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Palestinian artist: Rawan Anani Instagram: rawan_anani_artgallery |
Saturday, March 30, 2024
Palestinian artist: Rawan Anani “Women and Olive Trees- Jerusalem” (2024)
Land Day 2024 Palestine: In 1976 it was 6 unarmed farmers murdered by Israeli forces, this year it is more than 32,704 + Palestinian people murdered by Israeli forces, mostly women & children have been killed
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| "We have on this earth what makes life worth living"Mahmoud Darwish |
Every year on March 30, Palestinians observe Land Day, or Yom al-Ard,
recalling the events of March 30, 1976, when six unarmed Palestinians
were killed and more than 100 injured by Israeli forces during protests
against Israel’s confiscation of Palestinian land.
Israel has continued to seize large swaths of Palestinian land, designating them as military zones, state land and other labels. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/3/30/land-day-what-happened-in-palestine-in-1976
Settlements – illegal under international law – are Jewish-only communities built on Palestinian land in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.
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| 48 years on and we are witnessing the continuation of this with Israeli attempts at ethnically cleansing Gaza by genocide. #ceasefireNOW |
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| https://twitter.com/miftahpal |
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| https://twitter.com/miftahpal |
Today we mark the 48th anniversary of #LandDay.
Israel’s colonialism never abated and in the occupied West Bank, it has got only worse since 7 Oct 2023:
27,000 acres of land seized
There are 840 checkpoints and barriers aimed at disrupting the Palestinian right to movement
25 Bedouin communities were displaced from their lands
9,600 olive trees uprooted
Today is #LandDay in Palestine and I managed to get a text from my younger brother Tareq for the 1st time since the Israeli genocide started. His house got bombed in Jabalia and he is now in Rafah in a tent, still hoping to return to the North #Gaza
BDS worldwide- for Palestine @BDSmovement On the 48th anniversary of Land Day, let’s not just commemorate Israel’s past crimes, but also fight to end its ongoing #GazaGenocide as well as its ongoing Nakba, and, most importantly, to ultimately dismantle its underlying apartheid.
MIFTAH- Free Palestine https://twitter.com/miftahpal
Land Day is a day of commemoration of the Palestinian struggle against the Israeli occupation's ethnic cleansing of indigenous Palestinian people.
Today marks the 48th anniversary of Land Day.
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| 2024 "Of course, for the Palestinians, we did not need an international court
to tell us that Israel is committing a genocide, but it was cathartic to
hear this acknowledged on a global platform." |
& SPEAKING OF HOSTAGES....
9000 Palestinians, including children, are currently held hostage by Israel - jailed (& tortured) most with out charge or trial LAND DAY 2024 #Genocide
The
number of Palestinians held in Israel jails has reached 9,000 as of
March 30th which is celebrated in Palestine as Land Day according to Pa
Prisoner club.
Since October 7th 7,870 have been detained some were released , most
have stayed in jail most without charge or trial
Friday, March 29, 2024
‘They kept us alive for thousands of years’: could saving Palestinian seeds also save the world? Vivien Sansour, founder of the Palestine Heirloom Seed Library, believes biodiversity will save the planet in the climate crisis
"Sansour notes that the project is called a seed “library” rather than a seed “bank” for a reason. It’s about partnering with people who will grow things now rather than preserving seeds in some safe vault for a future doomsday, because from Sansour’s perspective, “doomsday is already here”.
“I got an email from folks in Gaza asking me what to eat in the wild right now, like, ‘what could be growing outside that we can eat? Because we’re starving.’ That email made me cry, not only because they are starving, but also because it made me understand how the work that we’ve been trying to do is urgent,” said Sansour. Reconnecting to heirloom seeds is also about trying to preserve cultural knowledge about food that’s already growing wild, both in a time of crisis and with the dream that someday it could be enjoyed in a time of thriving, as well.
“Every time we plant a seed or we plant a tree, we are planting it with the hope and intention to have a future,” Sansour said."
Sansour is the founder of the Palestine Heirloom Seed Library,
a project that began in 2016 to conserve Palestinian heritage and
culture by saving heirloom seed varieties and telling the stories and
history from which they emerged.
“The mission of the seed library is to revitalize and conserve a living
archive of our heirloom seeds,” said Sansour. “Not just for Palestine,
but also for the world. The world is in a hospice state and we need all
the different tools and biodiversity we can in order to adapt.”
Satellite analysis shows farms devastated and nearly half of the territory’s trees razed. Alongside mounting air and water pollution, experts say Israel’s onslaught on Gaza’s ecosystems has made the area unlivable
‘Ecocide in Gaza’: does scale of environmental destruction amount to a war crime?
by Kaamil Ahmed, Damien Gayle and Aseel Mousa in Gaza
In a dilapidated warehouse in Rafah, Soha Abu Diab is living with her three young daughters and more than 20 other family members. They have no running water, no fuel and are surrounded by running sewage and waste piling up.
Like the rest of Gaza’s residents, they fear the air they breathe is heavy with pollutants and that the water carries disease. Beyond the city streets lie razed orchards and olive groves, and farmland destroyed by bombs and bulldozers.
“This life is not life,” says Abu Diab, who was displaced from Gaza City. “There is pollution everywhere – in the air, in the water we bathe in, in the water we drink, in the food we eat, in the area around us.”
For her family and thousands of others, the human cost of Israel’s invasion of Gaza, launched after the Hamas attack on 7 October, is being compounded by an environmental crisis.
The full extent of the damage in Gaza has not yet been documented, but analysis of satellite imagery provided to the Guardian shows the destruction of about 38-48% of tree cover and farmland.
Olive groves and farms have been reduced to packed earth; soil and groundwater has been contaminated by munitions and toxins; the sea is choked with sewage and waste; the air polluted by smoke and particulate matter.
Researchers
and environmental organisations say the destruction will have enormous
effects on Gaza’s ecosystems and biodiversity. The scale and potential
long-term impact of the damage have led to calls for it to be regarded
as “ecocide” and investigated as a possible war crime.... READ MORE https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/mar/29/gaza-israel-palestinian-war-ecocide-environmental-destruction-pollution-rome-statute-war-crimes-aoe
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Don't Look Left: A Diary of Genocide by Atef Abu Saif- due out May 16, 2024 in paperback
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| Never in living history has such an atrocity been perpetrated in plain sight of the world's leaders and mainstream media, who have all somehow managed to give it their complete backing. Images and video clips of hourly horrors and tragedies have spread around the world, combatted by fake news propagated not by dark conspiratorial corners on the web, but by corporate media outlets and politicians. Baseless Israeli propaganda and deliberately-biased framing has been fed to journalists and repeated, without question, on the front pages of the world's newspapers and in the mouths of TV pundits and politicians. One of the few voices of Gaza to make it out into Western media has been that of writer Atef Abu Saif |
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| Don’t Look Left by Atef Abu Saif BOOK review |
Don’t Look Left by Atef Abu Saif BOOK review – in the line of fire
A Palestinian author and politician’s devastating eyewitness account of the Israel-Gaza war as he saw his relatives killed
It is hard to describe the cumulative effect this devastating chronicle has over 280 pages. It describes a mounting toll of death and destruction, with each day bringing more heartrending news of homes demolished and relatives and colleagues killed. Gradually, it makes it clear that there is no safe place in the Gaza Strip. Danger is everywhere, like the low hum of a mosquito.
Atef Abu Saif
is an acclaimed Palestinian author and journalist as well as being
minister for culture in the Palestinian Authority. On 7 October he found
himself in Gaza purely by chance. He was due to speak at a cultural
event in Khan Younis to celebrate Palestinian Heritage Day, but found
himself instead at the centre of a war.... READ MORE https://www.theguardian.com/books/2024/mar/14/dont-look-left-by-atef-abu-saif-review-in-the-line-of-fire
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Atef Abu Saif
Atef Abu Saif has been Palestinian Authority’s minister of culture since 2019 and is the author of six novels
***
Comma Press Statement in Relation to the Cancellation of Home’s ‘Voices of Resilience’ event and Baseless Allegations
28 Mar 2024
Comma is disappointed with HOME's decision to cancel our planned event for the 22 April. We are also deeply concerned about the baseless and libelous allegations against one of our Palestinian writers, Atef Abu Saif, issued by the lobby group, the Jewish Representative Council of Greater Manchester (JRC), and repeated by the Manchester Evening News. The allegations include the claims that Atef Abu Saif is a 'confirmed antisemite' and a 'holocaust denier'. This is utterly false.
The letter sent by the JRC to HOME and published on their X account, refers to an article Abu Saif wrote on 22 August 2022 in Al-Ayyam newspaper as evidence of this. Rather than deny the holocaust, he says the exact opposite: ‘Hitler's crimes against humanity cannot be forgiven or tolerated. They may be unprecedented in history in terms of their ugliness... As Palestinians, this is a fact we have not denied and will never deny. We are a people who suffer injustice, massacres, killing and displacement. We cannot accept something similar that happened to others and say it is right.’
Both Comma Press and the author absolutely refute the allegations of antisemitism. In a recent interview, Abu Saif repeated the same acknowledgment: 'The holocaust was one of the darkest moments in human history'. Neither Comma Press nor the author were approached or given any opportunity to defend themselves by either the MEN or JRC.
Atef is an award-winning writer, who has previously spoken at Hay Festival, Shubbak Festival, Manchester Literature Festival, and other high-profile events. He has been supported by English PEN, and held events in Jewish-focussed bookshops. He has been the Minister of Culture for the PA in the West Bank since 2019, and his first-hand accounts of the current genocide have been published in multiple mainstream newspapers: New York Times, Washington Post, The Guardian, Le Monde, and so on.
This character assassination cannot be allowed to stand. Legal action is currently being considered with regard to the original libel and any repetition of it.
Comma Press
For any enquiries, please contact CEO Ra Page on ra.page@commapress.co.uk
***
in The Nation
“I Have Left, but I’m Still There”: The Last Gaza Diary
After 84 days, Atef Abu Saif left Gaza. Here, he reflects on what he endured.
On December 29, Atef Abu Saif, the writer and politician whose diaries from the Gaza Strip have been featured in The Nation since November, left Gaza with his son after 84 days under Israeli siege and bombardment. He crossed into Egypt, visited his niece—who was in an Egyptian hospital after losing multiple limbs in an Israeli airstrike—and began processing the horrors of the experience he had just endured.
He then wrote this diary entry. It is the last of his Gaza dispatches.
Saturday, December 30 (The Day After)
Yesterday morning, on the 84th day of the
war, I was told my name and that of Yasser, my son, were included on the
list of those who can leave. It all happened very suddenly... READ MORE https://www.thenation.com/article/world/atef-abu-saif-last-gaza-diary/
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Thursday, March 28, 2024
US State Dept human rights officer latest to resign in Gaza protest: "She [Annelle Sheline] said she saw firsthand how US credibility has degraded... as the [Israel/Gaza]war progressed."
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Published On 27 Mar 2024
Annelle Sheline, a Middle East analyst who promoted human rights on behalf of the United States government, has become the latest staffer at the US Department of State to leave her post in opposition to President Joe Biden’s Israel policy.
Sheline announced her resignation in an interview with the Washington Post on Wednesday, as the official death toll in Gaza reached 32,490 since October 7 and the World Food Programme has warned that famine in the enclave is imminent.
“I wasn’t able to really do my job any more,” Sheline told the newspaper. “Trying to advocate for human rights just became impossible.”
Sheline’s resignation followed another State Department official, Josh Paul, a director in the Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, who resigned in October of last year, and Department of Education official Tariq Habash, a Palestinian American and Biden political appointee, who resigned in January.
Speaking to Al Jazeera, Habash said Sheline’s decision to leave underscored how the United States’s standing both at home and abroad has diminished amid the war in Gaza.
“It’s not surprising that there are people who tried to do important and critical work related to human rights at the State Department who felt like they were unable to do their job,” he said.
“It’s not surprising that [Sheline] felt like the only way that she can make an impact is by leaving, because in almost six months we’ve seen no substantive change in policy, and our influence at the international stage seems to be disintegrating by the day,” ... READ MORE https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/3/27/us-state-dept-human-rights-officer-latest-to-resign-in-gaza-protest [AS
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Wednesday, March 27, 2024
“The genocide in Gaza is the most extreme stage of a long-standing settler colonial process of erasure of the native Palestinians,” United Nations News: Rights expert finds ‘reasonable grounds’ genocide is being committed in Gaza
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Francesca
Albanese, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the
Palestinian territories, makes remarks at the 55th session of the UN
Human Rights Council in Geneva.
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Francesca Albanese was speaking at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, where she presented her latest report, entitled ‘Anatomy of a Genocide’, during an interactive dialogue with Member States.
“Following nearly six months of unrelenting Israeli assault on occupied Gaza, it is my solemn duty to report on the worst of what humanity is capable of, and to present my findings,” she said.
“There are reasonable grounds to believe that the threshold indicating the commission of the crime of genocide…has been met.”
Three acts committed
Citing international law, Ms. Albanese explained that genocide is defined as a specific set of acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group.
“Specifically, Israel has committed three acts of genocide with the requisite intent, causing seriously serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group, deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part, and imposing measures intended to prevent birth within the group,” she said.
Furthermore, “the genocide in Gaza is the most extreme stage of a long-standing settler colonial process of erasure of the native Palestinians,” she continued.
‘A tragedy foretold’
“For over 76 years, this process has oppressed the Palestinians as a people in every way imaginable, crushing their inalienable right to self-determination demographically, economically, territorially, culturally and politically.”
She said the “colonial amnesia of the West has condoned Israel's colonial settler project”, adding that “the world now sees the bitter fruit of the impunity afforded to Israel. This was a tragedy foretold.”
Ms. Albanese said denial of the reality and the continuation of Israel's impunity and exceptionalism is no longer viable, especially in light of the binding UN Security Council resolution, adopted on Monday, which called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.
Arms embargo and sanctions against Israel
“I implore Member States to abide by their obligations which start with imposing an arms embargo and sanctions on Israel, and so ensure that the future does not continue to repeat itself,” she concluded.
Special Rapporteurs and independent experts like Ms. Albanese receive their mandates from the UN Human Rights Council. They are not UN staff and do not receive payment for their work.
Israel ‘utterly rejects’ report
Israel did not participate in the dialogue but issued a press release stating that it “utterly rejects” Ms. Albanese’s report, calling it “an obscene inversion of reality”.
“The very attempt to level the charge of genocide against Israel is an outrageous distortion of the Genocide Convention. It is an attempt to empty the word genocide of its unique force and special meaning; and turn the Convention itself into a tool of terrorists, who have total disdain for life and for the law, against those trying to defend against them,” the release said.
Israel said its war is against Hamas, not Palestinian civilians.
“This is a matter of explicit government policy, military directives and procedures. It is no less an expression of Israel’s core values. As stated, our commitment to uphold the law, including our obligations under international humanitarian law, is unwavering.”
‘Barbaric aggression continues’: Palestine Ambassador
The Permanent Observer of the State of Palestine to the UN in Geneva, Ibrahim Khraishi, noted that the report provides the historic context of genocide against the Palestinian people.
He said Israel “continues its barbaric aggression” and refuses to abide by the decision of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), issued in January, to take provisional measures in order to prevent the crime of genocide. Israel has also refused to abide by UN General Assembly and Security Council resolutions, including the one adopted on Monday, he added.
“And this means that all recommendations in the report of the Special Rapporteur shall be implemented, and practical measures should be taken to prevent the export of weapons, to boycott Israel commercially and politically, and to implement mechanisms of accountability,” he said.
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| UNRWA/Mohammed Alsharif
Displaced Palestinians walk through the Nour Shams camp in the West Bank. |
Israeli settlement expansion
Separately, the UN Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights, Nada Al-Nashif, presented a report on Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory during the period from 1 November 2022 to 31 October 2023.
“The reporting period has seen a drastic acceleration, particularly after 7 October 2023, of long-standing trends of discrimination, oppression and violence against Palestinians that accompany Israeli occupation and settlement expansion bringing the West Bank to the brink of catastrophe,” she said.
There are now around 700,000 Israeli settlers in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, who live in 300 settlements and outposts, all of which are illegal under international humanitarian law.
Expansion of existing settlements
The size of existing Israeli settlements has also expanded markedly, according to the report by the UN human rights office, OHCHR.
Approximately 24,300 housing units within existing Israeli settlements in the West Bank in Area C were advanced or approved during the reporting period - the highest on record since monitoring began in 2017.
The report observed that policies of the current Israeli Government “appear aligned, to an unprecedented extent, with the goals of the Israeli settler movement to expand long-term control over the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and to steadily integrate this occupied territory into the State of Israel,” Ms. Al-Nashif said.
Transfer of power
During the reporting period, Israel took steps to transfer administrative powers relating to settlements and land administration from the military authorities to Israeli government offices, whose primary focus is to provide services within the State of Israel.
“The report therefore raises serious concerns that a series of measures, including this transfer of powers to the Israeli civilian officials, could facilitate the annexation of the West Bank in violation of international law, including the Charter of the United Nations,” she said.
‘Dramatic increase’ in violence
There was also a dramatic increase in the intensity, severity and regularity of Israeli settler violence against Palestinians, accelerating their displacement from their land, in circumstances that may amount to forcible transfer.
The UN recorded 835 incidents of settler violence in the first nine months of 2023, the highest on record. Between 7 and 31 October 2023, the UN recorded 203 settler attacks against Palestinians and monitored the killing of eight Palestinians by settlers, all by firearms.
Of the 203 settler attacks, more than a third involved threats with firearms, including shooting. Furthermore, almost half of all incidents between 7 and 31 October involved Israeli forces escorting or actively supporting Israeli settlers while carrying out attacks.
Blurred lines
Ms. Al-Nashif said the line between settler violence and State violence has further blurred, including violence with the declared intent to forcibly transfer Palestinians from their land. She reported that in cases monitored by OHCHR, settlers arrived masked, armed, and sometimes wearing the uniforms of Israeli security forces.
“They destroyed Palestinians’ tents, solar panels, water pipes and tanks, hurling insults and threatening that, if Palestinians did not leave within 24 hours, they would be killed,” she said.
By the end of the reporting period, Israeli security forces had reportedly handed out some 8,000 weapons to so-called “settlement defence squads” and “regional defence battalions” in the West Bank, she continued.
“After 7 October, the United Nations human rights office documented cases of settlers wearing full or partial Israeli army uniforms and carrying army rifles, harassing and attacking Palestinians, including shooting at them at point-blank range.”
Evictions and demolitions
Israeli authorities also continued to implement eviction and demolition orders against Palestinians based on discriminatory planning policies, laws and practices, including on the grounds that properties lacked building permits.
Ms. Al-Nashif said Israel demolished 917 Palestinian-owned structures in the West Bank, including 210 in East Jerusalem, again one of the fastest rates on record. As a result, more than 1,000 Palestinians were displaced.
“It is noteworthy that out of the 210 demolitions in East Jerusalem, 89 were self-demolitions by their owners to avoid paying fines from the Israeli authorities. This epitomizes the coercive environment that the Palestinians live in,” she said.
The human rights report also documented Israel’s ongoing plan to double the settler population in the Syrian Golan by 2027, which is currently distributed among 35 different settlements.
Beside settlement expansion, commercial activity has been approved, which she said may continue to limit the access of the Syrian population to land and water..
Israel’s attempt to destroy Unrwa is part of its starvation strategy in Gaza
"... Israel’s obstruction flouts the UN security council’s demand that it lift “all barriers to the provision of humanitarian assistance at scale”. That blockage is a war crime, as the international criminal court prosecutor Karim Khan has warned. It also contravenes the international court of justice’s order in its preliminary genocide ruling, which, fueling further Israel’s animosity, relied in part on evidence provided by Unrwa.
Israel
also hopes to destroy Unrwa because the government naively believes
that Palestinian refugees would then somehow forget that they are
Palestinian refugees and stop insisting on a right to return. Many would not exercise
that right but others would. Israel denies this right not only for
return to Israel within its 1967 borders but also for return to the
occupied Palestinian territory – to Palestine..."
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| People walk past Unrwa’s damaged Gaza City headquarters on 15 February 2024. Photograph: AFP via Getty Images |
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My first shower in six days was like an old friend. But now the war in Gaza is back