The story of Anat Kamm, and what it says about Israel's "democracy."

This story has a number of components:
1- An Israeli woman, Anat Kamm, has been under a SECRET house arrest, accompanied by a gag order to the Israeli media, since December 2009.
Here is the NYTimes coverage: http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2010/04/01/us/AP-US-Israel-Military-Whistleblower.html?_r=2&sq=anat%20kam&st=cse&scp=1&pagewanted=print
2- The story that she's allegedly leaked to Ha'aretz correspondent Uri Blau in 2008, implicating top military staff, including Lt. General Gabi Ashkenazi, in defying Supreme court (2006) ruling restricting targeted assassinations. The Ha'aretz story, in Hebrew, can be found at http://www.haaretz.co.il/hasite/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=1041551
3- The story of Israel's obedient media, and the Internet role in bringing it to the light. To read one version of how things went, see Gila Svirsky's article below.
In reality, the internet response was more complicated. We at JPN considered running a story published by Richard Silverstein on his blog (Tikkun Olam)a few months back, but - like many other news services - decided to avoid doing so because we were told that Anat Kamm and her lawyer asked to keep the story under raps, hoping it'll help her negotiate a deal with the Shin Bet (Israel's secret service).
4- The story exploded on the scene in the last few days, and as of today, the gag order was lifted (see below).
=======================================

It's the next day, and it's probably fair to say that in the meantime all hell broke loose.
Here are a number of additional links, most of them provided by Rela Mazali.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1161853.html

Last update - 12:26 09/04/2010

This isn't just a war for my freedom but for Israel's image

By Uri Blau

"When you're warned 'they know much more than you think,' and are told that your telephone line, e-mail and computer have been monitored for a long time and still are, then someone up there doesn't really understand what democracy is all about, and the importance of freedom of the press in preserving it."



http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1161849.html

Last update - 04:10 09/04/2010

In Israel, reality hides under a 'top secret' stamp

By Akiva Eldar

"The label "highly classified" does not automatically turn a document into a security concern, the leaking of which constitutes espionage or treason. In most cases, the designation is intended simply to ensure that the file's contents do not reach the public's view. … To manage an occupation, a nation must raise obedient soldiers and officers [and, my addition: the obedient public that keeps on producing these soldiers and officers, Rela] - the kind who sit quietly while ideas are floated on how to circumvent the rulings of the supposedly leftist High Court, how to keep prying journalists at bay and how to deceive the meddlesome state comptroller."

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1161956.html


Legal Analysis / Key charge against Kam carries life sentence

By Ze'ev Segal

"The stringent statutes [being applied to this case, Rela] are essentially carbon copies of criminal laws enacted during the pre-state British Mandate in 1936. While the current laws were adopted for Israeli jurisprudence, this was done with minimal alterations. The current statute does not explicitly recognize the defense claim - that revealing classified information is permitted in cases where the data is of vital public interest. …
Passing classified information to a media entity is considered "espionage," despite the fact that this term is only applied to cases where information is passed on to an enemy."



http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1161854.html

How I was almost accused of espionage

By Reuven Pedatzur

"there isn't a single military correspondent who doesn't commit this crime of espionage on a daily basis. … We can assume that the senior member of the defense establishment who wanted to use Section 113 against me did not really think that I was a spy, but intended to scare me and to convince me that I had better not continue to publish criticism of the body that he headed. … [Uri Blau] is being singled out because the article he published in Haaretz, which is what first brought the entire affair to light, was critical and exposed improper behavior on the part of senior officials in the defense establishment."

http://www.hahem.co.il/friendsofgeorge/?p=1283
An article, in Hebrew, by Yossi Gurvitz.

Here is a partial translation by "The Magnes Zionist":

1. It's not espionage. Anat Kamm has been accused of spying, no less. But Shabak Chief Yuval Diskin does not claim that the Uri Blau Haaretz articles damaged Israeli security. (He can't, can he? After all, it passed military censorship) So he can only refer to the "thousands of documents" that Kamm has confessed to stealing, and which she passed to Uri Blau (according to Diskin). And what is the argument? "Those documents are full of security and operational secrets that would endanger the lives of soldiers were they to fall into enemy hands." But they haven't fallen into enemy hands, so this is not espionage, nor is there intent. They were leaked to a journalist who has them in his possession (according to the Shabak). So whatever Kamm did, it was not espionage.

2. The Shabak's history of exaggerated accusations. Gurvitz points out that Diskin in his briefing said that the media should not compare Kamm to Tali Fahima. And why not? Because in several well-publicized cases, the Shabak and the media initially painted the accused as endangering the security of the state -- only to see that accusation wither away. Tali Fahima was accused of being an enemy agent, and planning terrorists attacks. When the trial began, the prosecution said (generously) that they would not seek the death penalty. Pretty good move, since she ended up getting a few years in jail. And let's not forget Sheikh Raad Saalah who was arrested in a big public way for contacting foreign agents, and ended up being convicted of some minor money crimes. In other words, the tactic scare the accused to death, then get a plea bargain. Gurvitz asks how credible is the charge that Blau has in his possession documents that will damage IDF soldiers, and he is refusing to return them? It
seems more likely that he has potentially damaging documents to the IDF brass.

3. Discrimination based on rank. Gurvitz points out that other IDF brass have removed documents from bases, and in one case, Elazar Stern, the head of the Education Corps leaked classified documents to Yair Lapid, a columnist. Some of these people were disciplined; Stern had to pay damages to the soldier whom he had ratted on; but nobody has been brought up on charges of espionage. Many other lower ranks of soldiers have "informed" against their superiors to human rights organizations, and their military careers have ended as a result (Gurvitz did that himself during the first intifada.) But none of these were considered more than minor offenses.

Racheli Gai.

http://www.jta.org/news/article/2010/04/08/1011486/report-israel-to-pull-gag-order

Israel pulls gag order on Kamm case
April 8, 2010
WASHINGTON (JTA ) -- Israel's defense establishment agreed to lift a months-long gag order over an Israeli journalist's secret house arrest.

Representatives of the Israel Defense Forces, the Shin Bet internal security service and the State Prosecutor's Office on Thursday asked Tel Aviv District Court for a partial removal of the gag order that has been in place for the last three-and-a-half months,.The request was granted.

The gag order revolves around Anat Kamm, 23, a journalist who was arrested last December and charged under Israel's espionage and treason for allegedly photocopying and leaking sensitive documents during her time in the IDF. The far-reaching gag order applies not only to the details of Kamm's arrest but to news of the arrest itself. Israeli media only have been able to refer to the incident as a "security-related affair."

The documents alleged to have been leaked by Kamm formed the basis for a 2008 Haaretz story implicating top military staff, including Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi, the military chief of staff, in defying Supreme Court rulings restricting targeted killings.

Though Israeli media was banned from reporting the story, foreign media and blogs not under Israeli jurisdiction have published details of the case. JTA reported the story on March 27. Reportedly, the Supreme Court sent messages to the State Prosecutor's Office and the presiding judge, Ze'ev Hammer, hinting that situation was untenable.

"If the entire world knows about it, issuing a gag order is baseless," said Press Council President Dalia Dorner, a former Supreme Court justice. "Gag orders impinge on the freedom of the press, and this is allowed if publication is highly likely to cause grave damage to state security. But if the whole world knows, this alone constitutes a reason to withdraw the injunction."

Gila Svirsky's account:

This story is a testament to the Internet. And to Anat Kam, the whistleblower, who is widely regarded in Israeli security circles as a traitor and will probably soon be charged with treason.

Anat (I'll use her first name, though I don't know her) is a 23-year old journalist who wrote for the popular Israeli portal Walla. Some months ago, Anat did the unthinkable: she passed on information that was decidedly newsworthy, but that the Shin Bet – Israel's security services – did not want outsiders to have. It was a"hit list" – the names of Palestinians living in the West Bank who were on the Shin Bet's "wanted" list. And it was a copy of the Shin Bet protocol stating that if these "wanted" figures are identified during the course of a military action, permission is granted to carry out "an interception". Nice language for execution without trial. Reports are that Anat photocopied this classified information while serving in the IDF.

Anat allegedly passed on this classified information to Uri Blau, a journalist, who published it months ago as a major scoop in Ha'aretz. Now Ha'aretz has whisked Uri away to London to protect him from the Israeli authorities, who would love to interrogate him about his informant. Meanwhile, Anat has been under house arrest and held incommunicado for at least three months.

This is a big story, but until today no Israeli newspapers could publish it because a judge issued a gag order at the Shin Bet's request. But go ask Henry Miller about banned books. Thanks to the ban and Israel's inability to control cyberspace, the story has taken on vastly greater proportions. Every news outlet in Israel – newspapers, radio, TV, news portals – has front-paged the story now that the gag order was lifted. It would never have received such widespread attention had the Israeli authorities not tried to hide it in the first place. And had the Internet not cloned the story through every webpage eager to expose state secrets.

This is not the first time the Israeli authorities have arrested suspects and held them incommunicado for extended periods. It happens to Palestinians all the time. The best known case of an Israeli is Mordechai Vanunu, who blew the whistle on Israel's nuclear warfare capabilities 24 years ago and was tried behind closed doors. More recently, Brig. Gen. Yitzhak Yaakov, an Israeli citizen now living in the U.S., was arrested on a visit to Israel in 2002, and a gag order placed on news of his month-long detention and interrogation. Yaakov, a key scientist in the development of Israel's nuclear weapons program, was suspected of divulging some of Israel's secrets, but eventually released without charge.

So Israel has managed to draw widespread international attention to a story it wanted to hush up. But why conceal the fact that the Shin Bet has a "hit list" and gives license to its commando units to carry out field executions? After all, doesn't the U.S. do the same thing in its own so-called war against terror?

Israel, in my view, wanted to hide this information to avoid the legal and diplomatic ramifications of disclosures that its soldiers were once again breaking international law. Israel has been playing defense ever since the Gaza Campaign, trying to keep its senior politicians and officers out of European courts on charges of war crimes. Most recently (December 2009), opposition leader Zipi Livni cancelled a trip to London out of fear she would be arrested, thanks to universal jurisdiction of human rights violations. Similar arrest orders were deflected by other senior Israelis (Barak, Mofaz, and Almog). Publicity about a hit list and hit squads could only add fuel to the growing criticism of Israel and the fear among its leaders of being arrested on a visit to Europe. Not to mention the fact that Israel's own Supreme Court outlawed such unprovoked assassinations just months ago.

But really, isn't Israel still the "only democracy in the Middle East"? Concealing someone's arrest and the charges against her are clearly pages from the annals of dark regimes. And the broader context is the growing McCarthyite culture inside Israel – the silencing of its critics, the squirreling away of its whistleblowers. We see this in the hate campaign against Israeli human rights organizations, which has now reached a new peak – a bill before the Knesset that would severely hamper these organizations from receiving funds from foreign states, one of their only sources of support as the Israeli government is not about to fund human rights activity.

What's not to love about secrecy, lies, and human rights violations? Praise the whistleblowers and all those who turned on the Internet lights, making it impossible for the authorities to turn them off again.

Gila Svirsky
Jerusalem / Nahariya

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Jewish Peace News editors:
Joel Beinin
Racheli Gai
Rela Mazali
Sarah Anne Minkin
Judith Norman
Lincoln Z. Shlensky
Rebecca Vilkomerson
Alistair Welchman
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Iran, Israel & the Conspicuous Absence of Nuclear Debate

In an extensive, research-based 2009 position paper titled: On Nuclear Weapons: A Feminist Perspective, Ednay Gorney and Hedva Eyal of the Isha L'Isha Haifa Feminist Center wrote, "the Israeli public remains excluded from the [nuclear] debate. The public does not ask questions, does not demand that the state takes responsibility, nor does it demand to be involved in decision making; it accepts and is content with the information or, more accurately, with the lack of information."

This passive indifference to the nuclear weaponry widely believed to be in the public's backyard is, in my view, a highly dangerous manifestation of Israel's longtime and entrenched militarization. As Gorney and Eyal have put it, "Decision-making in all areas related to security is characterized by secrecy and vagueness, excluding anyone who does not belong to the security elite. … The secret functions both on the outside as well as on the inside. Denying information under the guise of maintaining secrecy is one of the common ways through which elites maintain their status. … [While o]ne of the ways they can attain legitimacy for their control and actions is to continuously disseminate and instill fear – real and imaginary – among the citizens of Israel. This fear justifies and, in turn, foments military power and its use against any security threat, as defined by this elite group."

Meanwhile, Gorney and Eyal have noted, "We are flooded with information on the great threat Iran poses and on the necessity of military operations. The debate within the Israeli public discourse is almost devoid of the possibility of solution through diplomatic means."

Outlining the severely undemocratic suppression of any public nuclear debate in Israel, the position paper lists a line of researchers, journalists, politicians, activists and ex-security personnel who's critical voices have been stifled by the security establishment, using a broad range of tactics. This in addition to the constant dissemination of fear underpinning militarization in general and the unquestioning Israeli public acceptance of its governments' nuclear armament in particular. Thus, the risks of such armament to this public itself, as well as the entire area or even the globe, go unexamined and undebated for decades on end.

Resisting this reality and reaching for an actual, participatory democracy, Gorney and Eyal explain, "As feminists we wish to expose the connections between the policy of opacity, concealment and fear, and the current perception of security. We want to take responsibility for our lives and for actions carried out in our name."

In one of the rare public voices taking up these issues, the position paper concludes:
"We demand the removal of opacity surrounding the issue of nuclear weapons in Israel; We demand a public debate and the development of an alternative policy that will enable us to live in peace in the Middle East; We demand nuclear disarmament; We demand that the State of Israel join the International Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons."

To read the full 22 page position paper, see:

http://www.isha.org.il/files/files/File/1325_reports/On_Nuclear_Weapons.pdf

-----------------------------------------

Another such public voice, sounded now for many years, is that of nuclear historian and analyst, Avner Cohen, whose work is one of main sources repeatedly referred to by the Isha L'Isha position paper. Cohen is equally critical of successive Israeli governments' successful barring of nuclear debate and, in the recent op-ed forwarded in full below, offers a series of serious arguments against what he views as the irresponsible and extremely dangerous possibility that Israel might launch a military attack against Iran in an attempt to quash its nuclear capacity.

Cohen's op-ed, converging in part with some of the conclusions presented by the Isha L'Isha position paper, was published April 2nd in Haaretz.

Rela Mazali

------------------------------------------

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1160524.html

Fri., April 02, 2010

We look at Iran and see ourselves

By Avner Cohen

If Israel takes military action against Iran, it will be one of the biggest decisions in the history of the state. The risks involved will make it unprecedented.

There is no comparison between such a decision and the ones that established and implemented the so-called Begin doctrine: the decision by Menachem Begin's government to attack the Osirak reactor in Iraq in 1981 and the attack on the nuclear facility in Syria in 2007. In terms of both the complexity of the military operation and the uncertainty about the consequences and where they may lead, there is a qualitative difference between the legacy of the past and the challenge of the present.

The seriousness of the challenge requires as open and thorough a public discussion as possible. But unfortunately, such a discussion has been virtually nonexistent, even on a basic conceptual level. Instead of a public discussion there has been a belligerent press, which makes demagogic use of statements that intensify the message of the politics of fear. These include expressions such as "Iran is galloping toward a bomb" and a "second Holocaust" that Israel must prevent. Such discourse creates a feeling that if Iran is not attacked, and soon, we have no choice but to accept a nuclear Iran.

It's doubtful whether the people making those statements are capable of giving them a precise (technical and political) interpretation. It's doubtful whether they have a suitable answer to the question: When should Iran be considered a nuclear state? Where exactly is the red line? What is the precise significance of such a line and what makes it red?

One thing is clear: As long as Iran is a member of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, it will not be able to test a nuclear device or declare that it has one. Also, as long as Iran is subject to the treaty, it will not be a nuclear state according to the accepted definition of such a state.

It's true that under cover of the treaty Iran can get very close to the nuclear threshold and still claim - as it claims now - that it is not deviating from its legal obligations under the treaty. Iran as a threshold state can perhaps even position itself a few weeks away from a nuclear test. Such an Iran, despite supervision by the International Atomic Energy Agency, will of necessity be opaque; there will always remain a fear that it is working in secret, including making weapons in secret. But even in such a case, Iran would be considered a threshold state, not an actual nuclear state.

Even those who disparage the practical limitations of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (as Israelis tend to do) must recognize that it is almost impossible for Iran to be a nuclear state in the full sense without withdrawing from the treaty. And even if it is outside the treaty, it will take Iran years, many years, to make the transition from a threshold state to a mature nuclear state. Such a transition is not trivial; certainly it is not inevitable, even if we look at the experience of states that in the past were considered threshold states and were not bound by the treaty's restrictions.

For example, India, which carried out a nuclear test in 1998, is still making this transition slowly, and many experts say it should still not be considered a mature nuclear state. Even Pakistan, whose nuclear path was faster and more purposeful than India's, needed about a generation to become a nuclear state to all extents and purposes. In its nuclear behavior Iran is more like India than Pakistan.

It's ironic that an Iran under attack would probably become more determined and purposeful in its nuclear ambitions. After an attack, Iran would abandon the treaty in protest, declare its right to nuclear arms and almost certainly succeed in implementing it.

The public discussion in Israel about a nuclear Iran is simplistic, inadequate, confused and confusing. It reflects to some degree our own biases. We come from a culture of national security in which nuclear opacity has been exploited to the hilt to create a specific model of deterrence. The result is that when we look at Iran we see ourselves: how we would behave in a similar situation. But Iran is not Israel exactly, and the Israeli experience does not necessarily reflect Iran's behavior. On the contrary, it leads to systematic errors when making assessments.

The writer is the author of the book "Israel and the Bomb." His forthcoming book, "The Worst-Kept Secret," will be published in the United States in September.

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Jewish Peace News editors:
Joel Beinin
Racheli Gai
Rela Mazali
Sarah Anne Minkin
Judith Norman
Lincoln Z. Shlensky
Rebecca Vilkomerson
Alistair Welchman
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Naomi Klein's Open Letter to Berkeley Students / The Nation

Below you'll find Naomi Klein's letter in support of a bill, passed by the student senate in Berkeley by a vote of 16-4, and vetoed by the President.
The bill will be reconsidered soon, and we have the opportunity to write to the Senators in support of overturning the veto.
If you wish to write such a letter, you can do so at http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/301/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=2747

Racheli Gai.

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20100412/klein?rel=emailNation

Open Letter to Berkeley Students on their Historic Israeli Divestment Bill
By Naomi Klein

March 31, 2010

On March 18, continuing a long tradition of pioneering human rights campaigns, the Senate of the Associated Students of the University of California, Berkeley (ASUC) passed "A Bill In Support of UC DIVESTMENT FROM WAR CRIMES." The historic bill resolves to divest ASUC's assets from two American companies, General Electric and United Technologies, that are "materially and militarily supporting the Israeli government's occupation of the Palestinian territories"--and to advocate that the UC, with about $135 million invested in companies that profit from Israel's illegal actions in the Occupied Territories, follow suit. Although the bill passed by a vote of 16-4 after a packed and intense debate, the President of the Senate vetoed the bill six days later. The Senate is expected to reconsider the bill soon; groups such as Jewish Voice for Peace are asking supporters of the bill to send letters to the Senators, who can overturn the veto with only fourteen votes.

Here is the letter I just sent:

Dear members of the ASUC Senate,
I am writing to urge you to reaffirm Senate Bill 118A, despite the recent presidential veto.

It comes as no surprise that you are under intense pressure to reverse your historic and democratic decision to divest from two companies that profit from Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory. When a school with a deserved reputation for academic excellence and moral leadership takes such a bold position, it threatens to inspire others to take their own stands.

Indeed, Berkeley--the campus and the wider community--has provided this kind of leadership on many key issues in the past: not only Apartheid in South Africa but also sweatshops in Indonesia, dictatorship in Burma, political killings in Nigeria, and the list goes on. Time and again, when the call for international solidarity has come from people denied a political voice, Berkeley has been among the first to answer. And in virtually every case, what began as a small action in a progressive community quickly spread across the country and around the world.

Your recent divestment bill opposing Israeli war crimes stands to have this same kind of global impact, helping to build a grassroots, non-violent movement to end Israel's violations of international law. And this is precisely what your opponents--by spreading deliberate lies about your actions--are desperately trying to prevent. They are even going so far as to claim that, in the future, there should be no divestment campaigns that target a specific country, a move that would rob activists of one of the most effective tools in the non-violent arsenal. Please don't give into this pressure; too much is on the line. As the world has just witnessed with the Netanyahu government's refusal to stop its illegal settlement expansion, political pressure is simply not enough to wrench Israel off its current disastrous path. And when our governments fail to apply sanctions for defiant illegality, other forms of pressure must come into play, including targeting those corporations that are
profiting directly from human rights abuses. Whenever we take a political action, we open ourselves up to accusations of hypocrisy and double standards, since the truth is that we can never do enough in the face of pervasive global injustice. Yet to argue that taking a clear stand against Israeli war crimes is somehow to "discriminate unfairly" against Israelis and Jews (as the veto seems to claim) is to grossly pervert the language of human rights. Far from "singling out Israel," with Senate Bill 118A, you are acting within Berkeley's commendable and inspiring tradition.

I understand that there is some debate about whether or not your divestment bill was adopted "in haste." Not having been there, I cannot comment on your process, though I am deeply impressed by the careful research that went into the decision. I also know that in 2005 an extraordinarily broad range of Palestinian civil society groups called on activists around the world to adopt precisely these kinds of peaceful pressure tactics. In the years since that call, we have all watched as Israeli abuses have escalated dramatically: the attack on Lebanon in the summer of 2006, a massive expansion of illegal settlements and walls, an ongoing siege on Gaza that violates all prohibitions on collective punishment, and, worst of all, the 2008/9 attack on Gaza that left approximately 1,400 dead.

I would humbly suggest that when it comes to acting to end Israeli war crimes, the international response has not suffered from too much haste but from far too little. This is a moment of great urgency, and the world is watching.

Be brave.

Yours sincerely,

Naomi Klein

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Jewish Peace News editors:
Joel Beinin
Racheli Gai
Rela Mazali
Sarah Anne Minkin
Judith Norman
Lincoln Z. Shlensky
Rebecca Vilkomerson
Alistair Welchman
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UN: Israel's Militarized State Education in Violation of Children's Rights

21 March 2010

In January 2010, an official UN body determined for the first time (http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/crc/docs/CRC-C-OPAC-ISR-CO-1.pdf) that the militarization of Israel's government-run school system was in violation of the International Convention of the Rights of the Child and, in particular, of Israel's implementation of the Optional Protocol to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict (OPAC), to which it is a signatory.

Unprecedented in an international legal document, this was one of the conclusions of a report submitted by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child reviewing Israel's adherence to and breaches of the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Optional Protocol.

Part of the evidence collected by the review included a jointly authored report prepared by: Defense for Children International-Palestine Section, Defense for Children International-Israel Section and New Profile, with additional contributions of information by Adalah, Yesh Din, Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers, UNICEF Occupied Palestinian Territories.

The sections authored by New Profile are based on the New Profile Report on Child Recruitment in Israel (http://www.newprofile.org/data/uploads/child_soldiers/english.pdf), 2004, which they update and expand. These sections were authored by Sergeiy Sandler and Albert Givol.

The item below, issued on 11 March 2010, by DCI-Palestine, announces the public release of the jointly authored document providing detailed answers to a list of questions posed by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child. The item provides links to the full text of the 'List of Issues' and to additional relevant documents.

Sergeiy Sandler

[JPN: Guest contributor Sergeiy Sandler has been radical peace activist since the early 1990s. Since 1999 he is active with the feminist antimiliatrist movement New Profile, and since 2002 is an International Council member of the War Resisters' International.]

JPN: For some visual samples of militarized state education in Israel, see: http://theonlydemocracy.org/2010/03/schoolchildren-learn-to-count-with-tanks/.]

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http://www.newprofile.org/english/?p=273

DCI-Israel, DCI-Palestine and New Profile release today their answers to the 'List of Issues' (http://www.newprofile.org/data/uploads/child_soldiers/Reply_to_List_of_Issues.PDF) recently prepared by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) in connection with Israel's implementation of theOptional Protocol to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict (OPAC: http://www2.ohchr.org/english/law/crc-conflict.htm).

This report, entitled NGO Answers to the List of Issues (http://www.newprofile.org/data/uploads/child_soldiers/Reply_to_List_of_Issues.PDF), compiles data provided by seven organisations* and was submitted to the Committee in December 2009, ahead of the review of Israel's compliance with OPAC in January 2010. It includes thorough and up-to-date information on the recruitment practices of the Israeli state armed forces, and Palestinian and Israeli non-state actors. It also expands upon the militarisation of Israeli society at large.

[Read the full report: http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/crc/docs/AdvanceVersions/CRC-C-OPAC-ISR-Q-1.pdf]
[Read the CRC Concluding Observations on Israel: http://www2.ohchr.org/english/law/crc-conflict.htm]
[Also on the same topic: The New Profile Report on Child Recruitment in Israel, 2004: http://www.newprofile.org/data/uploads/child_soldiers/english.pdf]

More specifically, the 41-page report is based, inter alia, on: Adalah's expertise on the legal and practical aspects of the Israeli military's use of civilians as human shields; DCI-Palestine's research and field documentation of the impact of Operation Cast Lead, and its experience of representing Palestinian children accused of security offences in Israeli military courts; New Profile's expertise on Israel's recruitment laws and practices, its knowledge about the administration of military schools in Israel, and its research on the militarisation of the Israeli education system; Yesh Din's expertise on the Israeli military court system; and UNICEF's perspective on the Israeli government's support towards the implementation of the child rights monitoring and reporting mechanism set up by UN Security Council Resolution 1612.

On 19 January 2010, Israel's OPAC implementation was reviewed by the Committee on the Rights of the Child. Committee members probed the Israeli government delegation on the following topics, among others:

· Applicability of the Convention in the OPT

· Use of Palestinian children as human shields

· Detention of Palestinian children by Israeli authorities

· Israeli military juvenile courts

· Age of minimum recruitment in Israel

· Israeli military schools

· Operation Cast Lead

· Construction of the Wall in the West Bank

· Israeli landmines in the Golan.

On 29 January 2010, the Committee on the Rights of the Child issued its Concluding Observations (http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/crc/docs/CRC-C-OPAC-ISR-CO-1.pdf) to Israel.

*Adalah – The Legal Center for Arab Minority Right in Israel (Contributor); Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers (Contributor); DCI-Israel – Defence for Children International-Israel Section (Author); DCI-Palestine – Defence for Children International-Palestine Section (Author); New Profile – Movement for the Civilization of Israeli Society (Author); UNICEF – United Nations Children's Fund-OPT (Contributor); Yesh Din – Volunteers for Human Rights (Contributor).

BACKGROUND INFORMATION – OPAC Timeline

On 18 July 2005, Israel ratified the Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict (OPAC). As a State Party to OPAC, Israel was due to report to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child – the body in charge of monitoring implementation of the Convention and its Protocols – two years after ratification.

In March 2008, Israel submitted its Initial State Party Report (http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/crc/docs/AdvanceVersions/CRC-C-OPAC-ISR-1.doc), one year late. The report made no mention of the situation of children – Palestinian or Israeli – living in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT).

In July 2009, DCI-Israel and DCI-Palestine submitted a joint Alternative Report (http://www.dci-pal.org/english/display.cfm?DocId=1195&CategoryId=2) to the Committee in order to provide Committee members with complementary information relating to implementation of OPAC in the OPT.

On 6 October 2009, at the end of its 52nd Session, the Committee held a pre-session meeting on Israel's OPAC Initial State Party Report and invited representatives of DCI-Israel and DCI-Palestine to present the contents of their Alternative Report to them. The Committee had many questions on Israel's child recruitment practices in the OPT.

On 15 October 2009, shortly after the pre-session meeting on Israel, the Committee sent its List of Issues (22 questions) to the Israeli government, expressing its concern and requesting further information on a range of issues, a majority of them connected to the OPT, over which the Committee considers that Israel has jurisdiction. The government was given until 19 November 2009 to send its responses in writing.

On 7 January 2010, Israel forwarded its Written Replies (http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/crc/docs/AdvanceVersions/CRC-C-OPAC-ISR-Q-1-Add1.doc) to the List of Issues to the Committee on the Rights of the Child.

On 28 December 2009, NGOs sent their own replies to the Committee. The List of Issues had also benn forwarded to NGOs in Israel and the OPT, to encourage them to submit updated and complementary information to the Committee. Expert contributions from Israeli, Palestinian, international and UN organisations were compiled in the NGO Answers to the List of Issues (http://www.newprofile.org/data/uploads/child_soldiers/Reply_to_List_of_Issues.PDF).

On 19 January 2010, from 3:00-6:00pm, an Israeli government delegation met members of the Committee in Geneva in order to answer questions on the implementation of OPAC in the territories over which Israel has jurisdiction.

On 29 January 2010, the Committee on the Rights of the Child issued its Concluding Observations.

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Jewish Peace News editors:
Joel Beinin
Racheli Gai
Rela Mazali
Sarah Anne Minkin
Judith Norman
Lincoln Z. Shlensky
Rebecca Vilkomerson
Alistair Welchman
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Jewish Peace News archive and blog: http://jewishpeacenews.blogspot.com
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Jewish Peace News sends its news clippings only to subscribers. To subscribe, unsubscribe, or manage your subscription, go to http://www.jewishpeacenews.net

Nadia Hijabz: The Tale of Two Richards / counterpunch

Hijab's article describes the intense attacks Richard Goldstone - the head of the committee that penned the Goldstone Report, and Richard Falk - The UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights of Palestinians in the Occupied Territories - have been under, both from Israel and from the Palestinian Authority.
This is not just a matter of the personal hardships caused to these individuals. The type of attacks launched signals grave potential danger to international law and the rights of the poor and weak in Palestine and elsewhere.
To learn in gory detail about the work done Israel to sabotage international law, read Jeff Halper's excellent article: "The Second Battle of Gaza: Israel's Undermining of International Law"
http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2010/halper260210.html This effort is led by philosophy professor Asa Kasher and major general Amos Yadlin.
Another strong recommendation: An interview with Jeff Halper on the global pacification industry: http://dandelionsalad.wordpress.com/2010/02/27/jeff-halper-the-global-pacification-industry-must-see/

Racheli Gai

http://www.counterpunch.org/hijab03092010.html

A Tale of Two Richards

By Nadia Hijab

They hail from opposite parts of the globe, but they have much in common: Jewish; experts on and passionate defenders of international law; and pummeling bags for Israel and the Palestinian Authority. And the future of the law of war lies at the heart of the campaigns against them.

Richard Goldstone, whose international stature was cemented as chief prosecutor in the Yugoslavia and Rwanda tribunals, has been excoriated by Israel and its allies ever since his team submitted the report on the Gaza war requested by the United Nations Human Rights Council in September 2009. The steady stream of invective (the report is "full of lies," and he has "used his Jewishness to jeopardize the safety and security of Israel" are just two of the milder attacks) has also targeted his family and taken a toll on the publicly stoic judge.

Richard Falk, professor emeritus at Princeton University and UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, has been attacked by Israel for years. But now, in a new twist, he is being hung out to dry by the Palestinian Authority. This, perhaps, the unkindest cut of all.

The PA pummeling is more discreet. It has quietly suggested to Falk himself that he resign. One reported reason is that Falk can't do his job because Israel will not allow him into the country -- though this should, one would have thought, be all the more reason to defend him.

And the PA has asked the Human Rights Council to take Falk's report off the March 22 agenda and "postpone" it to June, which the Council has done. The PA-appointed representative to the UN in Geneva insists that there are simply more important reports than Falk's on the agenda -- yet at the same time he says the PA has "many" reservations about the Falk report. The real reasons seem to be that the PA did not like the mention of Hamas in Falk's report and his earlier criticism when the PA tried to "postpone" the Goldstone Report in September under pressure from Israel and the United States. A public outcry among Palestinians reversed that decision.

The attacks on Falk and Goldstone are hard for the two men to bear. And they tear at the very fabric of international law and the mechanisms put in place to uphold it. The Human Rights Council has stepped on a slippery slope by agreeing to postpone Falk's report. Instead of listening to the PA (and Egypt) the Council should have backed its special rapporteur. If it does the unthinkable and relieves Falk of his duties because the PA does not want him, the system of independent special rapporteurs would be undermined, just as it would if the Council gave in to Israeli or American pressure.

Undermining the Goldstone Report would be an equally harsh blow to the human rights system. Several earlier reports have called for the application of international law to the Arab-Israeli conflict, including the International Court of Justice's seminal opinion on the illegality of Israel's separation wall in the West Bank. But the Goldstone Report has been published at a time when people are ready to listen, which is partly why Israel is fighting it with such ferocity and on so many fronts.

On one of those fronts, Israel is trying to change international law itself, as Israeli human rights advocate Jeff Halper reveals in an important article, "The Second Battle of Gaza." Halper identifies the Israeli figures leading the campaign "to alter international law in ways that enable them -- and by extension other states involved in 'wars on terror' -- to effectively pursue warfare amongst the people while eliminating both the legitimacy and protections enjoyed by their non-state foes."

No one is more aware of the dangers to international law than Palestinian human rights advocates. Their organizations have acted as a group to support the implementation of the Goldstone Report and to protect Falk and his role.

Last month, 11 Palestinian human rights groups wrote to the High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay expressing dismay at the PA actions against Falk. His reports have provided "powerful instruments to advocate for Palestinian people's rights" they said, urging Pillay to ensure that Falk enjoyed the highest level of support from her office. They also called on her to reinforce the independence of the special rapporteurs from UN member states so as to protect the UN's own credibility.

More recently, 19 Palestinian groups wrote to PA president Mahmoud Abbas criticizing Falk's treatment and pointing out the repercussions for the Palestinians' internationally recognized human rights.

If the attacks on the two Richards succeed, the Palestinian cause will suffer and the world will be a poorer and more dangerous place -- one in which the might of the strong is legally allowed to prevail against the rights of the weak.

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Jewish Peace News editors:
Joel Beinin
Racheli Gai
Rela Mazali
Sarah Anne Minkin
Judith Norman
Lincoln Z. Shlensky
Rebecca Vilkomerson
Alistair Welchman
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Jewish Peace News archive and blog: http://jewishpeacenews.blogspot.com
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Jewish Peace News sends its news clippings only to subscribers. To subscribe, unsubscribe, or manage your subscription, go to http://www.jewishpeacenews.net

New Profile Urges UN to Hold Israel Accountable

http://www.newprofile.org/english/?p=266

NEW PROFILE URGES UN TO HOLD ISRAEL ACCOUNTABLE
On January 28th 2010, New Profile, a feminist movement working to demilitarize society and state in Israel, dispatched a letter to a list of top U.N. officials urging the U.N. General Assembly and the U.N. Security Council to intervene to ensure implementation of the recommendations made by the U.N. Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict.

"If the United Nations and wider international community are to meet their responsibilities in upholding the rule of law," New Profile wrote the U.N. Secretary-General, among others, "then concerted, effective and prompt action must be taken at the highest level to end the impunity and ensure the accountability of the State of Israel."

Based on its long years of research-based, oppositional praxis, New Profile stated in conclusion, that, "the militarized system in place in Israel renders the State of Israel incapable of conducting its own implementation of the U.N. Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict."
To read the entire analysis corroborating New Profile's claim and first-hand information on recent silencing measures encountered by the movement, please see the full text of the letter (PDF) at: http://newprofile.org/statements/New%20Profile%20Urges%20UN%20to%20Hold%20Israel%20Accountable.pdf.

Rela Mazali

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Jewish Peace News editors:
Joel Beinin
Racheli Gai
Rela Mazali
Sarah Anne Minkin
Judith Norman
Lincoln Z. Shlensky
Rebecca Vilkomerson
Alistair Welchman
------------
Jewish Peace News archive and blog: http://jewishpeacenews.blogspot.com
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Jewish Peace News sends its news clippings only to subscribers. To subscribe, unsubscribe, or manage your subscription, go to http://www.jewishpeacenews.net

Reuven Snir: The Arab Jews: Language, Poetry, and Singularity / Qantara

Qantara is a German Internet publication.
The Arabic word "qantara" means "bridge". The Internet portal Qantara.de represents the concerted effort of the Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung (Federal Center for Political Education), Deutsche Welle, the Goethe Institut and the Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen (Institute for Foreign Cultural Relations) to promote dialogue with the Islamic world. The project is funded by the German Foreign Office.
To find out more, go to http://www.qantara.de/webcom/show_softlink.php/_c-360/_lkm-2881/i.html

Here is how Qantara introduces Reuven Snir's essay: The Arab Jews: Language, Poetry, and Singularity:
"A joint Arab-Jewish identity seems an impossibility given the current political situation in the Middle East. And yet it was a reality, exemplified by Arabic-speaking Jews and their writers. In his extensive essay Reuven Snir investigates the complex history of Arab Jews."

Racheli Gai.

Reuven Snir: The Arab Jews: Language, Poetry, and Singularity
December 18, 2009

http://www.qantara.de/webcom/show_article.php/_c-310/_nr-712/i.html

My parents were born in Baghdad. They immigrated to Israel in 1951, without great enthusiasm. I was born two years later. As a sabra – a native-born Israeli Jew – in the Israeli-Zionist educational system, I had been taught that Arabness and Jewishness were mutually exclusive.

Trying to conform to the dominant Ashkenazi-Zionist norm as a child, like most if not all children of the same background, I felt ashamed of the Arabness of my parents. For them, I was an agent of repression sent by the Israeli-Zionist establishment, after excellent training, into the territory of the enemy – my family – and I completed the mission in a way that only children can do with their loving parents: I forbade them to speak Arabic in public or to listen to Arabic music in their own house.

And it was not only the problem of Arabness – my father was also a Communist activist at a time when to be a Communist in Israel was like belonging to a terrorist organisation.

What I remember very clearly about my father is that he was a great lover of poetry, Arabic poetry, and always quoted verses for my benefit. I'm not sure that I remember any of them now – I only know that he insisted on reciting them, even though, thanks to my Zionist education, I didn't want to listen.

But probably because I was so dumb that he had to recite them again and again I think I have managed, many years later, to reconstruct one verse: because I remembered that it had something to do with camels and water, and because I had some sense of the music, which is the melody of the kāmil Arabic meter. It is a verse that has been attributed to the blind ascetic medieval poet Abū al-'Alā' al-Ma'arrī (973-1058 CE), who, it has been argued, influenced Dante Alighieri (1265-1321 CE) in his Divine Comedy. Mine proved later to be a tragedy, not at all divine.

Like camels in the desert, suffering from thirst, while the water is on their back

A deep feeling of regret

To read the article in its entirety, go to
http://www.qantara.de/webcom/show_article.php/_c-310/_nr-712/i.html

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Jewish Peace News editors:
Joel Beinin
Racheli Gai
Rela Mazali
Sarah Anne Minkin
Judith Norman
Lincoln Z. Shlensky
Rebecca Vilkomerson
Alistair Welchman
------------
Jewish Peace News archive and blog: http://jewishpeacenews.blogspot.com
------------
Jewish Peace News sends its news clippings only to subscribers. To subscribe, unsubscribe, or manage your subscription, go to http://www.jewishpeacenews.net