school attack only hit civilians
Posted by webadmin in Arabic Articles, Latest News on 01 8th, 2009 | no responses
The United Nations has dismissed Israeli claims that its bloody attacks on schools were directed at killing Palestinians fighters.
Christopher Gunness, spokesman for the UN refugee agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) said with high confidence on Wednesday that there were no combatants or combative activities in the schools and school compounds targeted by Israel on Tuesday.
“We are calling for an independent investigation to establish the facts,” he said, calling for those who broke the rules of war to be brought to justice.
Israeli forces attacked three UN-run schools in the Gaza Strip, killing at least 45 civilians, most of whom were Palestinians who had taken refuge in the buildings to escape the raining Israeli fire on Gaza.
Israeli officials had tried to justify the incident as an attack on a militant stronghold.
Israeli ground forces began a full-scale invasion of Gaza on Saturday after pounding the region with airstrikes for a week.
According to Tel Aviv, the war on Gaza is aimed at ending rocket attacks against Israeli settlers, toppling Hamas and preventing the resistance group from rearming.
Hamas, however, demands a cessation of Israeli attacks and the opening of the Gaza border — which has been closed due to the 18-month blockade imposed on the strip by Tel Aviv.
So far the Israeli aggression has killed over 660 Palestinians, half of whom are women and children. More than 2,950 others have been wounded and many are feared to be under the rubble.
MRS/AA
Posted by webadmin in Arabic Articles, Latest News on 01 8th, 2009 | no responses
The United Nations has dismissed Israeli claims that its bloody attacks on schools were directed at killing Palestinians fighters.
Christopher Gunness, spokesman for the UN refugee agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) said with high confidence on Wednesday that there were no combatants or combative activities in the schools and school compounds targeted by Israel on Tuesday.
“We are calling for an independent investigation to establish the facts,” he said, calling for those who broke the rules of war to be brought to justice.
Israeli forces attacked three UN-run schools in the Gaza Strip, killing at least 45 civilians, most of whom were Palestinians who had taken refuge in the buildings to escape the raining Israeli fire on Gaza.
Israeli officials had tried to justify the incident as an attack on a militant stronghold.
Israeli ground forces began a full-scale invasion of Gaza on Saturday after pounding the region with airstrikes for a week.
According to Tel Aviv, the war on Gaza is aimed at ending rocket attacks against Israeli settlers, toppling Hamas and preventing the resistance group from rearming.
Hamas, however, demands a cessation of Israeli attacks and the opening of the Gaza border — which has been closed due to the 18-month blockade imposed on the strip by Tel Aviv.
So far the Israeli aggression has killed over 660 Palestinians, half of whom are women and children. More than 2,950 others have been wounded and many are feared to be under the rubble.
MRS/AA
The Gaza Holocaust
12/01/2009
16 Days of Israeli Zionism Attack On Gaza have caused 905 kills and 4100 wounded, half of the casualties are kids and woman, Israel have used phosphoric and chemical weapons, human right swatch has announced Israeli Army have attacked schools, hospitals mosques and have destroyed hundreds of civilian houses and power generation stations
Friday, January 9, 2009
Israel used chemical weapons in Lebanon and Gaza report
By now there are countless reports, from hospitals, witnesses, armament experts and journalists that strongly suggest that in the current offensive, Israeli forces are using “new weapons” in Lebanon and Gaza.
New and strange symptoms are reported amongst the wounded and the dead.
Bodies with dead tissues and no apparent wounds; “shrunken” corpses; civilians with heavy damage to lower limbs that require amputation, which is nevertheless followed by unstoppable necrosis and death; descriptions of extensive internal wounds with no trace of shrapnel, corpses blackened but not burned, and others heavily wounded that did not bleed.
Many of these descriptions suggest the possibility that the new weapons used include “direct energy” weapons, and chemical and/or biological agents, in a sort of macabre experiment of future warfare, where there is no respect for anything: International rules (from the Geneva Convention to the treaties on biological and chemical weapons), refugees, hospitals and the Red Cross, not to mention the people, their future, their children, the environment, which is poisoned through dissemination of Depleted Uranium and toxic substances released after oil and chemical depots are bombed.
Right now, the Lebanese and Palestinian people have many urgent and impellent problems, yet many people believe that these episodes cannot and must not pass ignored. In fact several appeals have been launched to scientists and experts with a view to investigating the issue. With the intent of responding to such appeals, we have set up a team to investigate the testimonies, the images, and possibly the material evidence that delegations and NGOs will be able to bring from the affected areas. We want to offer support to the health institutions of Lebanon and Palestine, which ask constantly for help and external verification and monitoring, and we are examining all available materials in order to formulate hypotheses which can be verified or disproved.
We ask for the active participation of our (Italian) scientific institutions, and, following the request from medical personnel in the conflict area, we are requesting that the UN set up an international independent verification and investigation committee, with a view to facilitating entry into the conflict zone, as well as collecting material and testimonies directly in the field, and undertaking inquiries and verifications concerning the various claims regarding these new kinds of weapons of mass destruction being used by Israeli forces in Lebanon. We request that such investigating teams be set up immediately, and that procedures be defined and implemented with a view to supporting future investigations. Of particular concern is the issue of how to collect and store samples from the different theaters, with a view to preserving important information regarding the various impacts of these weapons.
We ask that the international committee have access to all sources of information, that it be fully operational, while abiding by relevant investigative procedures, including cross-checking of information between different laboratories.
As people and as scientists, we are offering our time and expertise in order to reach an understanding of the underlying facts, in the belief that a perspective of justice, equity and peace among people can be reached only with the respect of the rules defined up to now within the international community of nations. The issue pertains to the behavior of the parties in an armed conflict.
We ask that the respect of these rules be verified in the context of the present conflict. We invite scientists to contribute to this effort by offering their specific competences. In particular we seek collaboration of toxicology experts, pharmacologists, anatomy pathologists, doctors with an expertise in trauma and burns, chemists. They can reach the working group at the e-mail address: nuovearmi@gmail.com — Paola Manduca is professor of genetics, University of Genova, Italy.
New and strange symptoms are reported amongst the wounded and the dead.
Bodies with dead tissues and no apparent wounds; “shrunken” corpses; civilians with heavy damage to lower limbs that require amputation, which is nevertheless followed by unstoppable necrosis and death; descriptions of extensive internal wounds with no trace of shrapnel, corpses blackened but not burned, and others heavily wounded that did not bleed.
Many of these descriptions suggest the possibility that the new weapons used include “direct energy” weapons, and chemical and/or biological agents, in a sort of macabre experiment of future warfare, where there is no respect for anything: International rules (from the Geneva Convention to the treaties on biological and chemical weapons), refugees, hospitals and the Red Cross, not to mention the people, their future, their children, the environment, which is poisoned through dissemination of Depleted Uranium and toxic substances released after oil and chemical depots are bombed.
Right now, the Lebanese and Palestinian people have many urgent and impellent problems, yet many people believe that these episodes cannot and must not pass ignored. In fact several appeals have been launched to scientists and experts with a view to investigating the issue. With the intent of responding to such appeals, we have set up a team to investigate the testimonies, the images, and possibly the material evidence that delegations and NGOs will be able to bring from the affected areas. We want to offer support to the health institutions of Lebanon and Palestine, which ask constantly for help and external verification and monitoring, and we are examining all available materials in order to formulate hypotheses which can be verified or disproved.
We ask for the active participation of our (Italian) scientific institutions, and, following the request from medical personnel in the conflict area, we are requesting that the UN set up an international independent verification and investigation committee, with a view to facilitating entry into the conflict zone, as well as collecting material and testimonies directly in the field, and undertaking inquiries and verifications concerning the various claims regarding these new kinds of weapons of mass destruction being used by Israeli forces in Lebanon. We request that such investigating teams be set up immediately, and that procedures be defined and implemented with a view to supporting future investigations. Of particular concern is the issue of how to collect and store samples from the different theaters, with a view to preserving important information regarding the various impacts of these weapons.
We ask that the international committee have access to all sources of information, that it be fully operational, while abiding by relevant investigative procedures, including cross-checking of information between different laboratories.
As people and as scientists, we are offering our time and expertise in order to reach an understanding of the underlying facts, in the belief that a perspective of justice, equity and peace among people can be reached only with the respect of the rules defined up to now within the international community of nations. The issue pertains to the behavior of the parties in an armed conflict.
We ask that the respect of these rules be verified in the context of the present conflict. We invite scientists to contribute to this effort by offering their specific competences. In particular we seek collaboration of toxicology experts, pharmacologists, anatomy pathologists, doctors with an expertise in trauma and burns, chemists. They can reach the working group at the e-mail address: nuovearmi@gmail.com — Paola Manduca is professor of genetics, University of Genova, Italy.
Custom Search
Israeli Crimes In Gaza-Palestine
10/01/2009
Israel is pushing ahead with its offensive in the Gaza Strip after branding a
UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire "unworkable".
Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, rejected the truce call following a
security cabinet meeting on Friday.
Referring to continued rocket fire from Gaza into Israel, Olmert said: "The
firing of rockets this morning only goes to show that the UN decision is
unworkable and will not be adhered to by the murderous Palestinian
organisations."
A series of Israeli air raids and ground attacks on Friday killed dozens of
Palestinians in northern Gaza, medical sources said.
Palestinian doctors said tanks shelled a house in Beit Lahiya in the north of
the Strip, killing six Gazans from the same family.
The Israeli air force launched attacks overnight against what an army
spokesman described as 50 targets, including launching pads for rockets fired
from Gaza into Israel.
The Israeli army said six rockets were also fired into southern Israel on
Friday morning, injuring one person and four rockets hit Beersheba, a town
about 40km from the Israeli-Gaza border and the port of Ashdod.
Civilian casualties
At least 803 Palestinians have been killed and 3,300 injured since the
Israeli offensive began on December 27.
More than 300 Palestinian children and nearly 100 women are among the dead,
according to the UN.
Thirteen Israelis, including three civilians, have been killed during the
same period.
The UN said on Friday that a further 30 Palestinians were killed in Gaza on
January 4 after the Israeli army moved dozens of civilians to a building
which troops later shelled.
A special report by the UN's Office for the Coordinator of Humanitarian
Affairs (OCHA) said 110 Gazans were transferred to the house and that the
Israeli army were investigating the incident.
The continuing hostilities will come as a disappointment for those within the
international community who have been pushing for a ceasefire since the
conflict began.
Sherine Tadros, Al Jazeera’s correspondent in Gaza, said despite the talk of
peace at the United Nations in New York, there was "certainly no peace here
in the Gaza Strip".
She said explosions and heavy artillery fire could be continuously heard
overnight and into Friday.
The UN resolution, which was backed by 14 of the 15-member body with only the
US abstaining, called for an "immediate, durable and fully respected"
ceasefire.
It also said border crossings into Gaza should be re-opened and measures put
in place to prevent the smuggling of weapons into the Gaza Strip Strip.
The resolution underlined there should be "unimpeded provision" and
distribution of aid into the territory, where Gazans have been starved of
fuel, food and medical supplies for months following Israel’s crippling
blockade.
UN aid suspension
Meanwhile, the United Nations Works and Relief Agency (Unwra) has been forced
to suspend humanitarian activities in the Strip after coming under fire from
Israeli forces.
On Thursday, a contract worker was killed when a Unwra aid convoy came under
Israeli fire during a three-hour armistice agreed by the Israelis in order to
deliver essential supplies to Gaza residents.
Israel says it is investigating the incident.
The UN says it cannot resume aid work in the territory because it is unable
to guarantee the safety of its employees – despite the daily three-hour pause
in the Israeli offensive.
Israel is pushing ahead with its offensive in the Gaza Strip after branding a
UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire "unworkable".
Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, rejected the truce call following a
security cabinet meeting on Friday.
Referring to continued rocket fire from Gaza into Israel, Olmert said: "The
firing of rockets this morning only goes to show that the UN decision is
unworkable and will not be adhered to by the murderous Palestinian
organisations."
A series of Israeli air raids and ground attacks on Friday killed dozens of
Palestinians in northern Gaza, medical sources said.
Palestinian doctors said tanks shelled a house in Beit Lahiya in the north of
the Strip, killing six Gazans from the same family.
The Israeli air force launched attacks overnight against what an army
spokesman described as 50 targets, including launching pads for rockets fired
from Gaza into Israel.
The Israeli army said six rockets were also fired into southern Israel on
Friday morning, injuring one person and four rockets hit Beersheba, a town
about 40km from the Israeli-Gaza border and the port of Ashdod.
Civilian casualties
At least 803 Palestinians have been killed and 3,300 injured since the
Israeli offensive began on December 27.
More than 300 Palestinian children and nearly 100 women are among the dead,
according to the UN.
Thirteen Israelis, including three civilians, have been killed during the
same period.
The UN said on Friday that a further 30 Palestinians were killed in Gaza on
January 4 after the Israeli army moved dozens of civilians to a building
which troops later shelled.
A special report by the UN's Office for the Coordinator of Humanitarian
Affairs (OCHA) said 110 Gazans were transferred to the house and that the
Israeli army were investigating the incident.
The continuing hostilities will come as a disappointment for those within the
international community who have been pushing for a ceasefire since the
conflict began.
Sherine Tadros, Al Jazeera’s correspondent in Gaza, said despite the talk of
peace at the United Nations in New York, there was "certainly no peace here
in the Gaza Strip".
She said explosions and heavy artillery fire could be continuously heard
overnight and into Friday.
The UN resolution, which was backed by 14 of the 15-member body with only the
US abstaining, called for an "immediate, durable and fully respected"
ceasefire.
It also said border crossings into Gaza should be re-opened and measures put
in place to prevent the smuggling of weapons into the Gaza Strip Strip.
The resolution underlined there should be "unimpeded provision" and
distribution of aid into the territory, where Gazans have been starved of
fuel, food and medical supplies for months following Israel’s crippling
blockade.
UN aid suspension
Meanwhile, the United Nations Works and Relief Agency (Unwra) has been forced
to suspend humanitarian activities in the Strip after coming under fire from
Israeli forces.
On Thursday, a contract worker was killed when a Unwra aid convoy came under
Israeli fire during a three-hour armistice agreed by the Israelis in order to
deliver essential supplies to Gaza residents.
Israel says it is investigating the incident.
The UN says it cannot resume aid work in the territory because it is unable
to guarantee the safety of its employees – despite the daily three-hour pause
in the Israeli offensive.
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