person:jamal

  • The Iraqi and Syrian refugees using body-mapping to share their stories

    What does it mean to flee one’s country and undertake the dangerous journey to Europe? What does it mean to suddenly lose everything and be forced to live in a different country? A new home, new school, new friends and a totally new life? To what extent does it influence family lives and the family unit as such? These are questions that a new research project, based at the University of Birmingham and funded by the British Academy, is tackling. The focus is not only on the changes occurring within refugee families, but equally on the impact of the influx of refugees on the host society.

    We use art as a research method to allow Iraqi and Syrian women and men to express their thoughts and feelings, on both their refugee journey and their new lives in their host countries. Fleeing one’s country puts enormous pressure and stress on an individual, both emotionally and physically. Using the artistic technique of body mapping proved to be very useful in this project, as it allowed participants to embody the emotional and psychological pain caused by their refugee experiences through art. Holding a paint brush, painting and being taught by a renowned artist, in this instance Rachel Gadsden, were for the majority of the participants a new experience. It provided them with a feeling of pride, achievement and self-fulfilment, at a time when they needed it the most. But what are they painting? How are they expressing their experiences? How do they portray themselves? What do they say about their new lives? Do their own narratives confirm widespread notions of their ‘vulnerability’?

    Decades of displacement

    Saddam Hussein’s decades of authoritarian rule in Iraq, the continuous political instability caused by his fall in 2003 and the rise of the so-called Islamic State (ISIS) in 2014 has forced over three million Iraqis to flee their country since the 1980s. Since the outbreak of the Syrian civil war in 2011, Syrians have become one of the largest groups of refugees, with more than five million civilians forced to flee to neighbouring Middle Eastern countries and to Europe. Many Iraqi and Syrian refugees have headed to Europe directly and settled in countries such as Germany or the UK, others went through multi-local trajectories of displacement in so-called ‘transit countries’ such as Jordan.

    Syrian and Iraqi societies are to a significant extent tribal and patriarchal in nature, with familial or community-based social networks often serving to protect their members. However, these networks may be disrupted or disappear entirely during a migration process, leaving women and children in particular in extremely vulnerable situations, unprotected by their family networks. Women, as well as children, very often find themselves in the most subservient and marginal positions, making them vulnerable to abuse and violence, inflicted either by social and religious communities or the state. Human trafficking operations have played a central role in facilitating immigration. In such circumstances, human traffickers who bring migrants across borders abuse women and children and force them into sexually exploitive occupations, or subject them to physical and sexual abuse themselves. Tackling violence against women and girls is one of the UK government’s most important goals. The UK’s aid report in 2015 highlights explicitly the challenges the UK faces regarding the conflict in Iraq and Syria and the need to support peace and stability abroad, in order to secure social and political stability in the UK. The UK government is working extensively towards implementing the ‘No One Behind Promise’, which strives to achieve gender equality, prioritise the empowerment of girls and women and end violence against them, within war zones, such as in Syria and Iraq, and during migration processes in particular.

    Women are often limited to gender-specific narratives of female vulnerability within patriarchal social structures. Without neglecting the fact that women are more affected by and subject to sexual and gender-based violence, the over 150 women we talked and worked with in our projects so far have another story to tell. In our art workshops, these women used art and body-mapping to express their powerful stories of resilience, endurance and survival.

    Gender roles in a time of war and instability

    “I never worked with fabric, but I learnt how to produce the most amazing clothes for women’s engagement and wedding parties. I go around clothing shops in the city and try to sell them. Now I have my own network of buyers. I earn more money now than my husband used to earn. He passed away five years ago and left me with three children to feed. Yes, they call me sharmuta – a slut – because I go around male merchants in town to see whether they would buy my products. I don’t sleep with them. I only sell them my dresses. I don’t do anything wrong. Therefore, I will not stop. I cannot stop. I have children to feed. The problem is not me – the problem is their dirty thinking, only because I am a woman and a good-looking one too [laughing].”

    The young Iraqi widow above was not the only female refugee in Jordan, the UK or in Germany who struggles with social stigmatisations and sexual harassment, on the way to and from work as well as in the workplace. Women’s independence is very often violently attacked, verbally and physically, in order to control women’s lives, bodies and sexuality. Refugee women’s pending legal status, their socio-economic integration and the degree of their security within the host environment change long-held values on family structures and socio-cultural expectations on gender roles. They also influence women and men’s own understanding of their roles which, in most cases, represents a shift from their traditional gender roles within their families. Women and men’s roles in family and society inevitably change in time of war and forced migration and society needs to adapt to this development. In order to achieve sustainable change in society’s perception, both men and women need to be socialised and equipped to understand these societal changes. This does not solely apply to the refugee communities, but also to the host communities, who are also influenced by the presence of these newcomers.

    Through stitching fabric onto their body map paintings or adding pictures of the food they cook to sell on the canvases, women express their attempts to survive. Through art, women can portray how they see themselves: strong in enduring the hardship, without neglecting the challenges they face. “I want to show the world out there that we are not poor victims. One woman like us is better and stronger than 100 men,” as one Iraqi in Germany explains. Another Syrian in the UK emphasised women’s resilience, saying “wherever we fall we will land straight. I want to paint my head up for these politicians to know that nothing will bend us”.

    Women in our art workshops see the production of their artwork and the planned art exhibitions as an opportunity to provide a different narrative on Muslim refugee women. It provided them with a space to articulate the challenges they faced, during and after their refugee journey, but also to create a bridge between the refugee communities and the host community. The artwork produced in the workshops helped to facilitate community bonding, integration and above all, as one Syrian in Jordan explains, “a better understanding of what we really are”.
    https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/blog/summer-showcase-2019-iraqi-syrian-refugees-body-mapping
    #corps #cartographie #cartoexperiment #réfugiés #réfugiés_syriens #réfugiés_irakiens #asile #migrations #couture #femmes #genre #dessin
    ping @reka

    • Negotiating Relationships and Redefining Traditions: Syrian and Iraqi Women Refugees in Jordan
      Art workshops in Jordan April 2019

      Narratives of displacement is a research-based project of the University of Birmingham and funded by the British Academy, documenting the effects of the long and extensive conflict in Syria and the consequent process of significant temporary and permanent displacement of families, upon the marriages and the family-units of the many thousands of Syrian and Iraqi women affected, and now living as refugees, and as asylum-seekers, within several host nations, namely: Germany, UK and Jordan.

      The project is devised and directed by Dr Yafa Shanneik, and comprises at its core the collecting and collating of data, in several locations, in this instance within Jordan, by Shanneik, by means of a comprehensive and broad-reaching programme of interviews with women affected, personal testimony, that considers the sustainment of the marriage and the family unit, and those topics directly related to this, ranging from, the physical, and frequently arduous and perilous, journey from home to host country, to the shifting balance as to the family provider – affected in turn by, for example, skills and the availability of opportunity, psychological changes within individual family members, cultural differences within those host nations.

      Dr Shanneik is acutely conscious of the forced upheaval, the diaspora of no choosing, and the desire therefore, the longing, of those affected, to give voice to the emotional impact, simply to tell their own stories. And, for this reason she has enlisted the services of artist Dr Rachel Gadsden, who will, over an extended period, work with the interviewees, together with family members, mothers, sisters, children, to create mural-style artwork, using the body-mapping process as a starting-point, to depict not only the destruction they may have left behind, the harrowing passages and the significant demands imposed by the process of integration, but also, perhaps, the opportunities, both foreseen and unforeseen, of the new circumstances that they find themselves in.

      The artwork will serve an additional purpose: the opportunity for the testimony, the stories, to be presented to the outside world, a public voice in the form of an exhibition; and therefore, as a means of enhancing this experience, composer and musician Freddie Meyers has been commissioned to compose an original score integrates the Syrian and Iraqi narratives as part of a live art performance, that will sit alongside the exhibition of artworks, to provide an additional layer in terms of expressing the emotional response.

      The starting-point for this particular leg of the project is the one-time fortified town of Karak. Historically, Karak was always of importance, in its strategic location overlooking the easy trading route formed by the valley and the escarpment that is now the Kings Highway, running from north to south through the centre of the country. There will always have been a ‘stop-over’ here, and certainly in the time of the Nabateans, it would have been both a military base and one of many toll-gates, alongside of course Petra in the south, used to control the movement of frankincense, in particular, shipped and sold to Rome, that made the Nabateans so wealthy and enduring. Later, it was held by the Romans themselves, and later again the, Frankish, Crusaders, who used it as a means of protecting Jerusalem, until finally it was laid siege to and liberated by Saladin.

      This fascinating and colourful history is of great significance in terms of Narratives of Displacement, exemplifying as it does the history of the different forms of migration, movement, cross-cultural trade and interface that has been instrumental in forging the tolerant and diverse nature of modern Jordan.

      Since the conflict in Syria began it is understood that there are, conservatively, over a million Syrians currently taking refuge in Jordan, and the country therefore actively engages in seeking to understand the many and continuing pressures consequent to this, borne not only by the refugees themselves but by their hosts, and impinging upon the infrastructure and social and work environment, the better to accommodate the enormous influx.

      The project for five days has based itself at the Al Hassan Cultural Community centre, interestingly on the other side of the valley from, and having spectacular views of, the liberated fortress. Strategically this location is still of importance. Under the inspirational guidance of its director, Ouruba al Shamayle, the community centre houses an extensive library, research and study rooms, and also a brilliant 800 seat theatre and, used in conjunction with Karak University, attracts students hailing from every other part of the country, north and south.

      The immediate vicinity of the centre alone plays host to many hundreds of refugee families, and so over the juration of our stay the centre has witnessed a continuous visitation of the women and their families, attending for interview with Shanneik, and subsequently to interact in creating body-mapping paintings. The interviewing process has been successful and revealing in documenting individual narratives, and the participants have rendered their often-harrowing stories within a total so far of 7 narrative canvases.

      The venue has proved wholly appropriate for additional reasons. The centre plays host to the regular round-table forum of local community leaders, and consequently on Wednesday, Shanneik was given the opportunity to present to a near full complement of forum members including influential local tribal and community leaders. The talk generated considerable interest and discussion amongst the forum, who voiced their appreciation of the objectives, and offered continuing support.

      Subsequently the governor of Karak, Dr. Jamal Al Fayez, visited the centre to familiarize himself with the research, taking a short break for coffee and relaxed discussion about the project’s aims and objectives, and additionally contributing to the artwork underway, completing a part of the painted surface of one of the artworks, and also superimposing in charcoal some of the written word to be contained in the finished pieces.

      From Karak we journeyed north to Irbid where the weather took a turn for the worse. With the rain and the cold, we were conscious of how such conditions might affect our ability to link up with prospective artistic collaborators. The first workshop in Irbid brought together a group of both Syrian and Iraqi women and was hosted in a private home. A red plastic swing swaying in the sitting room, caught our attention. Our Iraqi host has 2 young children, a daughter, and a son who is autistic. The swing allows the son to continue to enjoy physical activity throughout the winter months – this winter, apparently, having been one of the longest. We painted two canvases; one that accommodated two Syrian sisters and our Iraqi host, and one created on traditional dark canvas and telling the stories of displacement of the four Iraqi women, designed in a circular pattern and evoking journeys and life’s force. After the women drew and painted, music filled the air as all the Iraqi women danced and sang traditional songs together. It was a joy for Yafa and Rachel to witness: art and music transports the mood, and the women let their feelings go, laughed, sang and danced together. Rachel recorded their ululation; to incorporate in the music and performance Freddie Meyers is composing.

      That night there was crashing thunder and flashes of lightning, so no surprise that our trip to Mafraq, further north, had to be postponed – flooding can be a hazard on these occasions as rainwater pours down from the mountains and fills up the dry wadis. So instead the project headed to a Palestinian refugee camp, to a society that supports orphaned children.

      Freddie and Tim were not able to join the workshop and so went off to film the surrounding area. Hearing the stories of migration is always a challenge, but as Yafa interviews the women a clear narrative emerges to guide the piecing together of the artwork. This time there were two Iraqi women and also two Syrian women. Despite living in the same building, the two Syrians had never before spoken to one another. One of the Iraqi women has been fantastically creative in her efforts to secure the lives of her children, taking whatever work she can to support her family, having been widowed five years ago. Adoption is rare in these communities so it was heartening to hear about the work of the society as it goes about raising funds to educate and support the young orphans. The psychological impact upon the women is invariably, but perhaps not always addressed or discussed, and the process of art and the interviews can be cathartic, allowing the women to be open and perhaps emotionally truthful about their predicament.

      The weather turned the following day, so Mafraq was back on the schedule. The project visited a centre that teaches basic skills to support and enable refugees to seek work. A group of five women who all had direct contact with the centre joined the workshop. The women were all from Homs, and its environs. One of the canvases tells of the many ways the refugees fled their homeland and made their way to Jordan, both north and south. The key factor that emerged was that all of the women wanted to hold hands in the painting. It is clear that they support one another. Yafa and Rachel had the opportunity to visit the temporary homes of three of the women. As is to be expected, living conditions can sometimes be difficult, with problems related to dampness, for example, lack of adequate heating, and overcrowding. Despite the challenges the women were making traditional food to sell in the market and doing whatever they could to make the daily conditions and circumstances for their families better.

      The final destination for the project was Amman, where the project was hosted at the Baqa’a Palestinian refugee camp. It was market day in Baqa’a so our journey into the camp was more a case of maneuvering around stallholders than following the road. Al Baqa’a camp was one of six “emergency” camps set up in 1968 to accommodate Palestine refugees and displaced people who left the West Bank and Gaza Strip as a result of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. Over 200,000 people live in the camp now; the community has welcomed recently many Syrian and Iraqi refugees.

      We were hosted by an organisation that also supports orphans, and they had brought together the group of Syrian women refugees and their children for our art workshop. 
Their husbands and fathers are all missing as a direct result of the Syrian conflict. We hear this narrative often, the bravery of each of the women as they share their stories and continue to support their families in the best possible way they can, is humbling. 
We will be creating a full narrative artwork, but these images say so much already.

      14-sketches13-blue-muralWe were additional joined in this workshop by Nicola Hope and Laura Hope, friends of Rachel’s. Nicola is at University studying Arabic and is currently attending Arabic classes as part of her degree process in Amman, and Laura, an Italian literature teacher was visiting her daughter. Additionally so as not to let the men miss out of the experience of the centre and the Baqa’a hospitality, the hosts took all of us on a tour of the camp after the workshop.

      Having listened to many harrowing and challenging stories of displacement during their time in Jordan, told by the Syrian and Iraqi refugee artistic collaborators, at the forefront of Yafa’s and Rachel’s mind is the fact that displacement is never a temporary predicament, it is a continuing one. The emotional scars are life long, and they have yet to meet a single refugee whose greatest hope is anything other than to safely return home.

      This was even more evident at Baqa’a Refugee Camp. Vulnerable individuals have a remarkable ability to survive, and ultimately they have no other choice other than to do just that.

      https://www.birmingham.ac.uk/schools/ptr/departments/theologyandreligion/research/projects/narratives-of-displacement/blog.aspx
      #art

  • For Iranians, the War Has Already Begun – LobeLog
    https://lobelog.com/for-iranians-the-war-has-already-begun

    #Iran is only marginally reflected in the U.S. news, which means the American public does not hear voices that express the human suffering caused by the U.S. government far beyond its borders. The murder and dismemberment of Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi Arabia, Trump’s best ally in the region, is a rare instance of attention given to the nature of America’s allies and Iran’s opponents in the Middle East. Pro-democracy Iranians worldwide are experiencing a political trauma. They feel alienated from both internal and world politics. They are unable to communicate the debilitating pain of, on the one hand, expecting a military attack by the United States and on the other, the worsening of the political landscape in their home country.

    [...]

    Living a double life between the United States and Iran, I struggle daily with moments of despair and alienation: I am simply unable to communicate my concerns with the most caring colleagues at work and at school. U.S. civil society is so devoid of a voice representing my position that I struggle to find a way to verbalize my sense of panic, frustration, and despair. These fused feelings emerge because the wall between me and the rest of the society does not allow them to see the impact of the U.S. government’s decisions in lives lived far from them, but so close to my heart.

    #etats-unis #guerre

  • NSO, une société israélienne qui vend ses spywares - Thread by oliviertesquet :
    https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1108631504547127296.html

    En mai 2017, dix jours après l’assassinat du journaliste mexicain Javier Valdez, qui enquêtait sur les cartels de la drogue, sa femme a été ciblée par un logiciel espion de NSO, une société israélienne qui vend ses spywares… au gouvernement mexicain.
    Le remarquable @citizenlab de Toronto, qui enquête sur NSO depuis deux ans avec des ONG mexicaines, avait déjà montré que des collègues de Valdez ont été hameçonnés de la même manière dans les jours qui ont suivi sa mort.
    Au total, 25 personnes ont été pris pour cible à l’aide du spyware de NSO au Mexique : 9 journalistes, des avocats, un ressortissant américain et un enfant qui étudiait aux Etats-Unis.
    Ces derniers mois, le nom de NSO a ressurgi à 14000km de Mexico : en Arabie Saoudite. On soupçonne la société israélienne d’avoir aidé les sbires de Ben Salmane à surveiller Jamal Khashoggi dans les mois qui ont précédé son exécution stambouliote.

  • American values : Embassies are for chopping up journalists, not protecting them — RT Op-ed
    https://www.rt.com/op-ed/456344-assange-khashoggi-embassy-us-values

    Valeurs US : les ambassades, ça sert à découper en rondelles les journalistes, pas à les protéger. C’est... saignant comme titre !

    Fair-minded people across the world have rightly condemned the US-ordered arrest of Julian Assange. However, few have noted how it fits part of a pattern of American hypocrisy when it comes to the treatment of journalists.

    Only six months ago, Jamal Khashoggi was murdered and hacked to pieces by Saudi agents at the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul. He was a columnist at the Washington Post and editor-in-chief of the Al-Arab News Channel, known for his sharp criticism of the illegal US-backed Saudi war on Yemen.

    Despite a CIA conclusion that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered the gruesome assassination, President Donald Trump stood by his ally and no meaningful sanctions or penalties were directed towards Riyadh.

    #khashoggi #assange

    • C’est une façon très concrète de dire ce qui est.

      Chez nous, en France, je parle depuis la France, on continue de faire comme si les gens qui gouvernent avaient la moindre idée de ce qu’est l’état de droit. De ce qu’est la décence. Mais quand aujourd’hui, un porte-parole de parti t’explique que la collusion ça n’existe pas quand t’es une femme, parce que y-a un joker qui s’appelle féminisme, tu comprends que ces gens n’ont absolument aucune décence. Sans parler du « reste ». Les centaines de mutilés de ces derniers mois démontrent à leur façon que gouverner, c’est prévoir... d’acheter des armes pour mutiler sa population.

      Et donc, oui, les US et leurs alliés démontrent que la diplomatie n’existe plus. C’est un message relativement fort. Et si j’étais chef d’état, je tâcherai d’aller rendre visite aux autres pays du monde, pour vérifier s’ils sont dans le même état d’esprit, et j’essaierai d’entretenir de bonnes relations avec ceux-ci. Je doute que notre cowboy de pacotille ait ce genre de préoccupations, tellement il est occupé à brader les richesses collectives pour le compte des oligarques divers et variés.

    • La communication est une science toujours inexacte, et parfois mensongère. La majorité actuelle en fait la démonstration quotidienne. Car de la même façon que le président de la République dénonce officiellement les comptes anonymes utilisés sur les réseaux sociaux pour mieux s’en servir dans sa propagande (voir ici notre article), il ne cesse de propager des mensonges tout en prétendant combattre les « fake news ».

      C’est Emmanuel Macron lui-même qui s’est approprié cet anglicisme. Mais qu’on les nomme fake news, informations fallacieuses, « infox », fausses nouvelles, ou juste mensonges, l’intention est la même. Tromper en toute connaissance de cause.

      Il ne s’agit en effet pas ici de faire part de divergences d’analyse, de prétendre que le président ment quand il affirme que la suppression de l’impôt sur la fortune est une bonne chose pour l’économie française. Il est probable que le président croie en ce qu’il dit.

      Il ne s’agit pas non plus de s’attarder sur ses jugements à l’emporte-pièce, du type « Je traverse la rue et je vous trouve du travail ». Il est ici question de mensonges purs et durs. De faits sciemment déformés, omis ou transformés.

      Sibeth Ndiaye, la nouvelle porte-parole du gouvernement, anciennement chargée des relations presse à l’Élysée, doit se mordre les doigts d’avoir un jour dit la vérité à L’Express à propos des bobards de l’exécutif : « J’assume de mentir pour protéger le président. »

      Depuis, elle a nié avoir tenu ces propos. Mais ne dément-elle pas pour « protéger le président » ?

      Comme s’il voulait décrédibiliser par avance les informations à paraître, Emmanuel Macron assurait le 26 juillet 2018 à ses amis, aux prémices de l’affaire Benalla, que « nous avons une presse qui ne cherche plus la vérité ». En réalité, c’est l’Élysée qui cherche à l’en détourner.

      Les fausses vidéos de l’affaire Benalla (Emmanuel Macron)

      Ismaël Emelien, en promotion pour la sortie de son livre écrit avec David Amiel, a eu les plus grandes difficultés à se défendre. Le 19 juillet 2018, au lendemain des révélations du journal Le Monde sur les agissements d’Alexandre Benalla, le conseiller spécial du chef de l’État avait orchestré la riposte en faisant diffuser par un compte anonyme sur les réseaux sociaux des vidéos censées dédouaner Benalla.

      Deux problèmes se posent. Tout d’abord, Ismaël Emelien a utilisé une vidéo issue des caméras de surveillance de la police, ce qui est illégal. Il prétend qu’il ne connaissait pas l’origine de ces vidéos. Qu’il n’a pas pensé à se renseigner.

      Mais l’Élysée a aussi fait circuler, avec la bénédiction de Sibeth Ndiaye qui a conseillé aux journalistes d’aller consulter ces vidéos, le film d’un homme très agité poursuivant un groupe d’hommes vêtus de noir, chaise à la main.

      Le problème, comme l’a raconté Le Monde, est qu’il ne s’agit pas du tout du jeune homme immobilisé par Alexandre Benalla place de la Contrescarpe. La vidéo a été tournée le soir, bien après l’intervention musclée d’Alexandre Benalla. Et selon une enquête publiée jeudi 4 avril par le site la-bas.org, l’homme à la chaise poursuivait en réalité des militants « antifas ».

      Mais Emmanuel Macron lui-même a endossé ce mensonge, alors que la comparaison des deux hommes sur ces vidéos ne tromperait pas un enfant familier du jeu des sept erreurs (chaussures de couleurs différentes, blouson sans fourrure…).

      Quelques jours plus tard, le 26 juillet, à la Maison de l’Amérique latine, outre le fait qu’il se plaint de cette « presse qui ne recherche plus la vérité », Emmanuel Macron lance : « Les images tournent en boucle d’une scène inadmissible et que je condamne. Je ne vois jamais la scène d’avant, la scène d’après. Quel est le contexte, qu’est-ce qui s’est passé ? S’agissait-il d’individus qui buvaient gentiment un café en terrasse ? Que s’est-il passé juste ensuite ? »

      Le chef de l’État fait ensuite clairement référence à cette vidéo tournée postérieurement. « J’ai cru comprendre qu’il y avait des images, poursuit-il. Où sont-elles ? Sont-elles montrées avec la même volonté de rechercher la vérité et d’apporter de manière équilibrée les faits ? Non. » Avant de conclure : « Je vois un pouvoir médiatique qui veut devenir un pouvoir judiciaire. »

      La réalité est tout autre. Des investigations journalistiques ont mis en lumière des faits avérés sur lesquels la justice enquête aujourd’hui.

      La perquisition à Mediapart sur les enregistrements Crase/Benalla (Nicole Belloubet)

      Après que nous avons diffusé les extraits d’une conversation entre Alexandre Benalla et Vincent Crase, Mediapart a reçu, le vendredi 1er février, une demande de réquisition de ces extraits par les juges d’instruction de l’affaire du 1er Mai.

      Nous avons tout de suite fait savoir que nous ne nous opposions pas à cette réquisition judiciaire, de façon que des juges indépendants puissent authentifier les documents publiés et statuer, notamment, sur la violation du contrôle judiciaire.

      Cet accord a été renouvelé le lundi 4 février, à 9 heures.

      Pourtant, ce même lundi 4 février, peu après 11 heures, notre journal a fait l’objet d’une tentative de perquisition après l’ouverture d’une enquête préliminaire par le parquet de Paris des chefs d’« atteinte à l’intimité de la vie privée » et de « détention illicite d’appareils ou de dispositifs techniques de nature à permettre la réalisation d’interception et de télécommunications ou de conversations ».

      Deux procureurs du parquet de Paris se sont présentés à notre journal et nous ont annoncé qu’ils venaient pour procéder à une perquisition, et non réquisitionner les enregistrements publiés.

      Vu que nous avions déjà donné notre accord pour la réquisition judiciaire, la tentative de perquisition n’avait qu’un seul objectif : identifier nos sources, et faire peur à tous ceux susceptibles de nous parler.

      Devant l’Assemblée nationale, et pour justifier cette tentative de perquisition, la ministre de la justice Nicole Belloubet a cependant déclaré le 5 février : « Mediapart a dans un premier temps refusé cette remise, mais comme la presse s’en est fait l’écho, depuis, les bandes sonores ont été remises à la justice, ce qui est une très bonne chose, je crois, pour que toute la vérité soit faite dans cette affaire. »

      En mélangeant sciemment les deux procédures, Nicole Belloubet a menti.

      Geneviève Legay, blessée à Nice par un policier (Emmanuel Macron)

      Lors de rassemblements à Nice, le 23 mars, Geneviève Legay, porte-parole d’Attac, est blessée lors d’un rassemblement de gilets jaunes.

      Le lundi 25 mars, le procureur de la République indique, lors d’une conférence de presse, que Geneviève Legay « n’a pas été touchée par des policiers. Il n’y a aucun contact direct entre un policier et cette dame ».

      Dans un entretien avec Nice Matin, publié le lundi 25 mars, le président de la République déclare à son tour, sans la moindre prudence, que « cette dame n’a pas été en contact avec les forces de l’ordre ». Il ajoute quelques phrases qui ont profondément irrité Geneviève Legay : « Pour avoir la quiétude, il faut avoir un comportement responsable. […] Quand on est fragile, qu’on peut se faire bousculer, on ne se rend pas dans des lieux qui sont définis comme interdits et on ne se met pas dans des situations comme celle-ci. »

      Or dès le 23 mars, comme nous l’avons révélé, un policier expliquait le jour même du rassemblement sur procès-verbal qu’au vu des premiers éléments de l’enquête, la victime, âgée de 73 ans, avait été heurtée par « un homme portant un bouclier ».

      Au cours de son audition, un autre policier, ayant participé à la charge, avait précisé : « Nous avons chargé, donc effectivement nous avons poussé les personnes devant nous. […] C’est après la charge en me retournant que j’ai constaté qu’une femme était à terre. »

      Le gouvernement et les chômeurs « trop » indemnisés (Édouard Philippe)

      Le premier ministre et la ministre du travail affirment qu’un chômeur sur cinq gagnerait plus au chômage que dans son travail précédent. Ce chiffre est en réalité totalement vicié et aboutit à un mensonge qui salit 600 000 personnes.

      Comment est-ce possible ? Le gouvernement compare deux périodes qui ne sont pas les mêmes. Avec une méthode de calcul différente, l’Unédic aboutit au chiffre de moins d’un salarié sur 25 se retrouvant dans la situation décrite par l’exécutif.

      Pour le sociologue spécialisé dans les politiques de l’emploi Mathieu Grégoire, il s’agit donc d’« un artefact statistique » et d’« une manipulation assez troublante des chiffres ».

      Selon le gouvernement, ce sont les salariés en contrats courts, généralement peu qualifiés et peu rémunérés, qui sont censés « trop » profiter de l’assurance-chômage. Et en dépit du calcul erroné, c’est sur eux que le gouvernement devrait faire porter l’essentiel des économies à venir.

      Le nombre d’ultras parmi les gilets jaunes (Emmanuel Macron)

      Le jeudi 31 janvier, Emmanuel Macron reçoit cinq journalistes pour une « discussion informelle » autour d’un café. Le président de la République se montre très offensif au moment de dénoncer les violences commises lors des manifestations des « gilets jaunes ». Selon lui, elles seraient l’œuvre « de 40 à 50 000 militants ultras qui veulent la destruction des institutions ». « Face aux violences orchestrées par les extrêmes », rapporte Paris-Match, le chef de l’État « met en garde contre la ‘‘fachosphère’’ et la ‘‘gauchosphère’’ qui ont surinvesti les réseaux sociaux ».

      Pourtant, dans les jours précédents, selon nos enquêtes, des notes des services de renseignement sont remontées à l’Élysée. Et elles disent précisément l’inverse de ce que prétend Macron.

      En effet, à ce moment-là, l’ultradroite se désengage « à Paris comme en province ». Selon la DGSI, « la scène d’ultradroite est quasi inexistante au sein des cortèges ». Même au plus fort de leur mobilisation les premières semaines du mouvement, les services ne comptaient que « quelques centaines d’individus » relevant de cette mouvance.

      À l’ultragauche, alors ? Pas plus. « L’ultragauche s’est impliquée de manière limitée dans un mouvement perçu comme populiste et réactionnaire », écrit-on à la DGSI. Des sources dans différents services de renseignement donnent un même chiffre de 300 militants « au grand maximum » d’ultras de droite et de gauche réunis au plus fort du mouvement, début décembre. En mars, ils n’étaient plus que quelques dizaines.

      Dans la même interview, le président de la République décrit le mouvement des gilets jaunes comme « une manipulation des extrêmes, avec le concours d’une puissance étrangère : la Russie de Poutine ». Or la DGSI et la DGSE n’auraient toujours pas trouvé la moindre trace d’ingérence russe. Et l’Élysée n’a jamais voulu nous faire part de ses sources sur le sujet.

      Le retour des djihadistes français (Emmanuel Macron)

      « Contrairement à ce que j’ai pu lire ou entendre, il n’y a pas un programme de retour des djihadistes qui est aujourd’hui conçu, nous restons sur la même doctrine », explique à l’occasion du « grand débat » Emmanuel Macron à des élus de la Région Grand Est. Selon lui, il n’y aurait donc jamais eu de programme de retour des djihadistes français. Pas question de donner l’impression de tergiverser.

      Selon nos informations, les services des ministères des affaires étrangères, de la défense, de l’intérieur et de la justice travaillaient pourtant bien depuis l’automne 2018 au retour des djihadistes détenus par les Kurdes de Syrie.

      Les conditions du programme de retour étaient tenues pour acquises par les principaux acteurs du dossier lorsque, dans la première quinzaine de février, le président de la République a changé d’avis.

      Qu’est-ce qui a fait changer Emmanuel Macron de position et l’a ainsi fait aller à l’encontre des préconisations de son administration ? L’Élysée n’a pas répondu à nos sollicitations.

      Le chlordécone ne serait pas cancérigène (Emmanuel Macron)

      « Il ne faut pas dire que ce pesticide est cancérigène. » En une phrase, le président de la République a soulevé l’indignation, en particulier des élus d’outre-mer qui lui faisaient face le vendredi 1er février, à l’Élysée, pour une rencontre dans le cadre du grand débat national.

      La discussion portait sur la dangerosité du chlordécone, un pesticide extrêmement toxique et perturbateur endocrinien, classé « cancérigène possible » par l’Organisation mondiale de la santé (OMS) dès 1979 et utilisé jusqu’en 1993 dans les bananeraies en Guadeloupe et en Martinique. Ce jour-là, pour le président, « il ne faut pas dire que c’est cancérigène. Il est établi que ce produit n’est pas bon, il y a des prévalences qui ont été reconnues scientifiquement, mais il ne faut pas aller jusqu’à dire que c’est cancérigène parce qu’on dit quelque chose qui n’est pas vrai et qu’on alimente les peurs ».

      Presque tous les Guadeloupéens et les Martiniquais sont contaminés au chlordécone, selon une étude publiée par Santé publique France en 2018. Et les sols sont pollués pour quatre cents à sept cents ans.

      Estomaqués par les propos du président, l’urologue Pascal Blanchet et le chercheur à l’Inserm Luc Multigner ont répondu en rappelant, entre autres, que « l’exposition au chlordécone est associée à une augmentation de risque de survenue du cancer de la prostate ».

      Face à la polémique, l’Élysée a maladroitement tenté de faire machine arrière, plaidant le malentendu, sans convaincre personne.

      La mort de Jamal Khashoggi (Jean-Yves Le Drian)

      Dès le 6 octobre 2018, soit quatre jours après la disparition de Jamal Khashoggi, un notable saoudien exilé aux États-Unis et devenu chroniqueur au Washington Post, qui n’est jamais ressorti de son consulat à Istanbul où il venait chercher des papiers administratifs, les autorités turques commencent à laisser filtrer des informations auprès de la presse indiquant que le journaliste a été tué dans l’enceinte diplomatique.

      Les jours suivants, la police et le gouvernement turcs distillent de plus en plus de preuves des agissements d’une équipe de tueurs saoudiens composée de proches du prince hériter Mohammed ben Salamane, qui aurait interrogé, torturé, puis découpé en morceaux la victime.

      Le 11 octobre, Ankara laisse entendre qu’elle possède un enregistrement audio de ce qui s’est déroulé à l’intérieur du consulat, qui ne laisserait aucune doute sur la culpabilité des Saoudiens.

      Le 10 novembre, le président turc Recep Tayyip Erdogan affirme que l’enregistrement a été fourni aux États-Unis, au Royaume-Uni, à la France, à l’Allemagne et au Canada.

      Pourtant, Jean-Yves Le Drian, ministre des affaires étrangères bien timide sur le dossier, nie le 12 novembre sur France 2 avoir eu connaissance de l’enregistrement. Et il ajoute : « Si le président turc a des informations à nous donner, il faut qu’il nous les donne », soulevant l’indignation des autorités turques.

      Après une longue enquête, Mediapart a obtenu la confirmation auprès de sept diplomates et fonctionnaires du renseignement français que le Quai d’Orsay, à son plus haut niveau, avait bien eu accès à ces enregistrements à la date où le ministre s’exprimait.

      L’hommage au maréchal Pétain (Florence Parly)

      À l’occasion des cent ans de l’Armistice, l’état-major des armées souhaitait organiser, « en présence du président de la République », un hommage aux huit maréchaux de la Grande Guerre, dont Philippe Pétain. Dans un premier temps, l’Élysée laisse passer cette option, qui se retrouve inscrite dans le programme officiel des célébrations.

      Mais face à l’ampleur de la polémique, l’hommage est finalement retiré in extremis. Ce qui n’empêche pas la ministre des armées Florence Parly de jurer au micro de BFM-TV que « l’État-major n’a jamais imaginé rendre hommage au maréchal Pétain », mais qu’il souhaitait uniquement « rendre hommage aux maréchaux qui sont aux Invalides ».

      Cette cérémonie était pourtant bel et bien prévue, comme l’a d’ailleurs confirmé l’Élysée à Mediapart. Et il n’y a pas de place pour le doute. Chaque étape de cette « itinérance mémorielle » avait été minutieusement préparée : les dossiers de presse sur le site de la Mission du centenaire et sur celui du ministère de l’éducation nationale ne faisaient pas mystère de la présence du président de la République.

      Pataugeant dans ses dénégations, Emmanuel Macron aura au passage jugé « légitime » de rendre hommage au maréchal Pétain, soulignant que le dirigeant du régime de Vichy avait été « pendant la Première Guerre mondiale un grand soldat », même s’il a « conduit des choix funestes » pendant la Seconde. Des déclarations qui ont fait bondir la plupart des historiens.

      Un paparazzi placé en garde à vue pour rien (l’Élysée)

      Le Palais n’a pas attendu les derniers mois pour diffuser des craques. Dès septembre 2017, l’Élysée fait fuiter dans Challenges une information censée montrer à quel point Emmanuel Macron est un président magnanime. « EXCLUSIF. Emmanuel Macron vient de décider d’abandonner ses poursuites judiciaires qu’il avait engagé [sic] contre un paparazzi. »

      La réalité est autre. Selon des informations obtenues à l’époque par Mediapart, s’il est mis un terme à cette affaire très médiatisée, c’est en fait parce que le parquet de Marseille a classé sans suite l’enquête préliminaire ouverte en août pour « harcèlement » et « atteinte à la vie privée ». La plainte de l’Élysée ne tenait pas la route : le photographe mis en cause, Thibaut Daliphard, n’avait commis aucun des délits que l’Élysée lui reprochait.

      Ce photographe avait été contrôlé une première fois par un officier de sécurité devant la résidence privée de Marseille où les époux Macron passaient quelques jours de vacances au mois d’août, et s’était vu répondre qu’il n’y aurait pas de possibilité de prendre des clichés ce jour-là.

      Le lendemain, l’Élysée venant de confirmer que le couple présidentiel y passait ses vacances, le photographe s’était présenté à nouveau devant la résidence pour aller aux nouvelles, sans appareil photo.

      Selon Thibaut Daliphard, il s’était alors heurté à un homme qu’il avait pris pour un policier et qui lui avait déclaré : « Je n’aime pas votre métier », « Ce que vous faites, c’est du harcèlement », puis « Je vais vous placer en garde à vue, je vais vous faire coffrer pour 48 heures ».

      Selon Thibaut Daliphard, alors qu’il attend les forces de l’ordre, son téléphone sonne. « Je décroche le téléphone, il me saute dessus, essaie de me l’arracher, je me débats, puis il me dit : vous êtes en garde à vue, vous n’avez pas le droit de téléphoner. » Puis arrivé au commissariat du VIIIe arrondissement de Marseille, le commissaire présent sur place lui aurait confié : « Je suis désolé, on me demande de vous placer en garde à vue. »

      Thibaut Daliphard restera six heures en cellule. Le matériel, la carte-mémoire et l’ordinateur de ce journaliste sont fouillés.

      Ce n’est qu’un an plus tard, à l’été 2018, que Thibaut Daliphard découvrira que l’homme qui l’a violenté n’était pas un policier. Mais Alexandre Benalla.

  • Saudi Arabia paying Jamal Khashoggi’s children thousands each month – report | World news | The Guardian
    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/02/saudi-arabia-paying-jamal-khashoggis-children-thousands-each-month-repo

    The children of murdered Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi have received multimillion-dollar homes and are being paid thousands of dollars per month by the kingdom’s authorities, the Washington Post has reported.

    Khashoggi – a contributor to the Post and a critic of the Saudi government – was killed and dismembered in October at the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul by a team of 15 agents sent from Riyadh. His body has not been recovered.

    The payments to his four children – two sons and two daughters – “are part of an effort by Saudi Arabia to reach a long-term arrangement with Khashoggi family members, aimed in part at ensuring that they continue to show restraint in their public statements”, the Post said.
    Saudi crown prince wanted to go after Jamal Khashoggi ’with a bullet’ – report
    Read more

    The houses given to the Khashoggi children are located in the port city of Jeddah and are worth up to $4m, the newspaper reported.

    #arabie_saoudite #khashoggi ... beurk

  • Interview with CEO of NSO Group – Israeli spyware-maker – on fighting terror, Khashoggi murder, and Saudi Arabia - 60 Minutes - CBS News
    https://www.cbsnews.com/news/interview-with-ceo-of-nso-group-israeli-spyware-maker-on-fighting-terror-kh

    Tonight we’ll take you inside the growing, shadowy global market of cyber espionage. We looked specifically at a controversial Israeli company called the NSO Group, valued at nearly a billion dollars, that says it developed a hacking tool that can break into just about any smartphone on Earth.

    NSO licenses this software, called Pegasus, to intelligence and law enforcement agencies worldwide, so they can infiltrate the encrypted phones and apps of criminals and terrorists. Problem is this same tool can also be deployed by a government to crush dissent. And so it is that Pegasus has been linked to human rights abuses, unethical surveillance, and even to the notoriously brutal murder of the Saudi Arabian critic Jamal Khashoggi.

    Headquartered in the Israeli city of Herzliya, NSO Group operates in strict secrecy. But co-founder and CEO, Shalev Hulio, has been forced out of the shadows and not into a good light, accused of selling Pegasus to Saudi Arabia despite its abysmal record on human rights.

    Lesley Stahl: And the word is that you sold Pegasus to them, and then they turned it around to get Khashoggi.

    Shalev Hulio: Khashoggi murder is horrible. Really horrible. And therefore, when I first heard there are accusations that our technology been used on Jamal Khashoggi or on his relatives, I started an immediate check about it. And I can tell you very clear, we had nothing to do with this horrible murder.

    #NSO organise sa défense dans l’affaire #kashoggi ?

  • Palestinian youth killed by Israeli forces near Bethlehem
    March 21, 2019 11:15 A.M.
    http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?ID=782937

    BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) — A 22-year-old Palestinian succumbed to wounds he had sustained after Israeli forces opened heavy fire towards a vehicle that he was riding in, near the al-Nashash checkpoint in the southern occupied West Bank district of Bethlehem, on late Wednesday.

    The Palestinian Ministry of Health confirmed that Ahmad Jamal Mahmoud Munasra, 22, a resident from Wadi Fukin village, in the Bethlehem district, was shot with Israeli live fire in the chest, shoulder, and hand.

    The ministry said that Munasra was transferred to the Beit Jala Governmental Hospital, where he succumbed to his wounds.

    The ministry mentioned that another Palestinian was shot and injured in the stomach.

    #Palestine_assassinée

    • Gideon Levy // Even for the Wild West Bank, This Is a Shocking Story

      A young Palestinian’s attempt to help a stranger shot by Israeli troops costs him his life
      Gideon Levy and Alex Levac Mar 28, 2019
      https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-even-for-the-wild-west-bank-this-is-a-shocking-story-1.7066087

      Jamal, Ahmad Manasra’s father. A mourning poster for Ahmad is in the background. Credit : Alex Levac

      It was appallingly cold, rainy and foggy on Monday of this week at the southern entrance to Bethlehem. A group of young people stood on the side of the road, gazing at something. Gloomy and toughened, they formed a circle around the concrete cube in which are sunken the spikes of a large billboard – an ad for Kia cars that stretches across the road. They were looking for signs of blood, as though they were volunteers in Zaka, the Israeli emergency response organization. They were looking for bloodstains of their friend, who was killed there five days earlier. Behind the concrete cube they found what they were looking for, a large bloodstain, now congealed. The stain held fast despite the heavy rain, as though refusing to be washed away, determined to remain there, a silent monument.

      This is where their friend tried, in his last moments, to find protection from the soldiers who were shooting at him, probably from the armored concrete tower that looms over the intersection a few dozen meters away. It was to here that he fled, already wounded, attempting to take cover behind the concrete cube. But it was too late. His fate was sealed by the soldiers. Six bullets slashed into his body and killed him. He collapsed and died next to the concrete cube by the side of the road.

      Even in a situation in which anything is possible, this is an unbelievable story. It’s 9 P.M. Wednesday March 20. A family is returning from an outing. Their car breaks down. The father of the family, Ala Raida, 38, from the village of Nahalin, who is legally employed paving roads in Israel, steps out of his Volkswagen Golf to see what has happened. His wife, Maisa, 34, and their two daughters, Sirin, 8, and Lin, 5, wait in the car. Suddenly the mother hears a single shot and sees her husband lean back onto the car. Emerging from the car, she discovers to her astonishment that he’s wounded in the stomach. She shouts hysterically for help, the girls in the car are crying and screaming.

      Another car, a Kia Sportage, arrives at the intersection. Its occupants are four young people from the nearby village of Wadi Fukin. They’re on the way home from the wedding of their friend Mahmoud Lahruv, held that evening in the Hall of Dreams in Bethlehem. At the sight of the woman next to the traffic light appealing for help, they stop the car and get out to see what they can do. Three of them quickly carry the wounded man to their car and rush him to the nearest hospital, Al-Yamamah, in the town of Al-Khader. The fourth young man, Ahmad Manasra, 23, stays behind to calm the woman and the frightened girls. Manasra tries to start the stalled car in order to move it away from the dangerous intersection, but the vehicle doesn’t respond. He then gets back out of the car. The soldiers start firing at him. He tries to get to the concrete cube but is struck by the bullets as he runs. Three rounds hit him in the back and chest, the others slam into his lower body. He dies on the spot.

      The army says that stones were thrown. All the eyewitnesses deny that outright. Nor is it clear what the target of the stones might have been. The armored concrete tower? And even if stones were thrown at cars heading for the settlement of Efrat, is that a reason to open fire with live ammunition on a driver whose car broke down, with his wife and young daughters on board? Or on a young man who tried to get the car moving and to calm the mother and her daughters? Shooting with no restraint? With no pity? With no law?

      We visit the skeleton of an unfinished apartment on the second floor of a house in Wadi Fukin. It’s an impoverished West Bank village just over the Green Line, whose residents fled in 1949 and were allowed to return in 1972, and which is now imprisoned between the giant ultra-Orthodox settlement of Betar Ilit and the town of Tzur Hadassah, which is just inside the Green Line. A wood stove tries to rebuff the bitter cold in the broad space between the unplastered walls and the untiled floor. A grim-looking group of men are sitting around the fire, trying to warm themselves. They are the mourners for Manasra; this was going to be his apartment one day, when he got married. That will never happen now.

      Only the memorial posters remain in the unbuilt space. A relative and fellow villager, Adel Atiyah, an ambassador in the Palestinian delegation to the European Union, calls from Brussels to offer his shocked condolences. One of the mourners, Fahmi Manasra, lives in Toronto and is here on a visit to his native land. The atmosphere is dark and pained.

      The bereaved father, Jamal, 50, is resting in his apartment on the ground floor. When he comes upstairs, it’s clear he’s a person deeply immersed in his grief though impressive in his restraint. He’s a tiler who works in Israel with a permit. He last saw his son as he drove along the main street in Bethlehem as his son was going to his friend’s wedding. Jamal was driving his wife, Wafa, home from another wedding. That was about two hours before Ahmad was killed. In the last two days of his life they worked together, Jamal and his son, in the family vineyard, clearing away cuttings and spraying. Now he wistfully remembers those precious moments. Ahmad asked to borrow his father’s car to drive to the wedding, but Jamal needed it to visit the doctor, and Ahmad joined the group in Wahib Manasra’s SUV.

      Wahib Manasra, who witnessed the gunfire. Credit: Alex Levac

      Quiet prevails in the shell of the unfinished apartment. Someone says that Manasra was already planning the layout of his future home – the living room would be here, the kitchen there. Maisa Raida, the wife of the wounded driver, is at her husband’s bedside at Hadassah Medical Center, Ein Karem, Jerusalem, where he’s recovering from his severe stomach wound. He was brought there from Al-Khader because of the seriousness of his condition. Major damage was done to internal organs in his abdomen and he needed complicated surgery, but he seems to be on the mend.

      Maisa told a local field investigator from a human rights group that at first she didn’t realize that her husband was wounded. Only after she stepped out of the car did she see that he was leaning on the vehicle because of the wound. She yelled for help, and after the young men stopped and took her husband to the hospital, she got back into the car with Manasra, whom she didn’t know. While they were in the car with her daughters, and he was trying get it started, she heard another burst of gunfire aimed at their car from the side, but which didn’t hit them.

      She had no idea that Manasra was shot and killed when he got out of the car, moments later. She stayed inside, trying to calm the girls. It wasn’t until she called her father and her brother-in-law and they arrived and took her to Al-Yamamah Hospital that she heard that someone had been killed. Appalled, she thought they meant her husband but was told that the dead person had been taken to Al-Hussein Hospital in Beit Jala.

      Eventually, she realized that the man who was killed was the same young man who tried to help her and her daughters; he was dead on arrival. Before Maisa and her daughters were taken from the scene, an officer and soldiers from the Israel Defense Forces came to the stalled car and tried to calm them.

      Manasra was dead by then, sprawled next to the concrete cube. He was a Real Madrid fan and liked cars. Until recently he worked in the settlement of Hadar Betar, inside Betar Ilit. His little brother, 8-year-old Abdel Rahman, wanders among the mourners in a daze.

      After Jamal Manasra returned home, his phone began ringing nonstop. He decided not to answer. He says he was afraid to answer, he had forebodings from God. He and his wife drove to the hospital in Beit Jala. He has no rational explanation for why they went to the hospital. From God. “I was the last to know,” he says in Hebrew. At the hospital, he was asked whether he was Ahmad’s father. Then he understood. He and his wife have two more sons and a daughter. Ahmad was their firstborn.

      We asked the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit a number of questions. Why did the soldiers shoot Ala Raida and Ahmad Manasra with live ammunition? Why did they go on shooting at Manasra even after he tried to flee? Did the soldiers fire from the armored watchtower? Do the security cameras show that stones were indeed thrown? Were the soldiers in mortal danger?

      This was the IDF’s response to all these questions: “On March 21, a debriefing was held headed by the commander of the Judea and Samaria Division, Brig. Gen. Eran Niv, and the commander of the Etzion territorial brigade, Col. David Shapira, in the area of the event that took place on Thursday [actually, it was a Wednesday] at the Efrat junction and at the entrance to Bethlehem. From the debriefing it emerges that an IDF fighter who was on guard at a military position near the intersection spotted a suspect who was throwing stones at vehicles in the area and carried out the procedure for arresting a suspect, which ended in shooting. As a result of the shooting, the suspect was killed and another Palestinian was wounded.

      T he West Bank settlement of Betar Ilit is seen from the rooftop of Wadi Fukin, a Palestinian village. Credit : \ Alex Levac

      “The possibility is being examined that there was friction between Palestinians, which included stone-throwing.

      “The inquiry into the event continues, parallel to the opening of an investigation by the Military Police.”

      After the group of young people found what they were looking for – bloodstains of their friend, Ahmad – they reconstructed for us the events of that horrific evening. It was important for them to talk to an Israeli journalist. They’re the three who came out alive from the drive home after the wedding. One of them, Ahmad Manasra – he has the same name as the young man who was killed – wouldn’t get out of the car when we were there. He’s still traumatized. Wahib Manasra, the driver of the SUV, showed us where the stalled VW had been, and where they stopped when they saw a woman shouting for help.

      Soldiers and security cameras viewed us even now, from the watchtower, which is no more than 30 meters from the site. Wahib says that if there was stone-throwing, or if they had noticed soldiers, they wouldn’t have stopped and gotten out of the car. Raida, the wounded man, kept mumbling, “My daughters, my daughters,” when they approached him. He leaned on them and they put him in their car. By the time they reached the gas station down the road, he had lost consciousness. Before that, he again mumbled, “My daughters.”

      Wahib and the other Ahmad, the one who was alive, returned quickly from the hospital, which is just a few minutes from the site. But they could no longer get close to the scene, as a great many cars were congregated there. They got out of the car and proceeded on foot. A Palestinian ambulance went by. Looking through the window, Wahib saw to his horror his friend, Ahmad Manasra, whom they had left on the road with the woman and her girls, lying inside. He saw at once that Ahmad was dead.

    • Israeli army seeks three months community service for soldier who killed innocent Palestinian
      Hagar Shezaf | Aug. 16, 2020 | 1:25 PM- Haaretz.com
      https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-israeli-army-seeks-community-service-for-soldier-who-killed-innoce

      The Military Advocate General is to seek a sentence of three months’ community service for an Israeli soldier who shot and killed an innocent Palestinian, as part of a plea bargain signed with the solider.

      The 23-year-old victim, Ahmad Manasra, was helping a man who had been shot by the same soldier and seriously wounded. The soldier who killed Manasra was charged with negligent homicide, but was not charged for wounding the other man, although the first shooting is mentioned in the indictment.

      According to an eyewitness, the soldier fired six bullets at Manasra.

      The soldier has since been released from the Israel Defense Forces. The army did not respond to Haaretz’s query as to whether the soldier had continued in his combat role after the shooting.

      The plea bargain, which states that the soldier will be given a three-month prison sentence that he will serve as community service, will be brought before the military court in Jaffa on Monday. The deal also states that the soldier will be given a suspended sentence and will be demoted to the rank of private.

      This is the first time an indictment has been served against a soldier following the killing of a Palestinian since the case of Elor Azaria, who shot and killed a wounded and incapacitated assailant in Hebron in 2016.

      According to the July indictment, in March of 2019 Alaa Raayda, the 38-year-old Palestinian who was shot in the stomach and seriously wounded, was driving his car together with his wife and two daughters when another car crashed into them at a junction near the village of El-Hadar in the southern West Bank. The other car fled the scene, and Raayda left his vehicle and waved his hands at the other car. The indictment states that the solider thought that Raayda was throwing stones at Israeli vehicles and proceeded to shout warnings and fire into the air before shooting at him.

      However, in Raayda’s affidavit, he states that he was shot outside his vehicle without warning, which is an infraction of the rules of engagement.

      The indictment then states that Manasra came to Raayda’s aid, with three friends who had been on their way home with him after a wedding in Bethlehem. The three helped evacuate the wounded man to the hospital, while Manasra remained at the scene with Raayda’s wife and daughters to help them start their car. According to the indictment, Manasra was shot when he exited the car, and then shot again when he tried to flee the scene.

      The indictment also states that the soldier started shooting when he “mistakenly thought" that Manasra “was the stone-thrower he has seen earlier… although in fact the man who was killed had not thrown stones.”

      In response to the plea bargain, Manasra’s father, Jamal, told Haaretz: “In our religion it says you have to help everyone. Look what happened to my son when he tried to help – they shot him dead. It doesn’t matter how much I talked to Israeli television and newspapers, nothing helped.”

      Attorney Shlomo Lecker, who is representing the families of Raayda and Manasra, asked to appeal the plea bargain when it was issued last month. To this end, he asked for a letter summarizing the investigation, the reason the soldier had not been charged for shooting and wounding Raayda, and that the case had been closed. However, Lecker said the prosecutor in the case and the head of litigation, Major Matan Forsht, refused to give him the document. On Thursday, Lecker submitted his appeal against the plea bargain based on the facts in the indictment, but his request to postpone the hearing until after a decision on his petition was rejected.

      According to Lecker: “The higher echelons of the army convey a message to soldiers in the occupied territories that if they shoot Palestinians for no reason, killing and wounding them, the punishment will be three months of raking leaves” at the Kirya military base in Tel Aviv.

      The IDF Spokesperson’s Unit said that on the day of the shooting, “a warning had been received shortly before the shooting of a possible terror attack in the area,” adding that “the indictment was filed in the context of a plea bargain after a hearing. In the framework of the plea bargain the soldier is expected to take responsibility and admit to the facts of the indictment before the court."

      The plea agreement is subject to the approval of the military court and will be presented to it in the near future. In coming to a decision regarding the charges and the sentence, complex evidentiary and legal elements were taken into consideration, as well as the clear operational circumstances of the event, and the willingness of the soldier to take responsibility, the IDF said.

      The statement said that “contrary to the claims of the representative of the families of the killed and wounded men,” there has been an ongoing dialogue with him for a long time … thus the representative was informed of the negotiations and he was given the opportunity to respond. He also received a copy of the indictment and it was explained that he could convey any information he saw fit with regard to his clients, which would be brought before the military court when the plea bargain was presented. The hearing was also put off for a week at the request of the parties, which was filed at [Lecker’s] request.”

  • MBS approved ’intervention’ against dissidents : NYT report | News | Al Jazeera
    https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/03/mbs-approved-intervention-dissidents-nyt-report-190318075621971.html

    More than a year before the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, Saudi Arabia’s powerful Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, also known as MBS, approved a secret campaign to silence dissenters, the New York Times has reported.

    The campaign included surveillance, kidnapping, detention and torture of Saudis, said the report published on Sunday citing the US officials who have read classified intelligence reports about the effort.

    American officials referred to it as the Saudi Rapid Intervention Group, the Times said.

    #mbs #khashoggi

  • If Palestinians have 22 states, Israeli Jews have 200

    The notion that the Palestinians have 22 states to go to is a blend of malice and ignorance: The Palestinians are the stepchildren of the Arab world, no country wants them and no Arab country hasn’t betrayed them
    Gideon Levy
    Mar 16, 2019 1

    https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-if-palestinians-have-22-states-israeli-jews-have-200-1.7023647

    Here we go again: The Palestinians have 22 states and, poor us, we have only one. Benjamin Netanyahu isn’t the first to use this warped argument; it has been a cornerstone of Zionist propaganda that we’ve imbibed with our mothers’ milk. But he returned to it last week. “The Arab citizens have 22 states. They don’t need another one,” he said on Likud TV.

    If the Arab citizens of Israel have 22 countries, the state’s Jewish citizens have almost 200. If the prime minister meant that Arab citizens could move to Arab countries, it’s obvious that Jews are invited to return to their country of origin: Palestinians to Saudi Arabia and Jews to Germany.

    Netanyahu belongs in the United States much more than Ayman Odeh belongs in Yemen. Naftali Bennett will also find his feet in San Francisco much more easily than Ahmad Tibi in Mogadishu. Avigdor Lieberman belongs in Russia much more than Jamal Zahalka belongs in Libya. Aida Touma-Sliman is no more connected to Iraq than Ayelet Shaked, whose father was born there. David Bitan belongs to Morocco, his birthplace, much more than Mohammad Barakeh does.

    To really understand Israel and the Palestinians - subscribe to Haaretz

    The notion that the Palestinians have 22 states to go to is a blend of malice and ignorance. Underlying it are the right wing’s claims that there is no Palestinian people, that the Palestinians aren’t attached to their land and that all Arabs are alike. There are no greater lies than these. The simple truth is that the Jews have a state and the Palestinians don’t.

    The Palestinians are the stepchildren of the Arab world. No country wants them and no Arab country hasn’t betrayed them. Try being a Palestinian in Egypt or Lebanon. An Israeli settler from Itamar is more welcome in Morocco than a Palestinian from Nablus.

    There are Arab states where Israeli Arabs, the Palestinians of 1948, are considered bigger traitors than their own Jews. A common language, religion and a few cultural commonalities don’t constitute a common national identity. When a Palestinian meets a Berber they switch to English, and even then they have very little in common.
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    The suggestion that Israel’s Arab citizens move to those 22 states is despicable and mean, well beyond its reference to a common language. It portrays them as temporary guests here, casting doubt on the depth of their attachment to their land, “inviting” them to get out. The amazing thing is that the ones making such proposals are immigrants and sons of immigrants whose roots in this country still need to withstand the test of time.

    Palestinians are attached to this country no less than Jews are, possibly more so. It’s doubtful whether the hysterical clamoring for foreign passports would seize the Arab community as it did the Jewish one; everybody was suddenly of Portuguese descent. We can assume that there are more people in Tel Aviv dreaming of foreign lands than there are in Jenin. Los Angeles certainly has more Israelis than Palestinians.

    Hundreds of years of living here have consolidated a Palestinian love of the land, with traditions and a heritage – no settler can match this. Palestinians have za’atar (hyssop) and we have schnitzel. In any case, you don’t have to downplay the intensity of the Jewish connection to this country to recognize the depth of the Palestinian attachment to it.

    They have nowhere to go to and they don’t want to leave, which is more than can be said for some of the Jews living here. If, despite all their woes, defeats and humiliations they haven’t left, they never will. Too bad you can’t say the same thing about the country’s Jews. The Palestinians won’t leave unless they’re forcibly removed. Is this what the prime minister was alluding to?

    When American journalist Helen Thomas suggested that Jews return to Poland she was forced to resign. When Israel’s prime minister proposes the same thing for Arabs, he’s reflecting the opinion of the majority.

    From its inception, the Zionist movement dreamed of expelling the Palestinians from this country. At times it fought to achieve this. The people who survived the ethnic cleansing of 1948, the expulsions of 1967, the occupation and the devil’s work in general have remained here and won’t go anywhere. Not to the 22 states and not to any one of them. Only a Nakba II will get them out of here.

  • A défaut d’un système d’#identification centralisé concernant les migrants irréguliers décédés en mer. Des #morts_sous_X par centaines

    Comment des milliers de migrants morts échoués sur les côtés marocains sont-ils identifiés ? Comment les autorités marocaines parviennent-elles à connaître leurs noms et leur identité et permettent-elles à leurs familles de faire leur deuil ? « Le taux d’identification demeure faible voire limité et ce sujet ne semble pas se poser avec acuité pour les autorités locales », a indiqué Younous Arbaoui, responsable plaidoyer & coordination au sein de la Plateforme nationale protection migrants (PNPM) lors d’une conférence de presse organisée mercredi dernier pour présenter le rapport de la PNPM intitulé « Identification des personnes migrantes décédées aux frontières maritimes marocaines ». D’après lui, les autorités marocaines ne disposent d’aucun système centralisé ni de démarches procédurales permettant d’identifier les corps des migrants qui voyagent le plus souvent sans documents d’identité.
    L’intervenant a également précisé que l’identification des corps se fait grâce à des témoignages (déclarations des migrants qui ont vécu avec le défunt, des représentants communautaires ou associations) ou à des témoins (reconnaissance faciale par un membre de la famille ou un ami). Pourtant, il a précisé que le taux d’identification demeure très faible comme en atteste le cas de la ville de Tanger où ce taux ne dépasse pas, en moyenne, 2% selon des chiffres émanant des responsables de la morgue de la ville, ce qui veut dire que 98% des personnes repêchées par les autorités de Tanger sont non-identifiées et restent anonymes. A Nador, le taux est également très faible. En fait, sur les 81 corps repêchés au cours de l’été 2017, seulement 15 personnes ont été identifiées soit uniquement 18,5 %. Idem à Tétouan où la majorité des morts n’a pas été identifiée formellement.
    Concernant l’identification par témoin, l’intervenant a révélé que, souvent, les personnes qui ont survécu au naufrage sont rapidement séparées des morts par les autorités qui les considèrent comme des « migrants irréguliers » qui n’intéressent que les seules autorités nationales chargées du contrôle des frontières et ces personnes sont même souvent soit déplacées de force vers les villes du Sud du Maroc ou bien détenues/expulsées sans les impliquer ou leur donner l’occasion de contribuer à l’identification de leurs compagnons de voyage.
    En ce qui concerne l’usage des indices matériels trouvés sur les corps des victimes, la manière dont ils sont analysés et archivés n’est pas claire. Idem pour l’autopsie où l’expertise, les ressources ou encore le savoir-faire qui font défaut.
    Pour les méthodes basées sur l’analyse des empreintes et l’ADN (méthodes formelles), le défi est souvent de trouver des échantillons de référence. Ceci d’autant plus que les migrants ne sont pas tous enregistrés auprès des autorités marocaines avant leur mort. En fait, un nombre important de migrants n’est pas connu par les autorités car ils entrent clandestinement au Maroc et se dirigent vers Tanger ou Nador.
    Cependant, l’intervenant a affirmé que les migrants sénégalais font exception puisque la majorité des morts est identifiée grâce à l’implication du consulat sénégalais à travers ses agents installés dans différentes provinces du Maroc.
    L’autre problème, et non le moindre, réside dans la décomposition des corps des migrants décédés. C’est souvent le cas lorsque les dépouilles restent longtemps en mer et/ou conservées dans les réfrigérateurs de la morgue. A ce propos, Elouafa Jamal, de clinque El Hijra- Rabat, a indiqué que les autorités marocaines peinent à trouver des espaces et des facilités pour conserver les corps. Les témoignages collectés montrent que la capacité des morgues dans les trois villes concernées (Tanger, Tétouan et Nador) est limitée. Dans ce sens, il a noté qu’à Nador, la morgue est souvent obligée de conserver plus de dépouilles dans des espaces destinés initialement à en accueillir moins et qu’il arrive même que des corps soient conservés dans des chambres dont la température est inadéquate. Pire, quand un corps n’est pas identifié dans les deux mois, le procureur du Roi à Nador donne l’ordre de l’enterrer, ce qui permet de décharger la morgue. A Tétouan, la morgue est parfois obligée de mettre deux corps dans un espace destiné à un seul dans l’attente de la mise en fonction de la nouvelle morgue qui souffre d’un manque de personnel. A Tanger, la capacité de la morgue est limitée car l’identification prend du temps et si la dépouille n’est pas identifiée à l’issue de deux mois, elle doit être enterrée.
    Comment le PNPM envisage-t-il de résoudre ce problème ? Quelle réponse institutionnelle, réglementaire et juridique faut-il y apporter ? Qui sera chargé de gérer ce dossier face à la multiplication des intervenants (ministères de la Santé, de l’Intérieur et de la Justice, communes, Gendarmerie Royale,…) ? Qui doit payer les frais générés par l’opération d’identification (L’ UE, le Maroc, les pays d’origine des migrants, les familles, …) ? « L’enjeux est de taille et sincèrement, nous n’avons pas de réponse claire. D’ailleurs, notre ambition, via ce rapport, est d’ouvrir le débat sur ce sujet et d’impliquer l’opinion publique nationale et les autorités », nous a expliqué Younous Arbaoui. Mais en attendant que ce débat national soit initié, la Plateforme nationale protection migrants recommande l’implication des survivants des naufrages dans la procédure d’identification et le renforcement de la collaboration avec les consulats étrangers.
    Il est également question d’élargir la recherche des empreintes digitales en consultant tous les systèmes d’enregistrement d’empreintes disponibles au niveau national et en impliquant le système d’enregistrement du Haut-commissariat des Nations unies pour les réfugiés (HCR) sans oublier de collaborer avec les autorités des pays d’origine.
    La PNPM demande de cesser d’arrêter les membres de la famille des défunts qui se présenteraient aux autorités dans l’objectif de leur permettre de prélever des échantillons de référence ADN, et ce même s’ils sont en situation irrégulière ; ou bien de mandater une autre institution (qui n’a pas le mandat d’arrêter les migrants irréguliers) pour opérer les prélèvements d’ADN.
    Le ministère de la Santé a été aussi sollicité afin de pouvoir utiliser les échantillons prélevés dans les établissements de soins dans le cadre d’examens médicaux ou du sang stocké dans les banques dédiées. Le département de la Santé est également appelé à adapter la capacité d’accueil des morgues des villes frontalières au phénomène des morts en mer. Enfin, le PNPM estime qu’il est nécessaire de mener une enquête interne sur le manque d’intérêt des agents chargés de l’identification, sur l’usage des indices matériels trouvés sur les corps des victimes et sur la façon dont ces indices sont analysés et archivés.


    https://www.libe.ma/A-defaut-d-un-systeme-d-identification-centralise-concernant-les-migrants-irreg
    #mer #Mer_Méditerranée #cadavres #décès #mourir_en_mer #morts #asile #migrations #réfugiés #Maroc #Tétouan #taux_d'identification #Tanger #Nador #ADN

    • Les autorités marocaines appelées à identifier les migrants décédés aux frontières maritimes

      Aucune donnée ne permet, aujourd’hui, de connaître le nombre exact de migrants décédés ni la manière avec laquelle ils sont traités en tant que “morts”.

      Ils ne sont pas des anonymes. Ils ont un nom, une famille, une histoire, des droits. Le réseau de plaidoyer “Plateforme nationale de protection des migrants” (PNPM) veut attirer l’attention sur l’identification de migrants décédés aux frontières maritimes marocaines. Aucune donnée ne permet, aujourd’hui, de connaître avec exactitude le nombre de ces décès ni la manière avec laquelle ils sont traités en tant que “morts”. C’est le constat que dresse cette plateforme en ouvrant, ce mercredi à Rabat, le débat sur ce sujet qu’elle estime absent de la scène marocaine. “Il s’agit d’un engagement pris par les Etats dans le cadre du Pacte mondial pour des migrations sûres, ordonnées et régulières et le droit international qui les contraint à respecter les morts”, déclare le responsable du plaidoyer et coordinateur de la PNPM, Younous Arbaoui, en présentant ce rapport.

      Ce respect dû aux morts commence par leur “donner vie”. Le processus n’a rien de facile, car le taux d’identification formelle des ces migrants décédés, pour le moment, “est très faible”. A Tanger, il est de 2%, selon la morgue, relève ce rapport, constatant, ainsi que 98% des personnes repêchées par les autorités de la ville sont restées des anonymes. Dans la ville de Nador, cette fois-ci, sur 81 morts, au cours de l’été 2017, 15 seulement ont pu être identifiés, soit 18,5%, ajoute la même source. Quant à Tétouan, la plateforme n’a pas réussi à établir une estimation, précisant que la morgue de la ville l’avait informée que la majorité des morts n’est pas identifiée formellement. Toutefois, la PNPM relève une exception auprès des services consulaires sénégalais qui lui ont affirmé, de leur côté, qu’à travers leurs agents installés dans différentes provinces du Maroc, la majorité des personnes décédées d’origine sénégalaise est identifiée.

      Le fait que la plupart de ces migrants décédés ne soit pas identifiée n’est pas sans conséquences. La PNPM explique que leurs familles ne peuvent en faire le deuil, ni prendre les mesures légales que le décès d’un membre implique notamment au niveau de l’héritage, des assurances, du remariage ou encore du pouvoir parental. Une situation qui montre à quel point l’identification formelle doit se faire en tant qu’urgence sociale.

      “Une identification faciale peut se faire par témoins, mais ce n’est pas suffisant pour reconnaître formellement une personne”, signale Younes Arbaoui. Et pour cause, l’identification par témoin n’apporte pas toujours les indices nécessaires mais peut, néanmoins, servir de “valeur ajoutée”, pour augmenter les chances d’identification formelle. Sur ce point, la PNPM regrette que les survivants des naufrages ne soient pas impliqués dans l’identification. Considérés comme des “clandestins”, ces derniers sont séparés des morts et remis aux autorités nationales chargées des frontières, pour être, ensuite, expulsés ou détenus. Tandis que les morts relèvent de la responsabilité des autorités locales, souligne ce rapport.
      Des recommandations

      “Le ministère de l’Intérieur devrait essayer d’impliquer les survivants dans ce processus. C’est notre première recommandation !”, souligne Arbaoui, ajoutant que plusieurs indices matériels peuvent également servir dans ce processus. Ces indices concernent le passeport ou les papiers d’identité retrouvés sur le corps de la victime. “Il faut archiver ces indices pour mener de nouvelles tentatives d’identification. Tout ce que porte la victime doit être conservé. Pour cela, nous recommandons au Maroc de collaborer avec le comité de la Croix rouge en cas de manque d’expertise”, propose le président de la Clinique juridique Hijra, Jamal El Ouafa.

      À ces indices matériels s’ajoutent d’autres, scientifiques, servant à l’identification, notamment les empreintes. “C’est un grand défi ! Souvent, les empreintes sont putréfiées par l’eau. Alors, il faut retrouver les empreintes de la victime enregistrées avant sa mort, sauf que ces migrants ne se font pas enregistrer par les autorités”, constate le coordinateur de la plateforme. Pour relever ce “grand défi”, la PNPM recommande aux autorités marocaines d’élargir leurs recherches à toutes les bases de données disponibles au-delà de la gendarmerie et de la police et d’impliquer également le Haut Commissariat des Nations unies pour les réfugiés (HCR). Ce dernier procède, en effet, à l’enregistrement des demandeurs d’asile et peut aider, selon la PNPM, à identifier certaines victimes. Et à ces efforts, la plateforme recommande de joindre les autorités des pays d’origine pour faciliter l’identification.

      Tout aussi formelle que les empreintes, l’analyse ADN est également recommandée par la plateforme estimant, toutefois, que la difficulté de trouver l’échantillon référence pose là aussi une sérieuse difficulté. “D’après les témoignages recueillis, la seule possibilité est de faire appel à la famille de la victime. Mais, parfois, cette dernière ne réside pas au Maroc, sinon, elle est réticente à se présenter aux autorités”, fait remarquer Arbaoui. Et de préciser qu’”à Tanger, la PNPM a appris que certains membres de familles se sont faits arrêter alors qu’ils se présentaient pour un prélèvement ADN”.

      La plateforme appelle ainsi les autorités à ne pas interpeller les familles concernées “même si ses membres sont clandestins” et recommande aux ministères de l’Intérieur et de la Santé de travailler en collaboration pour établir une base de données commune. “Il est préférable de faire appel à des institutions qui n’ont pas pour mandat d’arrêter le migrant irrégulier, comme les morgues, afin d’effectuer ces prélèvements”, propose-t-elle.

      Autre problème que le Maroc est appelé à résoudre concerne les morgues. A Tanger, indique Jamal El Ouafa, “au bout de 2 mois, le corps d’un migrant anonyme est enterré et si l’identification est accomplie, l’enterrement doit se faire dans les plus brefs délais”. Le ministère de la Santé devrait adapter la capacité de ses morgues se trouvant dans les zones frontalières à ce phénomène, estime-t-il.

      Par ailleurs, la PNPM nourrit un doute quant à la volonté des fonctionnaires locaux de procéder à l’identification de ces morts. Dans son rapport, elle suppose que les agents de l’autorité ne font pas assez, par conviction, peut-être, que cette mission relève de “l’impossible”. “La victime est considérée comme ‘juste’ un migrant”, souligne le coordinateur de la plateforme, appelant le ministère de l’Intérieur à mener des enquêtes internes pour s’en assurer. “Il faut s’assurer si ce n’est pas l’attitude des fonctionnaires locaux envers les migrants, liée à leur origine ou à la manière dont ils sont décrits par les politiciens et parfois les médias comme ‘un groupe’ qui est à l’origine du faible taux d’identification”.

      https://www.huffpostmaghreb.com/entry/les-autorites-marocaines-appelees-a-identifier-les-migrants-decedes

  • « Des recherches ont montré que le logiciel espion Pegasus de NSO Group a été utilisé à travers le monde pour attaquer des personnes de la société civile, dont au moins 24 défenseurs des droits humains, journalistes et parlementaires au Mexique, un membre du personnel d’Amnesty International, les dissidents saoudiens Omar Abdulaziz, Yahya Assiri et Ghanem Al Masarir, le militant des droits humains Ahmed Mansoor (lauréat du prix Martin Ennals pour les défenseurs des droits humains) et probablement Jamal Khashoggi avant sa mort. »

    https://www.amnesty.org/fr/latest/news/2019/02/spyware-firm-buyout-reaffirms-urgent-need-for-justice-for-targeted-activist

  • Endeavor Returns Money to Saudi Arabia, Protesting Khashoggi Murder - The New York Times
    https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/08/business/endeavor-saudi-arabia.html

    There was much to celebrate last spring when Ariel Emanuel, the chief executive of the talent agency Endeavor, helped throw a splashy Hollywood party for Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman.

    The soiree, with guests including the Disney chief executive Robert A. Iger, the Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and the former N.B.A. star Kobe Bryant, took place as Saudi Arabia’s government investment fund was completing an agreement to invest $400 million in Mr. Emanuel’s firm. The deal was meant to finance Endeavor’s growth, while diversifying Saudi Arabia’s economy via the talent agency’s work in sports, events, modeling and television and film production.

    Less than a year after the star-studded party, Endeavor and Saudi Arabia have gone through a messy breakup, set in motion by the murder last October of the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

    In recent weeks, Mr. Emanuel’s firm returned the $400 million investment, effectively severing Endeavor’s relationship with Saudi leaders, according to two people with knowledge of the transaction.

    It is one of the few instances of a major company halting business with the wealthy kingdom to protest its agents’ assassination of a journalist.

    #arabie_saoudite #lobbying

  • Israeli Arab slate, far-left candidate banned from election hours after Kahanist leader allowed to run
    Jonathan Lis and Jack Khoury Mar 07, 2019 7:07 AM
    https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/elections/.premium-far-left-lawmaker-banned-from-israeli-election-for-supporting-terr

    Arab political sources say the move is evidence of racism and the delegitimization of Arab society in Israel, accusing Netanyahu’s Likud party of anti-Arab incitement

    The Central Election Committee disqualified the Arab joint slate Balad-United Arab List and Ofer Cassif, a member of politicial alliance Hadash-Ta’al, from running in the election on Wednesday, opposing the opinion of Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit.

    Michael Ben Ari and Itamar Ben-Gvir from the Kahanist, far-right Otzma Yehudit party had petitioned against both lists. The committee approved Ben Air to run in the election earlier Wednesday.

    The decisions will be referred to the Supreme Court on Sunday for approval. A ban against a party slate may be appealed in the Supreme Court, which holds a special “election appeals” process, while a ban on an individual candidate automatically requires approval by the Supreme Court if it is to take effect.

    Arab political sources described the disqualification of the Balad-United Arab List slate as evidence of racism and the delegitimization of Arab society in Israel and accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party of anti-Arab incitement.

    MK David Bitan petitioned on behalf of Likud against Balad-United Arab List, and Yisrael Beitenu chairman Avigdor Lieberman petitioned against Cassif. Petitioners claimed both lists and Cassif supported terror and ruled out Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish and Democratic state. Mendelblit said he opposed all the petitions.

    Ben-Gvir presented the committee with findings he claimed should disqualify the Hadash-Ta’al slate. He mentioned a call from Ta’al chairman Ahmed Tibi to annul the Declaration of Independence, and quoted a Facebook post by Ayman Odeh, the head of Hadash.

    In the post, written following a meeting with Fatah member Marwan Barghouti at an Israeli prison, Odeh compared Barghouti to Nelson Mandela. “The meeting was moving, as well as speaking to a leader who shares my political stances.” Ben-Gvir noted Odeh defined Ahed Tamimi as an “excellent girl,” and said she showed “legitimate resistance.” Tamimi, a Palestinian teenage girl, served time in prison for slapping an Israeli soldier in 2018.

    Cassif was accused of equating Israel and the Israel Defense Forces with the Nazi regime, and it was noted that he called to fight “Judeo-Nazism,” expressed support for changing the anthem, and called Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked “Neo-Nazi scum.” He did not attend the session, but was called after committee chairman Justice Hanan Melcer insisted on his presence.

    “I come from an academic background, and my area of expertise is among other things the subject of Fascism, Nazis and nationalism in general,” said Cassif, explaining his comments. “When I speak to a friend or write a post as a private person, I use metaphors. When I used the aforementioned terms – they were metaphors.”

    In an interview last month, Cassif said Israel conducts a “creeping genocide” against the Palestinian people.

    The top candidate on the slate, Mansour Abbas, said he had expected that most of the representatives of the Zionist parties on the election committee would support the move to disqualify the slate, but added: “We are a democratic Arab list that is seeking to represent Arab society with dignity and responsibility.”

    Commenting on Benny Gantz, the leader of Kahol Lavan, which is ahead of Likud in recent polls, Abbas said: “There’s no difference between Benjamin Netanyahu and Benjamin Gantz.”

    Mtanes Shehadeh, who is No. 2 on the Balad-United Arab list slate said the decision to disqualify his slate was expected because he said the Central Election Committee has a right-wing majority and “is also controlled by a fascist, right-wing ideology.”

    His Balad faction, Shehadeh said, “presents a challenge to democracy in Israel” and challenges what he called “the right-wing regime that is controlling the country.”

    Sources from the Balad-United Arab list slate said there is in an urgent need to strip the Central Election Committee of the authority to disqualify candidates and parties from running in elections. The considerations that go into the decision are purely political, the sources said.

    Balad chairman Jamal Zahalka said the decision to disqualify the slate sends a “hostile message to the Arab public” in the country. “We will petition the High Court of Justice against the decision and in any event, we will not change our position, even if we are disqualified.”

    Earlier Wednesday, the Central Elections Committee approved Ben Ari, the chairman of the far-right Otzma Yehudit party, to run for the Knesset.

    Meretz, Stav Shaffir (Labor) and the Reform Movement, who filed the petition to the Central Elections Committee to ban Ben Ari from running for Knesset, all said they would file a petition with the High Court of Justice against the committee’s decision.

    Prior to deliberations, Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit submitted his opinion to the comittee, stating he was in favor of disqualifying Ben Ari from running for Knesset on the grounds of incitement to racism.

    In November 2017, for instance, at an annual memorial for Rabbi Meir Kahane, Ben Ari gave a speech in which he said of Israeli Arabs, “Let’s give them another 100,000 dunams [of land] and affirmative action, maybe they’ll love us. In the end, yes, they’ll love us when we’re slaughtered.”

    In May 2018, Ben Ari gave another speech in which he said, “The Arabs of Haifa aren’t different in any way from the Arabs of Gaza. How are they different? In that they’re here, enemies from within. They’re waging war against us here, within the state. And this is called – it has a name – it’s called a fifth column. We need to call the dog by its name. They’re our enemies. They want to destroy us. Of course there are loyal Arabs, but you can count them – one percent or less than one percent.”

    #Hadash

    • Outlaw Israel’s Arabs
      They are already regarded as illegitimate citizens. Why not just say so and anchor it in law?
      Gideon Levy | Mar 10, 2019 3:15 AM
      https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-outlaw-israel-s-arabs-1.7003010

      The time has come to put an end to the stammering and going around in circles: Outlaw the Arabs, all of them. Make them all illegal dwellers in their land and have the Border Police hunt them down like animals, as they know how to do. They are already regarded as illegitimate citizens. It’s time to say so and to anchor it in law.

      Discerning the differences among them is artificial: What’s the difference between the United Arab List–Balad ticket and between the Hadash–Ta’al ticket (acronyms for the Arab political parties)? Why is only the first one on this list being disqualified? And what is the difference between the Palestinians who are Israeli citizens and those living under occupation?

      Why does one group have rights while the others don’t? The time has come to rectify the situation: Ta’al should be treated like Balad; citizens of the state should be treated like those under occupation. Anything less is like paying lip service to the guardians of political correctness, to a supposed semblance of fairness, to a deceptive image of democracy. Outlawing all the Arabs is the way to ensure you have a Jewish state. Who’s against that?

      Whoever thinks what I’ve written is wrong or an exaggeration isn’t reading reality. Disqualifying the Arabs is the issue that has the broadest consensus of the current election campaign. “I’ll put it simply,” Yair Lapid, the democrat, said. “We won’t form a blocking majority with the Arabs. Period.”

      Now I, will humbly put it simply, too: This is a revolting display of racism. Period. More than the torture of the residents of Gaza and the West Bank under the guise of security concerns, in this we see a broader Israeli racism in all its glory: Pure, unadulterated and acceptable racism. It’s not Balad, but the Arabs who are being disqualified. It’s not Ofer Kassif but the left that’s being disqualified. It’s a step-by-step slide down the slope and we can no longer shut our eyes to it.

      If this discourse delegitimizing our Arab citizens isn’t driving Israeli democrats mad – then there is no democracy. We don’t need any studies or institutes: A regime that disqualifies voters and elected officials because of their blood and nationality is not a democracy.

      You don’t need to cite the occupation to expose the lie of democracy – now it’s also apparent at home, within. From Benny Gantz to Bezalel Smotrich – all of them are Ben-Zion Gopsteins. The laws against racism and all the rest are only lip service. The Israeli Knesset has 107 lawmakers; thirteen of them, most of them among the best there are, are outside the game, they have less say than the ushers.

      Now we must try to imagine what they’re going through. They hear everyone trying to distance themselves from them, as though they’re a contagious disease, and they’re silent. They hear nobody seeking to get near them as though their bodies stink, and they avoid comment. The Knesset is like a bus that has segregated its Jewish and Arab passengers, an arena of political apartheid, not yet officially so, which declares from the outset that the Arabs are disqualified.

      Why even bother participating in this game that’s already been decided? The response should have been to boycott the elections. If you don’t want us, we don’t want you. The fig leaf is torn and has long been full of holes. But this is exactly what Israel wants: A country only for Jews. Therefore Arab citizens must not play this game and must head in their masses to the polling stations, just like the prime minister said, to poke Israeli racism painfully in the eye.

      For avowed racists, it’s all very clear. They say what they think: The Jews are a supreme race, the recipients of a divine promise, they have rights to this land, the Arabs are, at best, fleeting guests.

      The problem is with the racists in masquerade like Gantz and Lapid. I have a question for them: Why are Hadash and Ta’al not eligible to be part of a bloc? Why can’t you rely on their votes and why shouldn’t their representatives belong to the government? Would Ayman Odeh be any worse a culture minister than Miri Regev? Would Ahmad Tibi be any less skillful a health minister than Yaakov Litzman? The truth is this: The center-left is as racist as the right.

      Let’s hope no Gantz-Lapid government can be formed, just because of the Arab votes that it fails to have. That would be the sweetest revenge for racism.

    • La Cour suprême israélienne invalide la candidature d’un leader d’extrême droite
      La justice a interdit la candidature du chef d’Otzma Yehudit. Elle a approuvé la liste arabe, les présences d’un candidat juif d’extrême gauche et de Ben Gvir d’Otzma Yehudit
      Par Times of Israel Staff 18 mars 2019,
      https://fr.timesofisrael.com/la-cour-supreme-israelienne-invalide-la-candidature-dun-leader-dex

      (...) Les juges ont en revanche fait savoir que Itamar Ben Gvir, qui appartient également à la formation d’extrême-droite, est autorisé à se présenter.

      Ils ont aussi donné le feu vert à une participation au scrutin du 9 avril à Ofer Kassif ainsi qu’aux factions de Balad-Raam. Kassif est le seul candidat juif à figurer que la liste Hadash-Taal et il avait été disqualifié par la commission centrale électorale en raison de déclarations controversées faites dans le passé, notamment une dans laquelle il avait qualifié la ministre de la Justice Ayelet Shaked de « racaille néo-nazie ». (...)

      #Ofer_Kassif

  • Opinion | Jared and the Saudi Crown Prince Go Nuclear? - The New York Times
    https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/02/opinion/sunday/saudi-arabia-jared-kushner-nuclear.html

    Why on earth would America put Prince Mohammed on a path to acquiring nuclear weapons? He is already arguably the most destabilizing leader in an unstable region, for he has invaded Yemen, kidnapped Lebanon’s prime minister, started a feud with Qatar, and, according to American intelligence officials, ordered the murder of the Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi.

    ##armes#nucléaire #arabie_saoudite #etats-unis

  • « Ils ont puni les victimes » : Hébron 25 ans après le massacre de la mosquée d’Ibrahim
    Middle East Eye édition française - By Megan Giovannetti
    in HÉBRON, Territoires palestiniens occupés (Cisjordanie)
    Date de publication : Lundi 25 février 2019
    https://www.middleeasteye.net/fr/news/ils-ont-puni-les-victimes-hebron-25-ans-apres-le-massacre-de-la-mosqu

    « Depuis le massacre, tout a changé. » Jamal Fakhoury, 40 ans, a du mal à trouver les mots justes pour décrire sa ville natale.

    Les sourcils froncés et les yeux humides, il confie : « Chaque jour est difficile pour Hébron. »

    Jamal Fakhoury repense au massacre de la mosquée d’Ibrahim, dont ce lundi marque les 25 ans, et à son impact sur cette ville du sud de la Cisjordanie occupée.

    Le 25 février 1994, un colon juif-américain du nom de Baruch Goldstein a ouvert le feu sur les fidèles palestiniens dans la mosquée d’Ibrahim – également connue sous le nom de Tombeau des patriarches – dans le centre de la vieille ville d’Hébron.

    « Nous ne sommes pas du tout considérés comme des humains. Nous sommes des numéros »

    - Izzat Karaki, activiste de Youth Against Settlements

    Goldstein a tué 29 personnes en un instant, et en a blessé bien plus d’une centaine. Six autres Palestiniens ont été tués par les forces de sécurité israéliennes dans le chaos qui a suivi.

    À Hébron, plus grande ville de Cisjordanie, les habitants sont tous liés les uns aux autres à travers les structures culturelles et familiales. Pratiquement tous les citoyens ont donc des liens avec le massacre de la mosquée d’Ibrahim par le biais de proches, d’amis ou de voisins.

    « Un colon américain est venu et a tué des Palestiniens », s’insurge Izzat Karaki, 29 ans, militant du groupe palestinien Youth Against Settlements (YAS). « Et après ça, ils nous punissent nous, les victimes. »

    Au-delà du deuil, l’attaque a affecté la population de Hébron d’une manière profonde et structurelle. (...)

  • #Naval_Group va créer une coentreprise en #Arabie_saoudite
    https://www.latribune.fr/entreprises-finance/industrie/aeronautique-defense/naval-group-va-creer-une-coentreprise-en-arabie-saoudite-807804.html

    Le groupe industriel français a signé un protocole d’accord en vue de créer une entreprise commune avec les Industries militaires d’Etat d’Arabie saoudite (Sami), selon un communiqué publié par Sami. Naval Group n’a pas souhaité commenter cette information. Le texte ne précise pas quels types de navires et d’équipements seront susceptibles d’être construits par cette société commune.

    Les Industries militaires d’Etat d’Arabie saoudite (#Sami) et le groupe industriel français Naval Group ont signé, ce dimanche 17 février, un protocole d’accord en vue de créer une entreprise commune qui produirait et développerait en Arabie saoudite des systèmes navals, selon un communiqué publié par Sami.

    Ce protocole d’accord a été conclu en marge d’un salon international de la défense (Idex) qui se tient tous les ans à Abou Dhabi (Émirats Arabes Unis). Sollicitée par l’AFP, une représentante de Naval Group sur place a refusé de commenter l’information.

    Côté saoudien, on insiste sur l’objectif de « localiser les compétences et les capacités industrielles », ainsi que sur la création d’emplois « hautement qualifiés ».

    Le texte ne mentionne pas le type de navires et d’équipements susceptibles d’être construits dans le royaume par cette société commune.

    Celle-ci serait « à la tête des programmes des Forces navales royales saoudiennes » et appuierait « les besoins existants et futurs », indique simplement le communiqué.

    Selon le patron de Sami, Andreas Schwer, cité dans le texte, le protocole d’accord avec Naval Group pose les fondations d’un « #partenariat_stratégique » qui permettra au royaume saoudien d’être plus autonome en matière de défense navale.

    Des ONG et des parlementaires français ont appelé à plusieurs reprises à la suspension des fournitures militaires à l’Arabie saoudite en liaison avec son intervention au Yémen et à l’assassinat en octobre par des agents saoudiens de l’éditorialiste Jamal Khashoggi.

    #transfert_de_technologie

  • Le projet de loi anti-Opep refait surface au Congrès américain
    https://www.latribune.fr/economie/international/le-projet-de-loi-anti-opep-refait-surface-au-congres-americain-807056.html

    Aux États-Unis, des parlementaires ont récemment remis sur la table un projet de loi visant à empêcher l’Organisation des pays exportateurs de pétrole (Opep) d’influencer les cours de l’or noir mais risquant aussi de provoquer de forts remous géopolitiques et financiers.

    Le projet de loi baptisé "No Oil Producing and Exporting Cartels Act of 2019" ou #NOPEC a été déposé la semaine dernière à la fois devant la Chambre des représentants et devant le Sénat américain. Cette loi, si elle était adoptée, permettrait aux autorités américaines de poursuivre tout groupe de pays s’accordant pour influencer les prix du pétrole en ajustant leur production. L’idée est d’abaisser in fine le prix de l’essence à la pompe. Pour l’heure, aucune date n’a été fixée pour son examen en séance plénière.

    L’#Opep, et son chef de file l’#Arabie_saoudite, sont directement visés. Le cartel a notamment décidé fin 2016, en association avec plusieurs pays partenaires dont la Russie, de s’imposer des quotas pour tenter de redresser les cours de l’or noir.

    Proposé pour la première fois en 2000, le projet de loi NOPEC réapparaît depuis par intermittence au Congrès américain malgré l’opposition de la Chambre américaine de commerce et de la fédération du secteur pétrolier API. Il n’a toutefois jamais été adopté. Les présidents républicain George W. Bush et démocrate Barack Obama avaient toujours averti qu’ils y mettraient leur veto.

    Le projet de loi apporte à l’administration américaine « un moyen de pression important si les prix devaient grimper », estimaient récemment dans une note les analystes de Barclays.

    Il pourrait aussi fournir « des options législatives pouvant être considérées comme des sanctions au regard du meurtre (du journaliste saoudien Jamal) Khashoggi, des tensions entre la Russie et l’Ukraine et des arrangements que l’Opep et ses partenaires pourraient envisager le mois prochain à Bakou », relevaient-ils.
    Le cartel et ses partenaires doivent discuter en Azerbaïdjan d’éventuels ajustements à l’accord les liant. Donald Trump appelle régulièrement l’Opep, parfois vertement, à ouvrir plus grand les vannes.

    Si le texte devait être adopté, le cartel - Arabie saoudite en tête -, « n’aurait alors plus aucun intérêt à se réserver une marge de manœuvre en cas de troubles », souligne James Williams de WTRG Economics.

    L’Opep maintient en effet depuis plusieurs décennies de quoi augmenter rapidement sa production pour pouvoir maintenir l’offre d’or noir sur le marché mondial, et Ryad est plusieurs fois monté au créneau pour éviter une flambée des prix, au moment des guerres en Irak ou des combats en Libye par exemple. Mais c’est coûteux. Or sans ce coussin de sécurité, « les prix fluctueront au moindre pépin », affirme M. Williams.

    « Toute loi NOPEC soulève le problème des relations entre les Etats-unis et l’Arabie saoudite », rappelle Harry Tchilinguirian de BNP Paribas. Certes les Etats-Unis, grâce à l’essor du pétrole de schiste, sont désormais moins dépendants des importations de pétrole. Mais Ryad reste « la pierre angulaire de la politique étrangère de Donald Trump au Moyen-Orient, en particulier pour tout ce qui concerne l’Iran_ », ajoute-t-il. Et le royaume est un important acheteur d’armes américaines.

    Par ailleurs, « si les prix du pétrole descendaient trop, les revenus des pays du Moyen-Orient chuteraient d’autant et leur population pourrait de nouveau manifester son mécontentement comme lors du Printemps arabe », remarque M. Williams.
    Pour tous ces risques économiques et géopolitiques, l’administration américaine n’aurait pas intérêt, selon lui, à promulguer le texte. Mais, ajoute-t-il, « avec ce président, on n’est jamais certain de rien ».

  • US arms sold to Saudi Arabia and UAE end up in wrong hands
    https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2019/02/middleeast/yemen-lost-us-arms

    Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, its main partner in the war, have used the US-manufactured weapons as a form of currency to buy the loyalties of militias or tribes, bolster chosen armed actors, and influence the complex political landscape, according to local commanders on the ground and analysts who spoke to CNN.

    By handing off this military equipment to third parties, the Saudi-led coalition is breaking the terms of its arms sales with the US, according to the Department of Defense. After CNN presented its findings, a US defense official confirmed there was an ongoing investigation into the issue.

    The revelations raise fresh questions about whether the US has lost control over a key ally presiding over one of the most horrific wars of the past decade, and whether Saudi Arabia is responsible enough to be allowed to continue buying the sophisticated arms and fighting hardware. Previous CNN investigations established that US-made weapons were used in a series of deadly Saudi coalition attacks that killed dozens of civilians, many of them children.

    The developments also come as Congress, outraged with Riyadh over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi last year, considers whether to force an end to the Trump administration’s support for the Saudi coalition, which relies on American weapons to conduct its war.

    #yémen et en syrie déjà...

  • Driving out demons in Mosul
    https://m.dw.com/en/mosul-where-demons-women-and-islamic-state-met/a-47319908

    During the IS occupation of Iraq’s Mosul, secret sessions were held for women to exorcise demons — despite the IS deeming them black magic and banning any alternative religious practices. DW’s Judit Neurink reports.

    “Women still come asking for the exorcism sessions,” says Othman, the muezzin who, five times a day, calls the faithful to pray at the Haiba Khatoon Mosque in the center of Mosul. He did the same during the three years Iraq’s second city was occupied by IS and recalls how women would flock to the mosque for the sessions held especially for them to evict djinns, as the Quran calls demons or supernatural creatures.

    Othman is sitting in the mosque’s gardens, where men are performing their prayers. This busy mosque near the University of Mosul is used a lot by traders, students and travelers who miss one of the set prayer times.

    It seems too busy a place for demon eviction sessions to have been held there, which hardly anyone knew about. Imams who returned to their mosques after IS left deny any knowledge of the practice anywhere during the occupation. “Most people in Mosul had no idea what was going on here,” Othman told DW. “Perhaps only those who regularly came to this mosque to pray.” The sessions were held between the midday and 3 p.m. prayer sessions, and only in the women’s section. “And the women only used the side entrance.”

    Secret sessions are said to have been held at the Haiba Khatoon Mosque

    As a muezzin during the IS period, and fearing repercussions, Othman is reluctant to provide his family name. But since he had to enter it five time a day for the call, he had a key to the mosque and saw dozens of foreign and local women who turned up regularly for the sessions.

    One of the documented cases was that of a young Dutch woman who lived with her IS husband and two children just around the corner in a house they shared with another IS couple. The house is still standing, and its original owners have returned.

    Exorcising the demons

    Laura H. (whose last name is protected under Dutch law), spoke to Dutch writer Thomas Rueb about the experience. Rueb went on to write a book about it, which was published last year. She went to the sessions, known as rukyah in Islam, because she said her husband had molested her, and she sought the cause for his behavior within herself. Djinns were blocking her faith, which is why she was making mistakes, she was told.

    She said she saw women take off their gloves and sit in a small room with their palms upturned. She witnessed how they would all close their eyes and the man leading the session would start to chant texts from the Quran in a strange, high-pitched voice, gradually getting louder and louder. How he would hit the women on the palms of their hands — a scandal according to IS rules prohibiting all physical contact between men and women who are not married or related.

    She recounts how a young woman fell into a trance and pulled off her scarf — another taboo. Then how the women would start to vomit and fall to the floor as if they had lost control of their muscles. How they screamed, cried and laughed. When the session ended after some 20 minutes, the women rearranged their clothes and went outside in silence.

    The man who led the sessions was Abu Younis, a 55-year-old tailor with no Islamic education, Othman says. Younis had no ties to IS either, but because of his popularity, the terror group allowed him to conduct the rukyah in the mosque. This is quite extraordinary, as the group had deemed many other religious practices as shirk, or idolatry. It had forbidden the sales of amulets with Quranic texts and even executed those who offered services of this kind for using black magic.

    Did IS turn a blind eye?

    Before IS, these had been common practices for Sunnis in Mosul and elsewhere in Iraq. For women who desperately wanted a son, or others with illnesses that would not clear up, a visit to an imam or holy man for an amulet and a prayer would be called for. Others would pray at the graves of saints. According to witnesses in Mosul, exorcising sessions for djinns were also common, especially among Sufis. But Sufism, a branch of Sunni Islam that is more open to the occult, was forbidden by IS, as were all other faiths and customs that were not in line with the terror group’s Salafi interpretation of Islam.

    And yet the exorcism of djinns was accepted. That is because they are part of the Quran, says Jamal Hussen, an expert and writer on Salafi Islam from Iraqi Kurdistan. “According to the Salafi doctrine, women are more susceptible to a devilish djinn, because their perceived weakness and lack of intelligence are an invitation for the devil.” Perhaps that is why the eviction sessions only seem to have been attended by women; there is no mention anywhere of sessions being held for men during the occupation.

    In the Quran, djinns are a third kind of being, along with humans and angels. The latter are God’s messengers and created from light. Djinns are spirits created from a flame, Hussen says, and disguised from human senses. They can be both good and evil, and share some habits with humans, like getting married and having children. “There is a complete Sura in the Quran about djinns,” he says, and that is why they are part of the faith of Salafi groups like IS. During the war in Syria, the terror group repeatedly stated that they had angels and djinns fighting on their side against the unbelievers.

    The djinn method

    Conventional medicine would probably diagnose the symptoms of someone who is said to have been taken over by djinns as a psychological illness. But in place of medical treatment, Salafists subject the patient to sessions in which verses of the Quran are read and the djinn is ordered to leave the body. “Often, the patient will hallucinate or may suffer epileptic fits that can sometimes even lead to death. But then it is said that this is because the djinn refused to leave the body.”

    The exorcism should be conducted by a man, preferably old and known for his faith, Hussein says, but he admits it is strange that, in societies in which the male and female worlds are as strictly separated as they were under IS, a man should have led the sessions for women at the Haiba Khatoon Mosque. “It is known for men to have abused the situation and harassed the women,” he says. That is why some of the elders of Al-Azhar, the most influential religious university for Sunni Islam in Cairo, have said “this method is nothing but trickery and corrupt.”

    After IS left, Abu Younis was picked up by the Iraqi army, Othman says initially, only to contradict himself saying the man cannot be contacted as he has gone underground. Over a year after IS fighters were driven out of Mosul, there are still requests from women for exorcism sessions which would imply that Salafi women are still present in the city. But the Haiba Khatoon Mosque will not be providing them with what they want anytime soon.

    #religion #superstition #islam #exorcisme #Iraq #guerre

  • Undercover agents target cybersecurity watchdog who detailed Israeli firm NSO’s link to #Khashoggi scandal
    Haaretz.Com
    https://www.haaretz.com/misc/article-print-page/.premium-undercover-agents-target-watchdog-who-detailed-israeli-firm-nso-s-

    Operatives with fake identities are pursuing members of #Citizen_Lab, the group that uncovered the connection between Jamal Khashoggi’s murder and Israel’s surveillance company #NSO
    The Associated Press | Jan. 26, 2019 | 4:19 PM

    The researchers who reported that Israeli software was used to spy on Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi’s inner circle before his gruesome death are being targeted in turn by international undercover operatives, The Associated Press has found.

    Twice in the past two months, men masquerading as socially conscious investors have lured members of the Citizen Lab internet watchdog group to meetings at luxury hotels to quiz them for hours about their work exposing Israeli surveillance and the details of their personal lives. In both cases, the researchers believe they were secretly recorded.

    Citizen Lab Director Ron Deibert described the stunts as “a new low.”

    “We condemn these sinister, underhanded activities in the strongest possible terms,” he said in a statement Friday. “Such a deceitful attack on an academic group like the Citizen Lab is an attack on academic freedom everywhere.”

    Who these operatives are working for remains a riddle, but their tactics recall those of private investigators who assume elaborate false identities to gather intelligence or compromising material on critics of powerful figures in government or business.

    Citizen Lab, based out of the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Toronto, has for years played a leading role in exposing state-backed hackers operating in places as far afield as Tibet , Ethiopia and Syria . Lately the group has drawn attention for its repeated exposés of an Israeli surveillance software vendor called the NSO Group, a firm whose wares have been used by governments to target journalists in Mexico , opposition figures in Panama and human rights activists in the Middle East .

    In October, Citizen Lab reported that an iPhone belonging to one of Khashoggi’s confidantes had been infected by the NSO’s signature spy software only months before Khashoggi’s grisly murder. The friend, Saudi dissident Omar Abdulaziz, would later claim that the hacking had exposed Khashoggi’s private criticisms of the Saudi royal family to the Arab kingdom’s spies and thus “played a major role” in his death.

    In a statement, NSO denied having anything to do with the undercover operations targeting Citizen Lab, “either directly or indirectly” and said it had neither hired nor asked anyone to hire private investigators to pursue the Canadian organization. “Any suggestion to the contrary is factually incorrect and nothing more than baseless speculation,” NSO said.

    NSO has long denied that its software was used to target Khashoggi, although it has refused to comment when asked whether it has sold its software to the Saudi government more generally.

    The first message reached Bahr Abdul Razzak, a Syrian refugee who works as a Citizen Lab researcher, Dec. 6, when a man calling himself Gary Bowman got in touch via LinkedIn. The man described himself as a South African financial technology executive based in Madrid.

    “I came across your profile and think that the work you’ve done helping Syrian refugees and your extensive technical background could be a great fit for our new initiative,” Bowman wrote.

    Abdul Razzak said he thought the proposal was a bit odd, but he eventually agreed to meet the man at Toronto’s swanky Shangri-La Hotel on the morning of Dec. 18.

    The conversation got weird very quickly, Abdul Razzak said.

    Instead of talking about refugees, Abdul Razzak said, Bowman grilled him about his work for Citizen Lab and its investigations into the use of NSO’s software. Abdul Razzak said Bowman appeared to be reading off cue cards, asking him if he was earning enough money and throwing out pointed questions about Israel, the war in Syria and Abdul Razzak’s religiosity.

    “Do you pray?” Abdul Razzak recalled Bowman asking. “Why do you write only about NSO?” ’’Do you write about it because it’s an Israeli company?" ’’Do you hate #Israel?"

    Abdul Razzak said he emerged from the meeting feeling shaken. He alerted his Citizen Lab colleagues, who quickly determined that the breakfast get-together had been a ruse. Bowman’s supposed Madrid-based company, FlameTech, had no web presence beyond a LinkedIn page, a handful of social media profiles and an entry in the business information platform Crunchbase. A reverse image search revealed that the profile picture of the man listed as FlameTech’s chief executive, Mauricio Alonso, was a stock photograph.

    “My immediate gut feeling was: ’This is a fake,’” said John Scott-Railton, one of Abdul Razzak’s colleagues.

    Scott-Railton flagged the incident to the AP, which confirmed that FlameTech was a digital facade.

    Searches of the Orbis database of corporate records, which has data on some 300 million global companies, turned up no evidence of a Spanish firm called FlameTech or Flame Tech or any company anywhere in the world matching its description. Similarly, the AP found no record of FlameTech in Madrid’s official registry or of a Gary Bowman in the city’s telephone listings. An Orbis search for Alonso, the supposed chief executive, also drew a blank. When an AP reporter visited Madrid’s Crystal Tower high-rise, where FlameTech claimed to have 250 sq. meters (2,700 sq. feet) of office space, he could find no trace of the firm and calls to the number listed on its website went unanswered.

    The AP was about to publish a story about the curious company when, on Jan. 9, Scott-Railton received an intriguing message of his own.

    This time the contact came not from Bowman of FlameTech but from someone who identified himself as Michel Lambert, a director at the Paris-based agricultural technology firm CPW-Consulting.

    Lambert had done his homework. In his introductory email , he referred to Scott-Railton’s early doctoral research on kite aerial photography — a mapping technique using kite-mounted cameras — and said he was “quite impressed.

    We have a few projects and clients coming up that could significantly benefit from implementing Kite Aerial Photography,” he said.

    Like FlameTech, CPW-Consulting was a fiction. Searches of Orbis and the French commercial court registry Infogreffe turned up no trace of the supposedly Paris-based company or indeed of any Paris-based company bearing the acronym CPW. And when the AP visited CPW’s alleged office there was no evidence of the company; the address was home to a mainly residential apartment building. Residents and the building’s caretaker said they had never heard of the firm.

    Whoever dreamed up CPW had taken steps to ensure the illusion survived a casual web search, but even those efforts didn’t bear much scrutiny. The company had issued a help wanted ad, for example, seeking a digital mapping specialist for their Paris office, but Scott-Railton discovered that the language had been lifted almost word-for-word from an ad from an unrelated company seeking a mapping specialist in London. A blog post touted CPW as a major player in Africa, but an examination of the author’s profile suggests the article was the only one the blogger had ever written.

    When Lambert suggested an in-person meeting in New York during a Jan. 19 phone call , Scott-Railton felt certain that Lambert was trying to set him up.

    But Scott-Railton agreed to the meeting. He planned to lay a trap of his own.

    Anyone watching Scott-Railton and Lambert laughing over wagyu beef and lobster bisque at the Peninsula Hotel’s upscale restaurant on Thursday afternoon might have mistaken the pair for friends.

    In fact, the lunch was Spy vs. Spy. Scott-Railton had spent the night before trying to secret a homemade camera into his tie, he later told AP, eventually settling for a GoPro action camera and several recording devices hidden about his person. On the table, Lambert had placed a large pen in which Scott-Railton said he spotted a tiny camera lens peeking out from an opening in the top.

    Lambert didn’t seem to be alone. At the beginning of the meal, a man sat behind him, holding up his phone as if to take pictures and then abruptly left the restaurant, having eaten nothing. Later, two or three men materialized at the bar and appeared to be monitoring proceedings.

    Scott-Railton wasn’t alone either. A few tables away, two Associated Press journalists were making small talk as they waited for a signal from Scott-Railton, who had invited the reporters to observe the lunch from nearby and then interview Lambert near the end of the meal.

    The conversation began with a discussion of kites, gossip about African politicians, and a detour through Scott-Railton’s family background. But Lambert, just like Bowman, eventually steered the talk to Citizen Lab and NSO.

    “Work drama? Tell me, I like drama!” Lambert said at one point, according to Scott-Railton’s recording of the conversation. “Is there a big competition between the people inside Citizen Lab?” he asked later.

    Like Bowman, Lambert appeared to be working off cue cards and occasionally made awkward conversational gambits. At one point he repeated a racist French expression, insisting it wasn’t offensive. He also asked Scott-Railton questions about the Holocaust, anti-Semitism and whether he grew up with any Jewish friends. At another point he asked whether there might not be a “racist element” to Citizen Lab’s interest in Israeli spyware.

    After dessert arrived, the AP reporters approached Lambert at his table and asked him why his company didn’t seem to exist.
    He seemed to stiffen.

    “I know what I’m doing,” Lambert said, as he put his files — and his pen — into a bag. Then he stood up, bumped into a chair and walked off, saying “Ciao” and waving his hand, before returning because he had neglected to pay the bill.

    As he paced around the restaurant waiting for the check, Lambert refused to answer questions about who he worked for or why no trace of his firm could be found.

    “I don’t have to give you any explanation,” he said. He eventually retreated to a back room and closed the door.

    Who Lambert and Bowman really are isn’t clear. Neither men returned emails, LinkedIn messages or phone calls. And despite their keen focus on NSO the AP has found no evidence of any link to the Israeli spyware merchant, which is adamant that it wasn’t involved.

    The kind of aggressive investigative tactics used by the mystery men who targeted Citizen Lab have come under fire in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein sexual abuse scandal. Black Cube, an Israeli private investigation firm apologized after The New Yorker and other media outlets revealed that the company’s operatives had used subterfuge and dirty tricks to help the Hollywood mogul suppress allegations of rape and sexual assault.

    Scott-Railton and Abdul Razzak said they didn’t want to speculate about who was involved. But both said they believed they were being steered toward making controversial comments that could be used to blacken Citizen Lab’s reputation.

    “It could be they wanted me to say, ’Yes, I hate Israel,’ or ’Yes, Citizen Lab is against NSO because it’s Israeli,’” said Abdul Razzak.
    Scott-Railton said the elaborate, multinational operation was gratifying, in a way.

    “People were paid to fly to a city to sit you down to an expensive meal and try to convince you to say bad things about your work, your colleagues and your employer,” he said.

    “That means that your work is important.”

  • Une experte indépendante de l#’ONU conduira une enquête internationale sur la mort de Khashoggi | ONU Info
    https://news.un.org/fr/story/2019/01/1034912

    Le 4 janvier 2019, la Haut-Commissaire aux droits de l’homme Michelle Bachelet avait estimé que le procès pénal en #Arabie_saoudite de personnes soupçonnées d’être impliquées dans l’#assassinat du #journaliste Jamal #Khashoggi ne répondait pas aux exigences de l’enquête indépendante et internationale qu’elle avait réclamée.