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  • How America’s most controversial ’non-Zionist’ comic sparked outrage with his new ’bigoted’ book on Diaspora Jews

    Eli Valley’s goal with ’Diaspora Boy’ is to energize a ’besieged Jewish left’: ’We’ve been told we’re self-haters and Jewishly ignorant, and my book says, enough of that shit’

    Debra Nussbaum Cohen Aug 15,
    read more: http://www.haaretz.com/jewish/features/1.806807

    NEW YORK – Eli Valley’s book is hard to read. His comics are dense and intense, a bloody steak compared to the amuse-bouches of The New Yorker’s single-panel witticisms. But, like after eating a steak, reading Valley’s “Diaspora Boy: Comics on Crisis in America and Israel” leaves you feeling sated. And maybe a bit nauseous.
    The dozens of cartoons Valley includes in the soft-cover, large-format book, which is out August 31 and includes a forward by political commentator Peter Beinart, are sardonic and ironic. Valley’s commentaries on contemporary Zionism as taught by the American Jewish establishment are bitter, not amusing. “I consider comics to be activism,” he told Haaretz in a recent interview.
    Valley takes aim at the Jewish world’s sacred cows, including American organizational leaders like Abe Foxman and Malcolm Hoenlein, tycoon Sheldon Adelson and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Since 2007 his cartoons have been published in outlets ranging from Jewcy and +972 Magazine to The Village Voice, Gawker and The New Republic. He was The Forward’s artist-in-residence from 2011 to 2013.
    Though in person an affable presence, Valley uses a pointed poison pen to create cartoons that are “alarming. Stark. Like a car accident you can’t look away from,” as Eddy Portnoy, a senior researcher and curator at YIVO in Manhattan, put it in an interview.
    To Portnoy, who wrote his doctoral dissertation on Yiddish comics, Valley’s comics resemble the Yiddish political cartoons that flourished from the late 19th century through the 1960s. “His work is really compelling,” Portnoy told Haaretz. “It’s a type of criticism that hasn’t existed since the advent of Yiddish political cartooning which was intensely communal, and extremely critical in similar ways to Eli’s.”

  • The wall of insanity -

    Israel has opted for another wall, this time around Gaza. Israel will pay for it

    Gideon Levy Aug 13, 2017
    read more: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.806489

    The next time a cap gun is fired or a toy balloon is launched at Israel from the Gaza Strip, the army will start building a steel dome over the Strip to prevent it. The ceiling will also cut off the territory from the sky. After all, we’re talking about national security. When the first crack forms, and another balloon is launched or cap gun fired, the defense establishment will proceed to the next phase: flooding the Gaza Strip with water until it is completely submerged. After all, we’re talking about Israeli security.
    Until that happens — the plans have already been drawn up — the modest, hard-up Israeli army is making do with smaller measures: It’s building a new “barrier” around the Strip, the father of all the fences and the mother of all the walls with which Israel is surrounding itself, six meters high and reaching tens of meters underground. Israel is becoming a state with a wall at its heart: There’s nothing it likes more than to surround itself.
    History is replete with megalomaniacal rulers who built palaces. For now, Israeli megalomania settles for walls. The separation barrier and the border fence, the Good Fence on the Lebanese border and the bad fence, the entire country is fences. Just give defense officials an excuse and they will surround us with a fence costing billions. For that, money can always be found.
    The fence of horrors on the Egyptian border to keep out African refugees and the separation wall facing barefoot residents of the Deheisheh refugee camp in the West Bank. Now it’s the turn of the Gaza border fence to stop tunnels from being dug under the fence that it is replacing. Next thing you know, there will be an electronic fence around the Israeli-Arab city of Umm al-Fahm, in response to the terrorism emanating from there as well.
    The chief of the Southern Command made the announcement, the military correspondents quoted him slavishly and Israel responded with either a yawn or a Yes!. The method is tried and true: First you create a demon (the tunnels); then you find it a megalomaniacal solution. And there you have it, another $800 million Zionist project, to be built by workers from Moldova and asylum seekers from Africa. There we have it: another wall.

  • Israel: The Cluster-Bomb Nation

    The cluster bombs are aimed mainly at densely populated areas. There they can kill most effectively. That’s why the Israeli army wants them.

    Gideon Levy Aug 10, 2017
    read more: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.806016

    Israel wants to kill as many innocent people as possible. Under no circumstances does it want to belong to the community of enlightened nations. There is no other way to understand Gili Cohen’s chilling report (Monday’s Haaretz) that the defense establishment decided to prefer an Israeli-made cannon that has yet to be completed to a German one, merely to sidestep the international ban on cluster bombs.
    More than 100 states signed the international treaty banning the use of cluster bombs; Israel, as usual, isn’t one of them. What has Israel to do with international treaties, international law, international organizations – it’s all one big unnecessary nuisance. Israel’s fellow rejectionists are, as usual, Russia, Pakistan, China, India and of course the United States, the world’s greatest spiller of blood since World War II. This is the company Israel wants to keep, the club it belongs to.
    Cluster bombs are an especially barbarous weapon, a bomb that turns into countless bomblets, spreading over a wide area, killing and wounding indiscriminately. They sometimes explode years after were fired. The world was appalled and disgusted by such a weapon of mass destruction, and for good reason. The world – but not Israel. We’re a special case, as is commonly known. We’re allowed to do anything. Why? Because we can.
    This has been proved. We used cluster bombs in the Second Lebanon War and the world was silent. We also use flechettes, unmercifully. In 2002 I saw a soccer field in Gaza hit by IDF flechette shells, which spray thousands of potentially lethal metal darts. All the children playing on it had been hit.
    Another time I saw the thousands of darts sprayed by the flechette shells stuck into the walls of houses in Gaza. It wasn’t hard to imagine what those darts did to people’s bodies.
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    Flechettes are also banned in the world but permitted to Israel. Why? Perhaps because we’re the Chosen People, perhaps because we’re allowed to do anything. We fight for our desperate, precarious existence, flimsy leaf in the wind that we are, so we’re allowed to use cluster bombs, flechettes, white phosphorus, you name it. We are, after all, fighting for our survival against the advanced army of the Republic of Gaza and the terrifying divisions of the West Bank armies. We’re pitted against the Balata air force and the Deheisheh naval fleet, and above all against “the appalling brutality” of the Palestinians. So we need weapons, as many as possible, with no restrictions.

    The cluster bombs sowed shocking mayhem and destruction in Kosovo, Laos, Afghanistan and Iraq. Israel wants to do the same. The killing fields in the next war for the occupation, which will certainly come, will be like the killing fields in Laos, thanks to the cluster bombs fired by the new, sacred Israeli-made cannon. Otherwise, why do we need cluster bombs? Don’t we have enough regulation weapons in our arsenal? The cluster bombs are aimed mainly at densely populated areas. There they can kill most effectively. That’s why the IDF wants them.
    The next time you use the argument that the whole world is against us and the criticism and animosity against Israel don’t stem from its actions – remember the cluster bomb. Israel is excluding itself with its own hands from the family of nations, joining the most brutal states, flouting international decisions – and then moaning that the world hates it for no reason. The next time you think of the IDF, the most moral army in the world, think about the cluster bomb.
    The cluster bomb affair is no less atrocious than the submarines affair, yet sparks no interest in Israel. The submarines are money, state witnesses and suspects. It’s sexy to deal with them. The cluster bomb concerns the lives of innocent people, and who cares about that?
    The submarines are the corruption, which the nation is against. The cluster bomb is the arrogant, ongoing disregard for international law, which doesn’t interest anyone in this country. That same defense establishment, rotten to the core, is behind both deals – corruption of one kind in the submarines case, and corruption of another kind in the cluster bombs case. But the defense establishment can calm down. Nobody will be put on trial for using cluster bombs.

  • Israel: Courageous selfishness -

    Those who refuse to serve in the army spare themselves the experience of jolting awake one morning with the realization that they were directly involved in a crime

    Amira Hass Aug 09, 2017
    read more: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.805852

    Military prison can be a place worthy of esteem and pride, when the reason for incarceration is refusal to become a soldier. This is particularly true when the person imprisoned is openly refusing to take part in the well-oiled machine of dispossession and oppression of millions of people.
    On Monday, Hadas Tal of Kibbutz Yifat in the Jezreel Valley joined the too-meager list of Israel’s conscientious objectors: 10 in 2016 and the same number expected this year. (There are more who don’t wish to take part in the occupation, whom the army quietly exempts from service.)
    “Enlistment is not a neutral act,” Tal wrote in a Facebook post explaining her actions. “Actually, if you think about it, enlistment is more political than conscientious objection.” How accurate. Participation in denying another people’s freedom is a clearly political act. Even when you are just 18 years old.
    Refusal to serve in the army of the occupation is a selfish act. The conscientious objectors spare themselves the experience of jolting awake one morning at age 24 or 30, with the realization that they were directly involved in a crime. Minor or serious. They won’t have to soothe their conscience, repress feelings or recite justifications. They may also be sparing themselves from the discomfort of having to stand trial, locally or abroad, when the era of impunity finally comes to an end, or from painful revelations in something like a “truth and reconciliation committee.”
    The parents who with full knowledge send their sons and daughters to persecute and expel people from their land, as they themselves did 20 or 30 years ago, are not altruists. They are very selfish: They’re thinking about the prestige, about the career boost that military background provides, about the shame they would feel if their child didn’t follow in this set path. They know that the chances are very good that their child will return safely from his or her service. The high-tech Israel Defense Forces knows how to kill thousands without being killed. But this is selfishness that sustains injustice and nurtures privilege. Unlike the selfishness of the conscientious objectors that seeks to break the Israeli-settler pattern.
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    “I am refusing to serve in order to oppose a system that looks after the interests of small groups of people and not of all Israelis. The army is one of the most prominent, destructive and violent arms of this system. The main role of this system is to maintain the occupation,” Tal wrote.

  • Israeli army buying local cannons to sidestep international ban on cluster bombs - Israel News - Haaretz.com
    http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.805662

    The Israeli army will soon put into use new artillery cannons purchased from local defense company Elbit rather than a German firm over concerns that the latter would restrict the cannons from firing cluster bombs.
    >> Get all updates on Israel and the IDF: Download our free App, and Subscribe >>
    The use of cluster bombs is banned by an international treaty signed by more than 100 countries, including Germany, because of the high rate of civilian casualties and injuries associated with them. According to a now-retired Israel Defense Forces officer familiar with the matter, Israel was concerned that the Germans would not give the army the “complete independence” it sought in the use of the cannons. In light of this, the Defense Ministry recommended purchasing Israeli cannons, without inviting bids.
    The South Korean firm Hanwha Techwin was also approached but ultimately rejected because the cannons it manufactures are semi-automatic, while the Artillery Corps wants an automatic weapon that has a faster firing rate and requires a smaller team to operate.
    Cluster bombs cause extensive damage because they release a large number of bomblets and unexploded ordnance. Israel’s wide-ranging use of cluster bombs in the Second Lebanon War drew international criticism. After the war, 46 people were killed by bomblets and some 300 were injured according to figures published in Haaretz at the time.

  • Israel Police tells court: Netanyahu suspected of bribery and fraud -
    Court issues gag order on talks with former aide Ari Harow to become state witness; Netanyahu: The campaign to change the government is destined to fail
    Revital Hovel Aug 03, 2017 7:58 PM
    http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/1.805112

    Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is suspected of bribery, fraud and breach of trust in two cases, Israel Police confirmed on Thursday when it requested a gag order on the ongoing talks to recruit a state witness. The gag order was granted and is effective until September 17.

    A response on behalf of the prime minister stated on Thursday: “We completely reject the unfounded claims made against the prime minister. The campaign to change the government is underway, but it is destined to fail, for a simple reason: there won’t be anything because there was nothing.”

  • McMaster boots top intel adviser and Bannon buddy Ezra Cohen from National Security Council -

    Cohen’s dismissal is part of a larger battle between Gen. McMaster and Steve Bannon, who disagree on a number of key issues, including at least two related to Israel

    Amir Tibon (Washington) Aug 03, 2017
    read more: http://www.haaretz.com/us-news/.premium-1.804917

    WASHINGTON – A senior White House adviser on intelligence was removed from the National Security Council on Wednesday, just days after drama within Washington’s top echelons led to the resignation and firings of U.S. President Trump’s chief of staff, press secretary and director of communications 
    Ezra Cohen, a staffer inside the NSC who was appointed by U.S. President Trump’s former national security adviser, Michael Flynn, was dismissed by the latter’s successor, General H.R. McMaster. McMaster had wanted to fire Cohen ever since he replaced Flynn in March, but failed to do so because of an intervention by Steve Bannon, Trump’s far-right political adviser, who convinced the president to protect Cohen from McMaster. 
    Cohen’s title within the NSC, the body responsible for providing the president with foreign policy strategy and advice, was senior director for intelligence, a senior position which includes coordination between the White House and the U.S. intelligence community. McMaster, according to news reports, believed that Cohen, who is 31 years old, did not have the required experience for the job. Cohen is considered close to Flynn and Bannon, who both share extreme views about Islam and the Middle East and are opposed to McMaster’s more moderate approach, which is in line with traditional American policy.
    Cohen’s firing was first reported on Wednesday by Jordan Schachtel, a journalist at Conservative Review, who used to work for Breitbart, the right-wing website previously edited by Bannon. In his story about Cohen’s firing, Schachtel also attacked McMaster for “refusing to fire” career diplomats working for the NSC ("Obama holdovers" is the phrase used by many right-wing publications to describe them) and for the leaks coming out of the NSC under his watch. 
    Another development within the NSC which was reported on Wednesday was the firing of Rich Higgins, another NSC staffer appointed by Flynn and considered close to Bannon. Higgins, according to a report by Rosie Gray in The Atlantic, was fired for authoring a memo which said that “globalists,” the “deep state” and “bankers” are working together with “Islamists” to destroy the Trump presidency. Higgins wrote in his memo that “Globalists and Islamists recognize that for their visions to succeed, America, both as an ideal and as a national and political identity, must be destroyed.”
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    These two developments are part of a larger battle between McMaster and Bannon, who fundamentally disagree on a number of key issues, including at least two with a direct connection to Israel: the re-location of the American embassy to Jerusalem (Bannon supported the idea, McMaster and the NSC warned against it), and the Iran nuclear deal, which Bannon and his supporters pushed the president to scrap, against the advice of McMaster and other senior administration officials who urged Trump to keep it. For the time being, McMaster has won both battles. McMater also won an earlier battle in April when he forced Bannon to be removed from the NSC’s “principals committee.”

  • Not Just Subs: Italian Jets, the Libyan Government and the Israelis Who Profited From a $2.8b Deal

    Some of those being investigated about Israel’s purchase of subs from Germany have also been asked about a huge 2012 transaction involving jets in exchange for Israeli-made materiel

    http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/1.804349
    #Libye #armes #Israël #jets #Allemagne #Italie #Yehu_Ofer #Patrick_Landau #El-Op #Elbit_Systems #Orna_Simhoni-Ofer #Cellcom #Cal_credit_card #Leonardo #aviation

  • Israel Palestine
    Music, children’s choirs and camels in the desert

    Three years ago in Gaza, between July 21 and July 28, Israel killed (it is forbidden say murdered) 37 Palestinian children under the age of 7
    read more: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.804201

    1. My friend B. lives in Kobar. Somehow, during the four years of her young son’s life she has managed to protect him from the not-for-children narrations about the army and death, the occupation, shooting and guns. She and her husband have created an island around him, with children’s books and games, and made sure that the television, with its horrible sights, wouldn’t be turned on in his vicinity.
    Last week reality forced itself on them. Every day the army bulldozers came, made the barriers at the entrance to the village higher and wider, and deepened the wound they dug in the asphalt. Every day the residents swept aside the earth at the edges of the barriers so that their cars could pass. And when my friend passed by there in her car, with her son next to her, he wondered and asked who had made those high piles of earth. Al jish, the army, she replied. He at first thought she had said the jag (the hen) and was very confused. And then she had to tell him what the army is, whose army it is, and why they’re against everyone large and small.
    Comment 1: If until now B. was able to protect her son from the violent lexicon created by the Settlements Defense Forces, that says something about the relative quiet in the village of Kobar (despite pinpoint raids to detain residents). But almost a week of nighttime raids, with dozens of soldiers deploying among the houses, beating residents, firing stun grenades and tear gas and rubber-coated metal bullets, reminded them that the relative quiet is deceptive.
    Comment 2: The Shin Bet security services and the Israel Defense Forces were the subjects of exaggerated praise this week. Their stand concerning the metal detectors at the entrances to the Temple Mount did in fact prove that they understand the overall picture. In other words, the collective revenge campaign that they carried out last week in Kobar did not stem from a lack of understanding or knowledge that the harassment of the entire village and the persecution of all its residents would only give rise to more anger, even among those who are opposed to the attack in the West Bank settlement of Halamish or have reservations about it. This collective revenge is not a case of shooting from the hip. It’s part of the plan. Part of the logic of control. You escalate, you incite, you detain more young people, you scare more children to create more reasons for preventive activities and oppression, and to maintain the apparatus.
    2. T., a sweet boy of 11, joined me during my visits to several of the families in Kobar whose homes the army had invaded. In a short lull between their testimonies he said: “He proved himself a man, Omar al-Abed” (who killed three members of the Salomon family in Halamish). I asked T.: “So do you mean to say that all of you, all the rest of the Palestinians, aren’t men?” T. was somewhat confused. “No, of course that’s not what I mean,” he said.

    Israeli forces near the site of the attack in the West Bank settlement of Halamish and assailant Omar al-Abed, July 21, 2017.
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    Comment: The words expressing understanding of al-Abed’s motives shouldn’t allow us to forget two facts: Relative to the intensity and duration of the injustice in which they live, very few Palestinians have chosen or are choosing al-Abed’s path. On the other hand, tens of thousands of Israelis (correct me if necessary, maybe actually hundreds of thousands?) were and are directly involved in the killing (we are forbidden to call it murder) of Palestinians; not to mention all the other things we inflict on them.
    3. Noor, Malak, Miar and Dareen sing in the Amwaj choir. They’re about 12 years old. We met in the most unexpected place: the desert. A procession of camels was marching towards the sunset. The plucking of the strings in Beethoven’s Eighth Symphony and the strains of the piccolo from Ravel’s Bolero wafted above the row of plastic chairs placed on the sand.
    The Amwaj (Waves) choir in Bethlehem and the Ramallah Orchestra, founded by the Al Kamandjati Conservatory, are offering a series of concerts for the general public, conducted by Diego Masson. The concert, which was supposed to take place on Friday in Dar Al Tifl (The Child’s Home) in Jerusalem, was canceled because of the circumstances. Ramzi Abu Radwan, founder of Al Kamandjati and a native of the Al-Amari refugee camp, immediately phoned Abu Ismail.
    Abu Ismail heads the Bedouin Hospitality and Desert Excursions agency for those touring the desert, east of his village Arab al-Rashayida, south of Bethlehem. He immediately said, “Of course, play here.” The next day. The Kamandjati sound and lighting technicians worked all day on installing the systems and making sure they functioned. Girls from the Bedouin village, ages 3 to 12, sat fascinated on the plastic chairs and blended in with the aural and visual miracle taking place before their eyes. On Sunday the concert took place as planned in the Bethlehem Convention Palace. And on Monday, it will be held in the Ramallah Municipal Theater.

    The Amwaj (Waves) choir and the Ramallah Orchestra perform in the desert south of Bethlehem, July 29, 2017.Amira Hass
    4. The Amwaj choir includes 30 girls and boys from Hebron and 30 from the Bethlehem area, including villages and refugee camps. It began taking shape about three years ago. There are no auditions, all that’s required is a commitment to eight hours of study a week, and summer courses. At present there are 25 boys and 35 girls in the choir. The youngest singer is a 6-year-old girl.
    5. Three years ago, between July 21 and July 28, we killed (we are forbidden to call it murdered) 37 Palestinian children in the Gaza Strip between the ages of several months and 6 years. Next to the name of each toddler we killed (and who are included in the B’Tselem list of 546 children we killed in the 2014 onslaught), there is a dry notation: “Did not participate in the fighting.”
    Comment. We no longer like to dirty our hands with blood. We’re experts at killing (we are forbidden to call it murdering) from a distance, with high-tech gadgets, at most with rifles and pistols. That way it’s not sickening. Not disgusting. Not horrifying.

  • Al Jazeera Jerusalem bureau chief: Netanyahu’s colluding with Arab autocrats to silence us - Opinion

    It’s no surprise that other Mideast regimes want to see Al Jazeera’s independent voice gone. But why would Israel, one of the only self-proclaimed functional democracies in the region, want to join them?

    Walid Omary Jul 31, 2017
    read more: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/1.804320

    But this week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu threatened to shut down Al Jazeera’s Jerusalem office. Citing, in his own statement, the legal restrictions that currently prevent this, Mr. Netanyahu vowed to change the rules to silence our voice. 

    Israelis, don’t let your leaders kill the messenger: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem. July 30, 2017AMIR COHEN/AP
    While it’s no surprise that regional regimes would want to see the closure of Al Jazeera, why would Israel, one of the only self-proclaimed functional democracies in the region want to silence its voice?
    The collusion by Netanyahu with his Arab autocratic neighbors leaves little doubt that free independent media and truth are ready to be sacrificed as collateral damage in the power politics of the region. What difference then is there between Israel, as a perceived democracy, and these dictatorships?
    This recent turn of events, sadly, is not new for us. Our unflinching dedication to independent journalism and getting the story right has come with a heavy price. Our journalists have been threatened, imprisoned, tortured, and killed; our offices bombed, our websites hacked, and our social media accounts taken down. 
    We were the first network based in the Middle East to introduce investigative journalism to the region and have continued to win industry awards, including Emmys, for our in-depth brand of journalism. In many cases, our independent journalism put into focus the corruption marring the region and the world. At other times, it exonerated individuals and nations, including Israel, for charges and conspiracies alleged by detractors.

  • Israeli court upholds manslaughter conviction, 18-month sentence against Elor Azarya
    July 30, 2017 4:16 P.M. (Updated: July 30, 2017 4:16 P.M.)
    http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?ID=778432

    BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) — An Israel court upheld the manslaughter conviction and the 18-month sentence levied against former Israeli soldier Elor Azarya on Sunday for the execution-style shooting of 21-year-old Palestinian Abd al-Fattah al-Sharif in 2016.

    Azarya was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to a year and a half in prison for shooting and killing al-Sharif as the disarmed Palestinian lay severely wounded on the ground after allegedly committing a stabbing attack in the southern occupied West Bank city of Hebron in March 2016.

    Azarya’s defense team appealed both the manslaughter conviction and the 18-month jail sentence for being too harsh, while the Israeli military prosecution had submitted an appeal to increase the sentence.

    According to The Times of Israel, the appeal court judges ruled to maintain the manslaughter conviction, calling Azarya’s act “forbidden, severe, immoral” and claiming that “ethics are fundamental for an army’s resilience both externally and internally.”

    The judges voted three to two in favor of upholding the sentence.“The punishment is on the lower edge of appropriate sentencing,” the judges noted, while lamenting that “such an excelling soldier committed such a terrible error.”

    ““““““““““““““““““““““““““““““““““““““““““““
    Hebron Shooter Loses Manslaughter Appeal, Israeli Soldier to Serve Full 18-month Sentence
    Gili Cohen Jul 30, 2017 4:07 PM
    http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/1.804122

    Sgt. Elor Azaria, who killed an incapacitated Palestinian assailant in Hebron, was ’unreliable,’ judge says ■ Court rejects prosecution’s appeal for harsher sentence ■ Lieberman and Bennett call on family to request pardon

    #Elor_Azaria

    • Netanyahu, two ministers call for pardon of Hebron shooter after appeal loss
      Barak Ravid, Jonathan Lis and Gili Cohen Jul 30, 2017 4:34 PM
      http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/1.804175

      A military court on Sunday denied an appeal by Sgt. Elor Azaria, who killed a wounded Palestinian attacker in Hebron last year

      Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and two other cabinet ministers called on Sunday for Sgt. Elor Azaria to be pardoned, after a military court denied the appeal of his manslaughter conviction for killing an incapacitated Palestinian attacker last year in Hebron. The military appellate court upheld Azaria’s conviction, but also rdenied a prosecution appeal seeking a harsher sentence.

      Azaria shot and killed Abdel Fattah al-Sharif on March 24, 2016 after the Palestinian had stabbed an Israeli soldier. He was sentenced in February to 18 months in prison.

    • Un soldat israélien tue un Palestinien : appel rejeté
      30 juillet 2017
      http://www.tdg.ch/monde/Un-soldat-israelien-tue-un-Palestinien-appel-rejete/story/19202516

      IsraëlUn tribunal rejette l’appel d’un soldat franco-israélien condamné pour avoir achevé un Palestinien blessé en 2016.
      Un tribunal militaire israélien a rejeté dimanche l’appel d’un soldat franco-israélien, confirmant sa condamnation à 18 mois de prison pour avoir achevé un Palestinien blessé, selon des médias israéliens.

      Les juges ont aussi rejeté un appel des procureurs d’augmenter la peine d’Elor Azaria pour homicide volontaire, a-t-on indiqué de même source. Contactée par l’AFP, l’armée n’a pas confirmé ces informations dans l’immédiat.

      Au terme d’un procès ultramédiatisé, Elor Azaria, 21 ans, avait été condamné en février à 18 mois de prison ferme, une peine jugée trop légère et « inacceptable » par l’ONU et qui avait déçu les défenseurs des droits de l’Homme. Le soldat et des procureurs de l’armée israélienne avaient fait appel, ces derniers ayant jugé la peine « trop indulgente ».

      Une balle dans la tête

      Membre d’une unité paramédicale, Elor Azaria avait été filmé le 24 mars 2016 par un militant propalestinien alors qu’il tirait une balle dans la tête d’Abdel Fattah al-Charif à Hébron en Cisjordanie occupée. Le Palestinien venait d’attaquer des soldats au couteau. Atteint par balles, il gisait au sol, apparemment hors d’état de nuire. Les images s’étaient propagées sur les réseaux sociaux.

  • More moral than the Shin Bet - Opinion

    A Likud legislator criticizes the security service, and people rush to defend this enabler of the tyrannical occupation

    Gideon Levy Jul 30, 2017
    read more: http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.804072

    How scandalous: Coalition Chairman David Bitan criticized the Shin Bet security service. How dare he? He said they’re cowards who only want to get home safely. What gall! They protect him day and night and he’s a bigger coward – he hid for a month when his checks bounced.
    And who raised the cry? The Zionist left, obviously. This includes all those patriots, friends of the Shin Bet, from Isaac Herzog to Ofer Shelah, as well as the daily Yedioth Ahronoth, which put on a particularly grotesque show the other day, showing what could be likened to a sequel to “The Gatekeepers.”
    Whereas in Dror Moreh’s excellent documentary former Shin Bet heads lament the occupation, in which they obviously played no role, in part two they would whine about some guy Bitan daring to criticize the apple of their eyes. The old-boy network, excluding Likud’s Avi Dichter, whose spokesman said he couldn’t be located (speaking of cowards), called on politicians to keep their hands off this organization.
    They’re very sensitive people, these Shin Bet chiefs, fragile and vulnerable, just like the organization they used to command. They were thus offended to the depths of their souls by Bitan’s comments, as well as those by Culture Minister Miri Regev, who called the Shin Bet’s positions “delusional.” The Shin Bet as victim – soon we’ll be passing around donation trays – the heart commiserates with this moving welfare organization and its wonderful employees, the gatekeepers of Israel who never sleep, while Bitan only talks.

  • Palestinians clash with Israeli forces in Jaffa after local shot dead by police
    July 29, 2017 9:32 P.M. (Updated: July 29, 2017 9:35 P.M.)
    http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?ID=778431

    BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) — Palestinian citizens of Israel took to the streets in the Palestinian-majority city of Jaffa in Israel to protest against police brutality and racial profiling, after a man was shot dead in a police chase early Saturday morning, according to Israeli media reports.

    Another man was reportedly moderately wounded by gunfire during the police chase. According to Israeli police, the two fled the scene of a criminally-motivated shooting on Yefet Street in Jaffa on motorcycles and were shot while being pursued.

    Arab48 news reported that clashes broke out Saturday afternoon between outraged local protesters and Israeli police.

    Demonstrators denounced Israeli police for using excessive force with impunity, and vowed not to remain silent to prevent unjustified police killings from becoming normalized.

    A family member of the slain man, who was identified by Arab48 as 22-year-old Mahdi al-Saadi from Jaffa, told the news site that al-Saadi was killed “in cold blood” and posed no threat to police when he was shot dead. “They could have shot him in the foot and arrested him,” they said.

    Masked protesters reportedly closed the main road in Jaffa with burning tires and garbage containers and smashed a police car windshield, according to Israeli news site Ynet.

    Israeli police spokesperson Luba al-Samri wrote in a statement that a group of young men threw stones at police officers, and that two suspected stone throwers were detained.

    She said that as of Saturday evening, police continued to deploy heavily on Yefet street and the surrounding area to “maintain security and to respond to any possible scenario.”

    #Palestine_assassinée #Jaffa

    • Israeli police assault journalists, detain 8 Palestinians at funeral in Jaffa
      July 30, 2017 10:50 A.M. (Updated: July 30, 2017 10:50 A.M.)
      http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=778433

      JERUSALEM (Ma’an) — Israeli police assaulted Israeli journalists and detained eight Palestinian citizens of Israel, six of them minors, as hundreds participated in a funeral march Saturday night in Jaffa city in southern Israel for 22-year-old Mahdi al-Saadi who was shot dead by police early Saturday morning.

      Mourners in the Palestinian-majority town condemned what they said was an unjustified killing. According to Israeli police, the man was suspected of taking part in a criminally-motivated shooting and was shot dead, alongside another who was shot and injured, in a police chase as the two allegedly fled on motorcycles.

      However, locals argued that al-Saadi posed no threat to Israeli police when he was fatally shot and that he could have been detained without using lethal force.

  • Israeli police turn East Jerusalem hospital into battlefield amid hunt for dying Palestinian
    http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.803745


    A ’barbaric’ Israeli police raid on Makassed Hospital could have ended in a massacre, director says
    By Gideon Levy and Alex Levac | Jul. 28, 2017 | 6:19 PM

    Through the window of his office, Dr. Rafiq Husseini has a view of the courtyard of the hospital he directs, the stone wall that surrounds it and the pine grove on the other side. The wall is still speckled with bloodstains, now turned brown.

    This is the blood of Mohammed Abu Ghannam, 22, who was shot and killed by Israeli security forces during the rioting over the Temple Mount last Friday. Why is his blood smeared on the wall? Because friends of the dead young man rushed to smuggle his body out of the hospital, just minutes after he died in the corridor, to elude the unbelievable hunt for the cadaver conducted by the Border Police and the Jerusalem District’s men in blue.

    The body, wrapped in a bloodstained sheet, swayed from side to side as the group ran with it and passed it over the wall, which is several meters high. For a moment it seemed that the body was about to slide out from under the sheet, but in the end it reached the other side safely. From there it was carried to a nearby monastery and then, swiftly, was transported in a private car to the cemetery of the A-Tur neighborhood – “our village,” as residents call it – on the Mount of Olives. On the way, the car carrying the body was stopped by police at an intersection, but it was permitted to proceed on condition that no more than seven people be present at the burial.

    In the end, hundreds defied the police to accompany accompanied Abu Ghannam on his final journey, though the funeral was conducted hastily and not in accordance with the tradition of first going to the home of the deceased and then to the mosque – all because of the policy of pandering in human bodies that’s being pursued by Israel’s Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan, hero of the Temple Mount disturbances.

    But that was not enough for the Jerusalem police. On Sunday, officers arrested Hassan Abu Ghannam, 47, the bereaved father, for reasons that remain unclear. The next day, the police returned to the mourning tent set up in the youth’s memory and tore down all the photographs of him. They threatened to levy a fine for each additional photo hung and also to dismantle the tent. Thus shall it be done.

    But in Dr. Husseini’s office in East Jerusalem’s Makassed Hospital, not far away, a semblance of tranquility prevails. At 65, he’s a man of snow-white hair and otherwise distinguished appearance, who studied microbiology and health-care management. He has on his computer footage taken by the security cameras last Friday, documenting minute by minute what transpired in the corridors of the hospital he runs.

    At 1:30 P.M., the hospital began readying to receive individuals injured in demonstrations in East Jerusalem. By the end of the day, 120 people with wounds of varying severity would pass through the Makassed ER. At midweek only five were still hospitalized, two of them in intensive care. Most of the injured wanted to get first aid and leave immediately, to avoid possible arrest by policemen, who they feared would arrive at any moment. For the most part, the wounds were caused by rubber-coated bullets fired from short range – possibly a new version of this type of ammunition, as the damage it caused was more severe than what Husseini says he has seen in the past.

    The police had already raided the hospital on Monday last week, to arrest Ala Abu Taya, a 17-year-old who’d been badly wounded in an incident in Silwan. He was in serious condition; three police officers were assigned to guard his room in the ICU. They left on Wednesday, but since then policemen have been coming occasionally to check his status. They just show up and enter the unit.

    But what happened on Friday is something else again. Husseini arrived at his office, on what should have been his day of rest, at about 3:30 P.M., when it was clear that dozens had already been wounded. Upon his arrival he was told that Border Police troops were present and making their way to the operating rooms. Three were in the one Husseini entered – their very presence a violation of the rules of operating-theater hygiene. They were looking for Mohammed Abu Ghannam. He wasn’t there, so the police ordered Husseini to take them to the morgue – without saying whom they were after, Husseini says now. Earlier, noticing a nurse wearing bloodstained surgical gloves, the policemen asked whose blood it was, but it turned out to belong to a different patient who had undergone surgery.

    As he left the operating suite, Husseini saw dozens more Border Police personnel in the corridors. He estimates their number at about 50, though the hospital security guards we spoke with later think there were even more. In any event, the force moved in the direction of the morgue. On the way they passed the blood bank, where they told the dozens of people who were waiting to give blood to leave the premises immediately. The video footage shows one donor departing with a needle still stuck on his arm. “It turned into a madhouse,” Hussein recalls.

    Fortunately, a force of regular members of the Israel Police, led by two senior officers, also arrived at the hospital. Thanks to them, a major disaster was averted, the hospital director says. In the atmosphere that prevailed, and with dozens of Border Police striding through the corridors like they owned the place, he said he saw disaster looming. After he spoke with the civilian officers, they ordered the Border Police to leave the hospital. On their way out, the latter threw stun grenades and tear-gas grenades at the crowd that had gathered in the courtyard. The metal covering of the wall at the entrance clearly shows the impact of two rubber-coated bullets that struck it. A male nurse was knocked to the ground by Border Policemen, suffering light injuries; the video shows the troops pushing him over.

    “It was a very grave situation – I’ve never seen anything like it,” says Husseini. In 2015, a police force invaded the hospital in an attempt to confiscate a detainee’s medical file, and also behaved liked lords and masters, but he says it was nothing like this.

    “They were vicious,” Husseini says of those who perpetrated last Friday’s raid. “I think they lost control and it could have led to a massacre. We never had a Border Police raid. They were always police in blue or in black. The Border Police have no respect for the civilian population. What were they looking for? Weapons? Armed terrorists? The police could have come to me and said that there was a wounded person [they were seeking], and asked me about his condition in a civilized way, and not entered the operating rooms with their contaminated boots. Something like this would never happen at Hadassah Hospital.”

    Mohammed Abu Ghannam, a computer science student at Bir Zeit University and the object of the search, was in the ER in critical condition at the time. He had been hit in the chest and neck by two live rounds at the entrance to A-Tur, where he was participating in the violent demonstration that took place there that day, after returning from prayers at the entrance to the Temple Mount.

    An attempt was made to take the patient to an operating room, but police stopped the staff and friends who were pushing his gurney there. Abu Ghannam can be seen in the video footage, hooked up to an I.V., his bed bloodied. Footage from the hospital’s security cameras also shows armed Border Police advancing in the corridors as a young female photographer in a helmet and jeans documents the events, apparently on behalf of the police. Every so often they throw people aside. A sea of helmets at the reception desk, a sea of helmets at the blood bank. Suddenly the bed on which Abu Ghannam is lying can be seen opposite the police – it’s not clear whether he was alive or dead at that point – and then there’s a huge melee and the bed disappears from the frame.

    After the force left, a large quantity of blood remained on the floor, where the bed of the living-dead Abu Ganem passed. There’s part of a green hospital uniform too, along with an employee badge.

    “It was a barbaric attack,” Husseini repeats. “Many people could have been wounded here.”

    The guard at the hospital’s entrance, Rabia Sayed, who photographed everything with his cellular phone, adds, “What were they looking for? A dead man. What were they going to do with him? They killed him and also wanted to take him? Why? Halas. He’s dead. A cadaver. This is a hospital.”

    Asked for comment, a spokesperson for the Israel Police – which includes the Border Police – told Haaretz: “During violent disturbances in East Jerusalem last weekend, the police received a report that a person wounded by gunfire had been taken to Makassed Hospital. The police who went to the hospital to clarify the circumstances of the event and the truthfulness of the report encountered violent disturbances that included stone-throwing from the premises. The police entered the hospital in order to locate the person wounded by gunfire, and when the hospital director was asked, he misled the police and said the wounded person had left the place.

    “Mohammed Ghannam’s father was arrested by the police on suspicion of threatening to commit an act of terror. He was taken for questioning at the police [station] and the court afterward remanded him, emphasizing that these were serious statements.

    “The Israel Police will continue to act with determination, in all places and at all times, against everyone who disturbs the public order and tries to harm police officers or innocent civilians, all in the name of the security of the citizens of the State of Israel.”

    A few minutes’ drive from the hospital, in the heart of A-Tur, a group of men are mourning their dead son, relative and friend under tarpaulins stretched over the courtyard of the family home. The rage and frustration here are boundless; some of the remarks made against the police who tried to snatch the body and against those who tore the pictures off the wall in the mourning tent are unfit to print.

    An uncle of the deceased, Izhak Abu Ghannam, says he saw Mohammed not long before he was shot, as they young man was returning from Friday prayers outside the Temple Mount. He maintains that the Border Police, by invading the hospital as they did, prevented his nephew from receiving medical treatment, and may have been responsible for his death.

    Some of the young people in the tent are the same ones who rescued Mohammed’s body from the Border Police’s kidnapping attempt. They all speak Hebrew.

    Hassan, the bereaved father, is still under arrest and no one knows where he is. He was rousted from his bed at 4 A.M. on Sunday morning. He’d already been called a few times over the weekend by the police and the Shin Bet security service, who threatened that if he didn’t ensure that the village remained quiet, he would be arrested.

    “We have goats here in the village that know how to behave better with people than your policemen and soldiers,” says Uncle Izhak.

  • Hero of Israel
    Gideon Levy | Jul 27, 2017
    http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/1.803684

    Netanyahu, Einat Schlein, Israel’s ambassador to Jordan and Ziv, an embassy security officer, at the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem, July 25, 2017. Haim Zach / GPO

    The new hero of Israel wears torn jeans, lives in a religious cooperative community in the south, has a girlfriend and he kills Arabs. Heroes of Israel have always killed Arabs, but sometimes they did so bravely; today they do so with rather pathetic cowardice. They’re scared of a teen with a screwdriver.

    The hero of Israel kills Arabs indiscriminately, including ones who are innocent or who did not deserve to die. The Israeli hero is a young man of principles, principles he absorbed while serving in the occupied territories. He learned dehumanization in the Givati Brigade and how to kill civilians in Operation Protective Edge. He learned that the first action to take against an Arab is always to shoot to kill; the alternatives can be considered later.

    He learned that it’s perfectly fine, even heroic, to kill an Arab, no matter why. He trained in the territories and put it to use in Jordan — what difference does it make, all Arabs are the same, whether on the east or the west bank of the Jordan River. His friends say he’s a “man’s man,” that this wasn’t his first time in a tough situation, like that teen with a screwdriver, and that he’s calm and considered. Imagine what might have happened if he weren’t. He might have killed five people, maybe 10.

    The hero of Israel killed civilians: a physician, for no reason, and a teenager who was assembling furniture and who threatened him with that doomsday weapon, the screwdriver, in the heat of some argument, not even an attack. The hero of Israel didn’t blink. A hero of Israel never counts to 10. He draws and fires. Two dead, two more kill notches.

    Our newest hero’s name is Ziv, but we can’t show his face. His blurred visage as he is embraced by the prime minister only adds to his aura. He replaces his predecessor, the more exalted Elor Azaria. The former killed a dying man, the latter killed two civilians. Don’t accuse him. That’s what he was taught to do in “tough situations” in the territories — to shoot and to kill. That’s what he was trained to be, a blind machine gun.

    He is considered a hero. No one would dream of seriously questioning him as a suspect, beyond the formality promised to Jordan, and it’s already been said it would lead to nothing. Perhaps he committed murder, or perhaps negligent manslaughter? Perhaps he violated the rules of engagement? How would we know? We won’t know. We don’t want to know. Instead of that, we got the prime minister’s unsurprising phone call to him. “Did you make a date with your girlfriend yet?” asked Benjamin Netanyahu in that fatherly manner reserved for heroes. After that came the brave embrace in his office. Look, Jordan, look, these are the heroes of Israel, your sister in peace, the killers of your citizens. And the Palestinians are accused of exalting terrorists.

    When a Jordanian soldier killed seven Israeli schoolgirls in Naharayim in 2007, Jordan’s King Hussein cut short his trip to Spain and hurried to Beit Shemesh to kneel before the grieving families and beg forgiveness. He also visited the wounded and his kingdom paid compensation. But when an Israeli government security guard kills two Jordanians, at least one of them completely innocent, the Israeli prime minister won’t even consider apologizing. Condemnations we demand only from Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. We can only fantasize about a condolence call or the payment of compensation. Why, who died, as the saying goes? Two Arabs, nothing more.

    King Hussein of jordan consoling an Israeli family whose daughter was killed by a Jordanian soldier during a class trip to Naharayim, 2007.Avi Ohayon / GOP

    Two dead Arabs, and a hero of Israel who returned home safely, overcoming his injuries. Ziv the hero will recite his version of events, and perhaps even return to service. Tens of thousands of young Israelis dream of being Ziv. They dream of serving in the territories in the occupation army, of abusing and killing Arabs, of traveling to India and to Guatemala before becoming embassy security guards. If they’re lucky, they might even get to kill some teenager with a screwdriver and a doctor who happened to be there, as in the good old days in Qalandiyah.

    Salute the heroes of Israel. They are the finest of our youth.

    #Jordanie #Ziv

  • These four things will get you barred from entering Israel under its new BDS travel ban

    After BDS activists pulled off plane to Israel, senior minister warns, ’The rules of the game have changed’

    Judy Maltz Jul 25, 2017
    read more: http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.803427

    A day after five activists in the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement were pulled off a flight from the United States bound for Israel, senior government ministers published an official statement explaining their decision to keep them out of the country.
    “These were prominent activists who continuously advocate for a boycott and who sought to come [to Israel] as part of a delegation of extremist boycott organizations whose entire purpose is to harm Israel,” Interior Minister Arye Dery and Strategic Affairs Minister Gilad Erdan said in a joint statement. 
    In March, the Knesset passed a law that bars from Israel any foreigners who have publicly expressed support for boycotting Israel. In their statement, Dery and Erdan said the BDS supporters were pulled off the plane because of this new law.
    Separately, Erdan said that “the rules of the game have changed” and that organizations seeking to harm Israel’s “national security” through boycotts would be denied entry to the country. “We will not let key boycott activists in here to harm us,” he said.

    The interior minister is responsible for enforcing the new law. A spokeswoman said that decisions are made on a case-by-case basis, usually in compliance with recommendations from the Ministry of Strategic Sffairs, which monitors the international boycott movement.
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    “The Interior Ministry prevented in this case and will also prevent in the future the entry of boycott activists whose key objective is to work against the State of Israel,” said Dery.
    The five activists pulled off the flights were part of a 22-member interfaith delegation. They were about to board a Lufthansa flight from Dulles Airport when a representative of the airline notified them that instructions had been received from Israeli immigration authorities not to allow them on the flight. The activists prevented from flying with the group were members of three organizations that support the boycott: Jewish Voice for Peace, American Muslims for Palestine and Presbyterian Peace Fellowship.
    On Monday, the Interior Ministry published a list of criteria that determine which organizations and activists fall under the controversial new ban. The organizations that will be targeted, according to these criteria, are those that promote a boycott “actively, consistently and continuously.”
    The document notes, however, that just because an organization is “anti-Israel or pro-Palestinian, or has an agenda that is critical of Israeli government policy” is not an excuse to ban its members from the country.
    The ban on BDS activists, the document said, will apply to activists in those organizations that have been targeted as well as to independent activists who meet one of the following criteria:
    1. They hold senior-level positions in the targeted organizations;
    2. They are key activists in the boycott movement, whether or not they operate independently or through the targeted organizations;
    3. They are establishment figures (such as mayors) who openly support a boycott;
    4. They operate on behalf of targeted organizations.
    A complete list of organizations that have been targeted by the new law will be published in the near future, a spokeswoman for the Ministry of Strategic Affairs said.

    #BDS #Israël

  • Reports of ‘attempted security breach,’ 1 killed at Israeli embassy in Jordan
    uly 23, 2017 9:38 P.M. (Updated: July 23, 2017 9:47 P.M.)
    http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?ID=778307

    Jordanian security forces blocking off roads leading to the Israeli embassy in Amman on July 23, 2017.

    BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) — Jordanian media reported on Sunday that the area surrounding the Israeli embassy in the Jordanian capital, Amman, had been shut down on Sunday evening following an ’attempted security breach’ which allegedly left one person dead and another injured.

    According to media outlet Ammon News reported that security forces had cordoned off the area, adding that one Jordanian was believed to be dead, while an Israeli was reportedly wounded.

    Meanwhile, Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon said that the incident was “under full censorship” — preventing Israeli media and foreign journalists with Israeli press cards from reporting on the event.

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    Israeli embassy security guard shoots, kills 2 Jordanians in Amman
    July 23, 2017 9:38 P.M. (Updated: July 24, 2017 11:50 A.M.)

    BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) — An Israeli embassy security guard shot and killed two Jordanians in Amman under unclear circumstances Sunday night, with Jordanian media describing the incident as a personal dispute and the Israeli foreign ministry saying the Israeli guard was defending himself from a politically-motivated attack.

    According to reports, two Jordanian carpenter workers had arrived to an apartment in the residential complex used by the Israeli embassy to replace furniture.

    An Israeli foreign ministry spokesperson said in a statement that one of the workers crept up behind the guard and began stabbing him with a screwdriver. The guard then opened fire, killing the alleged attacker, and also inadvertently shot the Jordanian owner of the building who was present at the scene, who later succumbed to his wounds as well.

    A third Jordanian worker was present at the scene, according to the statement, which was released Monday morning after the incident was put under a media ban by Israeli authorities overnight.

    The ministry’s statement said the Israeli guard was lightly injured in the incident, without elaborating on the nature of his injuries. Israeli news outlet Haaretz said he was injured when jumping back away from the Jordanian as he his cocked his weapon.

    The slain alleged assailant was identified as 17-year-old Muhammad Zakariya al-Jawawdeh, reportedly of Palestinian origin, who died after being shot twice. He had previously done maintenance work in the Israeli embassy and its residential compound.

    The Jordanian General Security Administration issued a statement, reportedly saying the circumstances surrounding the incident were still being investigated, and did not say that a Jordanian carpenter had attacked an Israeli.

    Later Sunday night, dozens of al-Jawawdeh’s family members gathered in Asharq Al-Awsat square in Amman to protest his death, demanding that the Jordanian government release all details of the investigation and punish the shooter.

    One relative told news cameras from private Jordanian outlet Ammon that the boy had went to the apartment to collect money in return for a bedroom set purchased by the Israeli guard, claiming that al-Jawawdeh did not realize the customer was armed or a Jewish Israeli.

    “He was a student on summer holiday. The boy went with the young guys to collect the money, and a heated argument broke out between him another young man there. We didn’t know they were armed, nor did we know they were Jews. If we knew they were Jews, we would have considered it dishonor that they visit our stores,” the man said.

    “What has happened is that our son had heated argument with the man. Regardless of whether he slapped you or you boxed him, how dare you in cold-blood cock your handgun and shoot the boy as if he was a cockroach?”

    The father also said in an interview with Jordanian television station Roya TV that his son did not know the nationality of the man who killed him and that he was a regular customer who bought furniture from them.

    However, Israeli authorities have been treating the incident as a possible attack in retaliation to rising tensions in occupied East Jerusalem.

    #Ambassade_israélienne #Amman #Jordanie #Ziv

    • Un Jordanien tué et un Israélien blessé à l’ambassade d’Israël en Jordanie

      La mise en place par Israël de détecteurs de métaux aux entrées de l’esplanade des Mosquées à Jérusalem-Est, gérée par la Jordanie, a engendré des violences meurtrières.
      Le Monde.fr avec AFP | 23.07.2017 à 21h31
      http://www.lemonde.fr/proche-orient/article/2017/07/23/un-jordanien-tue-et-un-israelien-blesse-a-l-ambassade-d-israel-en-jordanie_5

      Alors que la tension reste vive à Jérusalem-Est, secouée depuis une semaine par la crise de l’esplanade des Mosquées, Amman, la capitale jordanienne est à son tour visée. Un Jordanien a été tué et un Israélien grièvement blessé lors d’un « incident » survenu dimanche 23 juillet à l’intérieur de l’ambassade d’Israël à Amman, la capitale jordanienne, selon une source des services de sécurité jordaniens.

      Cette dernière n’a toutefois pas fourni plus de précisions et il n’était pas clair, dans l’immédiat, si l’« incident » est lié aux tensions à Jérusalem, les autorités jordaniennes n’ayant pas donné davantage de détails tandis qu’Israël n’a pas réagi.

      Les forces de sécurité jordaniennes ont encerclé l’ambassade d’Israël, située dans le secteur de Rabieh, dans l’ouest d’Amman, et se sont déployées dans les rues voisines, selon un correspondant de l’Agence France-Presse (AFP).
      (...)
      « Nous irons à al-Aqsa en martyrs par millions »

      Vendredi, plusieurs milliers de manifestants ont défilé à Amman et dans d’autres villes de Jordanie, à l’appel de la mouvance islamiste et de partis de gauche, pour protester contre ces nouvelles mesures.

      « Nous irons à Al-Aqsa en martyrs par millions », répétaient-ils entre autres, en référence à la mosquée Al-Aqsa s’élevant sur l’esplanade des Mosquées, troisième lieu saint de l’islam.

      ““““““““““““““
      Mis à jour le 24.07.2017 à 10h42 |

      L’un des fonctionnaires israéliens en poste à l’ambassade d’Amman, en Jordanie, a tué deux Jordaniens après avoir été victime d’une agression. Les faits se sont produits dans son appartement, à côté de l’ambassade. Responsable de la sécurité, il avait convié un menuisier jordanien pour effectuer des travaux, en présence du propriétaire. Le menuisier a attaqué le fonctionnaire avec un tournevis. Ce dernier a ouvert le feu et l’a tué, tout en blessant grièvement le propriétaire jordanien, qui est mort.

      Les Israéliens disent ne pas douter de la motivation idéologique de l’agresseur, qui serait liée à la situation à Jérusalem. Le gouvernement a voulu rapatrier l’ensemble de ses diplomates, mais a dû renoncer. La Sécurité générale jordanienne souhaite interroger l’Israélien impliqué. Or il jouit de l’immunité diplomatique, selon le ministère des affaires étrangères.

    • Jordanian killed in shooting incident inside Israeli embassy compound in Amman
      //Petra// AF // 23/7/2017 - 11:02:23 PM
      http://petra.gov.jo/Public_News/Nws_NewsDetails.aspx?lang=2&site_id=1&NewsID=310871&CatID=13
      Amman, July 23 (Petra) — Police said they are investigating a shooting incident inside the Israeli embassy compound in Amman, which left a Jordanian citizen dead and injured two others; a Jordanian and an Israeli.

      The Public Security Department (PSD) said a police forced rushed to the scene of the incident and evacuated the three for medical treatment but one of them, a Jordanian, was pronounced dead upon arrival at the hospital.

      The PSD added in a statement that preliminary investigations indicate that the two Jordanians had entered the embassy’s compound to do carpentry work.

      The statement said the PSD launched an extensive investigation into the incident and informed the Public Prosecution in order to find out all details and circumstances in accordance with legal procedures followed in such cases.

    • Diplomatic Crisis With Jordan: Embassy Guard Who Killed Assailant Prevented From Returning to Israel

      Israeli Embassy guard shoots and kills a Jordanian teen who tried to stab him, and another man; Israel decides to pull out its diplomats but halts the evacuation when Jordan insists on interrogating him
      Barak Ravid, Jack Khoury and Gili Cohen Jul 24, 2017 7:58 AM
      http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/1.803076

      An unusual security incident in which a Jordanian civilian tried to attack an Israeli embassy guard in Jordan on Sunday and was shot dead has become a diplomatic crisis. Jordan is barring the Israeli guard from leaving the country.

      On Sunday evening, following an emergency meeting at the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem, it was decided to immediately evacuate all the staff of the Israeli embassy in Amman for fear that the incident would lead to riots and attempts to attack the embassy. However, the Jordanian authorities have refused to allow the security guard to leave the country and have demanded an investigation.

      Israel is currently refusing to allow an investigation of the security guard at this stage, claiming that the guard has diplomatic immunity under the Vienna Convention. The dispute over a possible investigation has led to the delay in the evacuation of the Israeli diplomatic team in Amman.
      (...) The guard at the Israeli Embassy in Amman was stabbed on Sunday by a Jordanian carpenter who was installing furniture in his apartment near the embassy compound. The Israeli security officer, who was lightly wounded in the incident, shot and killed the attacker. His landlord, who was also present during the incident, was also wounded during the incident and later died of his wounds.

  • Temple Mount crisis: Jerusalem unifies the Muslims through struggle - Palestinians
    http://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/palestinians/.premium-1.802844
    Although most Palestinians are not allowed to visit Al-Aqsa, this holy site is doing what the siege of Gaza and the expansion of the settlements could not: bringing them together

    By Amira Hass | Jul. 23, 2017 | 12:55 PM |

    A secular young man from the Ramallah area expressed his astonishment at how Jerusalem was unifying the entire Palestinian people,, and compared the perpetrator of Friday night’s attack in Halamish, Omar al-Abed, to Saladin. A silly comparison, all would agree. Still, the need to bring up Saladin encapsulates all the fatigue among Palestinians about those they perceive as the new Crusaders.

    That young man can’t go to East Jerusalem and the Old City, which is less than 30 kilometers (about 18 miles) from his home, because even in ordinary times Israel doesn’t give entry permits “just like that” for people his age. And perhaps he is among those who consider it humiliating to have to request an entry permit to a Palestinian city. The last time he visited was when he was 13 – some 13 years ago.

    And so this young Palestinian did not hear a few of the preachers in Jerusalem on Friday talk about their longing for Saladin. Because the Palestinians stuck to their prohibition on entering Al-Aqsa through the Israeli metal detectors, self-styled preachers spoke to groups of worshippers who had gathered in the streets of East Jerusalem and the Old City, surrounded by Border Police personnel aiming their long rifles at them.

    One of those preachers said that if not for the positions and actions of various regimes in the world in the past and present, the Jews would not have overcome the Palestinians. Then he paused and added, “If not for the Palestinian Authority, the collaborator, the Jews would not have the upper hand.” He also wondered: “Is it possible that in all the Muslim armies in the world today, not one can produce a Saladin?” And then he promised that the day would come when armies from Jakarta, Istanbul and Cairo will arrive to liberate Palestine, Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa.

    Another preacher made similar statements to a tourist from Turkey before the sermon. The content and style recalled the Islamist-Salafist party Hizb El Tahrir: There is no preaching for an armed struggle against the Israeli occupier, but strong faith in a day when the Muslim world mobilizes and brings down the “Jewish Crusaders.”

    When the prayer was over, only a few joined the call warning Jews that “the army of Mohammed would return” – but no one protested the characterization of the PA as a “collaborator.” Anyway, its activities are forbidden in Jerusalem. Israel pushed out the PLO (to which the PA is theoretically subservient) from every unifying, cultural, social or economic role it had until the year 2000. A vacuum like that can only be filled with religious entities and spokesmen who will give meaning to a life full of suffering. The consistent position of the PLO and the PA that this is not a religious conflict and that Israel should not be allowed to turn it into one doesn’t sound particularly convincing in Jerusalem.

    Since most Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank can’t go to Jerusalem, the city – and particularly the Al-Aqsa Mosque – are for them abstract sites, a “concept” or a picture on the wall; not a reality to be experienced. But this abstract place, Al-Aqsa, is doing what the siege of Gaza and its 2 million prisoners, the expansion of the settlements and the confiscation of water tanks and solar panels from communities in Area C, are not doing: It is unifying them. The anti-colonial discourse, which is essentially national, political and secular, is channeled to Facebook posts, to scholarly articles that do not reach the general public and to hollow slogans mouthed by leaders, the shelf-life of whose leadership and mandate has long since expired.

    In other words, the national discourse and the veteran national leadership are no longer considered relevant today. While Al-Aqsa, in contrast, manages to create mass popular opposition to the foreign Israeli ruler – and that sparks the imagination and inspiration of masses of others who cannot go to Jerusalem. Not only nonreligious people came to places of worship in Jerusalem on Friday to be with their people. A number of Palestinian Christians also joined the groups of Muslim worshippers and prayed in their way, facing Al-Aqsa and Mecca.

    Of course, this is first and foremost the strength of religious belief. The deeper the faith, the greater the insult to its sacred elements. The fact that Al-Aqsa is a pan-Islamic site is an empowering element. But not only that: Jerusalem has the highest concentration of Palestinians who rub elbows with the foreign Israeli ruler, with everything this entails in terms of the trampling on their rights and humiliating them. They don’t need “symbolic sites” of the occupation, like military checkpoints, to recall the occupation or express their rage. And the Al-Aqsa plaza, for its part, is where the largest number of Jerusalemites can gather together in one place to feel like a collective. And when this right to congregate is taken away from them, they protest as one – which also reminds the rest of the Palestinians that the entire public is one, suffering the same foreign rule.

    But that same unified public can no longer express its oneness in mass actions. It is closed and cut off in ostensibly sovereign enclaves, and split into social classes with ever-widening social, economic and emotional gaps. Its road to the symbolic sites of the occupation, which surround every enclave, is blocked by the Palestinian security forces as well as by adaptation to life in the enclave.

    This is the political and factual foundation for the continued presence of lone-wolf attackers, without reference to the outcome of their actions: First of all, the intolerable continuation of the occupation; then the inspiration of Al-Aqsa as a place that unifies, religiously and socially; the disappointing, weakened and weak leadership; and a willingness to die that is a mixture of faith in Paradise and despair at life.

    en français : https://seenthis.net/messages/617928

    • Esplanade des Mosquées : M. Abbas suspend la coordination sécuritaire avec Israël
      Par RFI Publié le 23-07-2017
      http://www.rfi.fr/moyen-orient/20170723-esplanade-mosquees-abbas-suspend-coordination-securitaire-israel-oslo

      Israël joue avec le feu en imposant de nouvelles mesures de sécurité à l’entrée de l’Esplanade des Mosquées. L’accusation est lancée ce dimanche au Caire par le secrétaire général de la Ligue arabe pour qui Jérusalem est une ligne rouge à ne pas franchir. De nouvelles manifestations ont eu lieu samedi et deux nouvelles victimes sont à déplorer : deux Palestiniens ont été tués. Mahmoud Abbas avait annoncé dès vendredi le gel de tous les contacts avec Israël : première traduction concrète ce dimanche avec l’annulation d’une réunion de coopération sécuritaire israélo-palestinienne.

      avec notre correspondante à Ramallah, Marina Vlahovic