Israel Warns Gaza Of "Shoah"
By REUTERS | Filed at 5:33 p.m. ET | February 29, 2008
GAZA (Reuters) - A year-old Palestinian girl and a senior Hamas bombmaker were killed in the Gaza Strip on Friday as Israel pressed home air strikes after a senior official warned Gazans they risked a "shoah" if rocket fire did not stop.
With the Palestinian death toll at 35 in three days, aides insisted the deputy defense minister used the Hebrew word not in its common meaning of holocaust but only as a term for disaster.
But the strength of his language reflected mounting anger after an Israeli was killed by a rocket on Wednesday and the government debated whether to mount a major ground offensive.
Hamas, which organized rallies in Gaza, held the comment up as proof their enemies were the "new Nazis."
Friday saw fewer air strikes. One, which the army said had targeted a rocket squad, killed Eyad al-Ashram. Hamas said he was one of the Islamist group's senior munitions experts.
Doctors said one-year-old Malak al-Kafarna died in hospital from a shrapnel wound to the head after a missile exploded near her home, wounding four other civilians. Hamas officials said it was an Israeli surface-to-surface missile. Residents said some rockets fired by militants also fell short, landing inside Gaza.
Political sources said Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was wary of launching a major ground offensive and Israeli public radio stations quoted security sources saying that, while plans for an assault were being prepared, such an invasion was not imminent.
The United States, whose Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is due next week to visit Olmert and Palestinian leaders in the occupied West Bank, urged Israel to "consider the consequences" of its action. Bloodshed could derail Washington's hopes of a peace deal this year before President George W. Bush steps down.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who has shared Israel's hostility to Hamas since they routed his forces in Gaza in June, called Israeli threats "dangerous." Even Palestinians who want to see Hamas defeated are outraged that at least 16 civilians, including children as young as 6 months, were among the 35 dead.
"A BIGGER "SHOAH
Israel's deputy defense minister Matan Vilnai told Army Radio: "The more Qassam fire intensifies and the rockets reach a longer range, they will bring upon themselves a bigger 'shoah' because we will use all our might to defend ourselves."
The word "shoah" is rarely used in Israel beyond discussions of the Nazi Holocaust of the Jews but government spokesmen said Vilnai had employed the word only to mean "disaster."
Israeli leaders said rockets from the blockaded territory may leave them no choice but to launch a broader offensive into the crowded coastal strip, which is home to 1.5 million people and which Israel occupied for 38 years until 2005.
Though rocket fire has long disrupted life in small Israeli border towns since then, the killing of an Israeli on Wednesday, the first such death since May, has increased public pressure on Olmert's already unpopular coalition government to act.
Hamas has also raised the stakes by firing Soviet-designed Katyusha missiles, more powerful and accurate than improvised Gazan Qassams, to strike the much larger city of Ashkelon.
Visiting there, Defense Minister Ehud Barak said an Israeli response was "required" and that "Hamas bears responsibility for this deterioration and it will also bear the results."
Ismail Haniyeh, the Hamas leader who was Abbas's prime minister until June, told supporters: "This is a proof of Israel's pre-planned aggressive intentions against our people. "They want the world to condemn what they call the Holocaust and now they are threatening our people with a holocaust."
According to Israel's Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper, Barak has sought to prepare the way for an offensive by sending confidential messages to world leaders, including Rice. "Israel is not keen on and rushing for an offensive, but Hamas is leaving us no choice," Barak told them, Yedioth said.
However, chastened by his 2006 war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, Olmert is wary of an operation that would incur more casualties when Israel is reluctant to re-occupy Gaza long-term.
Rice has voiced concern for Palestinian civilian deaths but stopped short of calling for Israeli restraint. Officials say she will make clear support for Israel's right to defend itself.
***
Friday, February 29, 2008
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
CIA/Skull-and-Bonesman Wm. F Buckley Jr. Obituary
William F. Buckley Jr. pleaded agnosticism when it came to knowledge of the treachery of Orthodox Judaism and Zionism.
His tenure as an unrepententant CIA agent posted to the CIA's Mexico City station under E. Howard Hunt, and as a member of Skull and Bones, the masonic secret society that numbered among its luminaries George Herbert Walker Bush, George W. Bush and John Kerrey, disqualifies Mr. Buckley for serious consideration as a Christian, despite his renowned ardor for classical music and highbrow culture.
In his play "A Man for All Seasons" Robert Bolt has Thomas More ask the traitor Sir Richard Rich if the selling of his soul was worth gaining the office of Attorney General for Wales. We ask the same of the shade of Wm. F. Buckely Jr: Bill, now that you're burning in hell, is the fawning New York Times obituary by Zionist asset Douglas Martin worth the price of admission?
For the lowdown on Buckley cf. John F. McManus, "William F. Buckley, Jr: Pied Piper for the Establishment," available from Amazon.com It's not the whole enchilada, but it's a spicy dish nonetheless.
They say the devil is a gentleman. If that's the case, then WFB Jr. was the archetype of the stereotype -- an entertaining con-man and scoundrel.
--Michael A. Hoffman II
WILLIAM F. BUCKLEY JR. IS DEAD AT 82.
By Douglas Martin
NY Times (website). Feb. 27, 2008
[Douglas Martin is a Zionist ideologue who filed jaundiced reports on the thought crime trial of dissident German-Canadian publisher Ernst Zundel beginning in 1985. It is appropriate that Mr. Martin would be chosen to burnish the reputation of one of the most successful moles in the history of the Conservative movement].
William F. Buckley Jr., who marshaled polysyllabic exuberance, famously arched eyebrows and a refined, perspicacious mind to elevate conservatism to the center of American political discourse, died Wednesday at his home in Stamford, Conn. He was 82.
Mr. Buckley suffered from diabetes and emphysema, his son Christopher said, although the exact cause of death was not immediately known. He was found at his desk in the study of his home, his son said. “He might have been working on a column,” Mr. Buckley said.
William Buckley, with his winningly capricious personality, his use of ten-dollar words and a darting tongue writers loved to compare to an anteater’s, was the popular host of one of television’s longest-running programs, “Firing Line,” and founded and shepherded the influential conservative magazine “National Review.”
He also found time to write more than 50 books, ranging from sailing odysseys to spy novels to dissertations on harpsichord fingering to celebrations of his own dashing daily life. He edited at least five more.
In 2007, he published a history of the magazine called “Cancel Your Own Goddam Subscription” and a political novel, “The Rake.” His personal memoir of Senator Barry M. Goldwater is scheduled to be published this spring, and at his death was working on a similar work on President Ronald Reagan.
The more than 4.5 million words of his 5,600 twice-weekly newspaper columns, “On the Right,” would fill 45 more medium-sized books. His collected papers, which were donated to Yale University, weigh seven tons.
Mr. Buckley’s greatest achievement was making conservatism — not just electoral Republicanism but conservatism as a system of ideas — respectable in liberal post-World War II America. He mobilized the young enthusiasts who helped nominate Barry Goldwater in 1964 and saw his dreams fulfilled when Reagan and the Bushes captured the Oval Office.
President George W. Bush said Wednesday that Mr. Buckley “brought conservative thought into the political mainstream, and helped lay the intellectual foundation for America’s victory in the Cold War.” To Mr. Buckley’s enormous delight, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., the historian, termed him “the scourge of liberalism.”
In remarks at National Review’s 30th anniversary in 1985, President Reagan joked that he picked up his first issue of the magazine in a plain brown wrapper and still anxiously awaited his copy every two weeks — “without the wrapper. You didn’t just part the Red Sea — you rolled it back, dried it up and left exposed, for all the world to see, the naked desert that is statism,” Mr. Reagan said.
“And then, as if that weren’t enough,” the president continued, “you gave the world something different, something in its weariness it desperately needed, the sound of laughter and the sight of the rich, green uplands of freedom.”
The liberal primacy he challenged had begun with the New Deal and so accelerated in the next generation that Lionel Trilling, one of America’s leading intellectuals, wrote in 1950: “In the United States at this time liberalism is not only the dominant but even the sole intellectual tradition. For it is the plain fact that there are no conservative or reactionary ideas in general circulation.”
Mr. Buckley declared war on this liberal order, beginning with his blistering assault on Yale, from which he graduated with honors in 1950, as a den of atheistic collectivism. “All great biblical stories begin with Genesis,” George Will wrote in National Review in 1980. “And before there was Ronald Reagan, there was Barry Goldwater, and before there was Barry Goldwater there was National Review, and before there was National Review there was Bill Buckley with a spark in his mind, and the spark in 1980 has become a conflagration.” Mr. Buckley wove the tapestry of what became the new American conservatism from libertarian writers like Max Eastman, free-market economists like Milton Friedman, traditionalist scholars like Russell Kirk and anti-Communist writers like Whittaker Chambers. He argued for a conservatism based on the national interest and a higher morality.
His most receptive audience became young conservatives first energized by Barry Goldwater’s emergence at the Republican convention in 1960 as the right-wing alternative to Nixon. Some met in September 1960 at Mr. the Buckley family home in Sharon, Conn., to form Young Americans for Freedom. Their numbers — and influence — grew.
Nicholas Lemann observed in Washington Monthly in 1988 that during the Reagan administration “the 5,000 middle-level officials, journalists and policy intellectuals that it takes to run a government” were “deeply influenced by Buckley’s example.” He suggested that neither moderate Washington insiders nor “Ed Meese-style provincial conservatives” could have pulled off the Reagan tax cut and other policy transformations. Speaking of the true believers, Mr. Lemann continued, “Some of these people had been personally groomed by Buckley, and most of the rest saw him as a role model.”
Mr. Buckley rose to prominence with a generation of talented writers fascinated by political themes, people with names like Mailer, Capote, Vidal, Styron and Baldwin. Like the others, he was a magnet for controversy. Even people on the right — from members of the John Birch Society to disciples of the author Ayn Rand to George Wallace to moderate Republicans — frequently pounced on him.
People of many political stripes came to see his life as something of an art form — from racing through city streets on a motorcycle to a quixotic campaign for mayor of New York in 1965 to voicing startling opinions like favoring the decriminalization of marijuana. He was often described as liberals’ favorite conservative, particularly after suavely playing host to an adaptation of Evelyn Waugh’s “Brideshead Revisited” on public television in 1982.
Norman Mailer may indeed have dismissed Mr. Buckley as a “second-rate intellect incapable of entertaining two serious thoughts in a row,” but he could not help admiring his stage presence. “No other act can project simultaneous hints that he is in the act of playing Commodore of the Yacht Club, Joseph Goebbels, Robert Mitchum, Maverick, Savonarola, the nice prep school kid next door, and the snows of yesteryear,” Mr. Mailer said in an interview with Harpers in 1967.
Mr. Buckley’s vocabulary, sparkling with phrases from distant eras and described in newspaper and magazine profiles as sesquipedalian (characterized by the use of long words), became the stuff of legend. Less kind commentators preferred the adjective “pleonastic” (using more words than necessary). And, inescapably, there was that aurora of pure mischief. In 1985, David Remnick, writing in The Washington Post, said, “He has the eyes of a child who has just displayed a horrid use for the microwave oven and the family cat.”
William Francis Buckley was born in Manhattan on Nov. 24, 1925, the sixth of the 10 children of Aloise Steiner Buckley and William Frank Buckley. His parents had intended to name him after his father, but the priest who christened him insisted on a saint’s name, so Francis was chosen.When the younger William Buckley was 5, he asked to change his middle name to Frank and his parents agreed. At that point, he became William F. Buckley Jr.
The elder Mr. Buckley made a small fortune in the oil fields of Mexico and Venezuela and educated his children with personal tutors at Great Elm, the family estate in Sharon, Conn. They also attended exclusive Roman Catholic schools in England and France. Young William absorbed his family’s conservatism along with its deep Catholicism. At 14, he followed his brothers to the Millbrook School, a preparatory school 15 miles across the New York state line from Sharon. In his spare time at Millbrook, young Bill typed schoolmates’ papers for them, charging $1 a paper, with a 25-cent surcharge for correcting the grammar.
He did not neglect politics, showing up uninvited at a faculty meeting to complain about a teacher’s having abridged his right to free speech and to oppose the United States’ entry into World War II. His father wrote him to suggest he “learn to be more moderate in the expression of your views.” He graduated from Millbrook in 1943, then spent a half a year at the University of Mexico studying Spanish, which had been his first language. He served in the Army from 1944 to 1946 and managed to make second lieutenant after first putting colleagues off with his mannerisms.
In his 1988 book, “William F. Buckley, Jr.: Patron Saint of the Conservatives,” John B. Judis quoted sister Patricia as saying that the army experience changed Mr. Buckley. “He got to understand people more,” she said. Mr. Buckley then entered Yale, where he studied political science, economics and history; established himself as a fearsome debater; was elected chairman of the Yale Daily News; and joined Skull and Bones, the university’s most prestigious (AND SOME WOULD SAY MOST LETHAL --Hoffman) secret society. As a senior, he was given the honor of delivering the speech for Yale’s Alumni Day celebration, but was replaced after the university’s administration objected to his strong attacks on the university. He responded by writing his critique in the book that brought him to national attention, in part because he gave the publisher, Regnery, $10,000 to advertise it.
Published in 1951, “God and Man at Yale: The Superstitions of ‘Academic Freedom,’ ” charged the powers at Yale with having an atheistic and collectivist bent and called for the firing of faculty members who advocated values out of line with what he saw as Yale’s traditional values. Among the avalanche of negative reviews, the one in The Atlantic Monthly by McGeorge Bundy, a Yale graduate, was conspicuous. He found the book “dishonest in its use of facts, false in its theory, and a discredit to its author.” But Peter Viereck, writing in The New York Times Sunday Book Review, viewed the book as “a necessary counterbalance.”
After a year in the Central Intelligence Agency in Mexico City (his case officer was E. Howard Hunt, who went on to participate in the Watergate break-in [AND SOME WOULD SAY THE ASSASSINATION OF JOHN F. KENNEDY]), Mr. Buckley went to work for the American Mercury magazine, but resigned to write on his own.
Over the next few years, Mr. Buckley worked as a freelance writer and lecturer and wrote a second book with his brother-in-law L. Brent Bozell. Published in 1954, “McCarthy and His Enemies” was a sturdy defense of the senator from Wisconsin who was then at the height of his campaign against communists, liberals and the Democratic Party. The book made The New York Times best-seller list. In 1955, Mr. Buckley started National Review as voice for “the disciples of truth, who defend the organic moral order” with a $100,000 gift from his father and $290,000 from outside donors. The first issue, which came out in November, claimed the publication “stands athwart history yelling Stop.”
It proved it by lining up squarely behind Southern segregationists, saying Southern whites had the right to impose their ideas on blacks who were as yet culturally and politically inferior to them. After some conservatives objected, Mr. Buckley suggested instead that both uneducated whites and blacks should be denied the vote.
Mr. Buckley did not accord automatic support to Republicans. For Eisenhower, whom National Review was founded in part to oppose, the magazine ultimately managed only a memorably tepid endorsement: “We prefer Ike.” Circulation increased from 16,000 in 1957 to 70,000 at the time of Goldwater’s candidacy in 1964, to 115,000 in 1972. It is now 166,000. The magazine has always had to be subsidized by readers’ donations, supplemented by Mr. Buckley’s lecturing fees.
Along with offering a forum to big-gun conservatives like Russell Kirk, James Burnham and Robert Nisbet, National Review cultivated the career of several younger writers, including Garry Wills, Joan Didion and John Leonard, who would shake off the conservative attachment and go their leftward ways. National Review also helped define the conservative movement by isolating cranks from Mr. Buckley’s chosen mainstream.
“Bill was responsible for rejecting the John Birch Society and the other kooks who passed off anti-Semitism or some such as conservatism,” Hugh Kenner, a biographer of Ezra Pound and a frequent contributor to National Review, told The Washington Post. “Without Bill — if he had decided to become an academic or a businessman or something else — without him, there probably would be no respectable conservative movement in this country.”
Mr. Buckley’s personal visibility was magnified by his “Firing Line” program, which ran from 1966 to 1999. First carried on WOR-TV and then on public television , it became the longest running program with a single host — beating out Johnny Carson by three years. He taped 1,504 programs, including debates on scores of topics like “Resolved: The women’s movement has been disastrous.”
There were exchanges on foreign policy with Norman Thomas; feminism with Germaine Greer; and race relations with James Baldwin. Not a few viewers thought Mr. Buckley’s toothy grin before he scored a point resembled nothing so much as a switchblade. To the New York City politician Mark Green, he purred: “You’ve been on the show close to 100 times over the years. Tell me, Mark, have you learned anything yet?” But Harold Macmillan, former prime minister of Britain, flummoxed the master. “Isn’t this show over yet?” Macmillan asked.
At the age of 50, Mr. Buckley crossed the Atlantic Ocean in his sailboat and became a novelist. Eleven of his novels are spy tales starring Blackford Oakes, who fights for the American way and beds the Queen of England in the first book.
Others of his books included a historical novel with Elvis Presley as a significant character, another about the Nuremberg trials, a reasoned critique of anti-Semitism and journals that more than succeeded dramatizing a life of taste and wealth — his own. For example, in “Cruising Speed: A Documentary,” published in 1971, he discussed the kind of meals he liked to eat.
“Rawle could give us anything, beginning with lobster Newburgh and ending with Baked Alaska,” he wrote. “We settle on a fish chowder, of which he is surely the supreme practitioner, and cheese and bacon sandwiches, grilled, with a most prickly Riesling picked up at St. Barts for peanuts.” Mr. Buckley’s spirit of fun was apparent in his 1965 campaign for mayor of New York on the ticket of the Conservative Party. When asked what he would do if he won, he answered, “Demand a recount.” He got 13.4 percent of the vote. In retrospect, the mayoral campaign came to be seen as the beginning of the Republican Party’s successful courtship of working-class whites who later became “Reagan Democrats.”
For Murray Kempton, one of his many friends on the left, the Buckley news conference style called up “an Edwardian resident commissioner reading aloud the 39 articles of the Anglican establishment to a conscript of assembled Zulus.” Unlike his brother James, who served as a United States senator from New York, Mr. Buckley generally avoided official government posts. He did serve from 1969 to 1972 as a presidential appointee to the National Advisory Commission on Information and as a member of the United States delegation to the United Nations in 1973.
The merits of the argument aside, Mr. Buckley irrevocably proved that his brand of candor did not lend itself to public life when an Op-Ed article he wrote for The New York Times offered a partial cure for the AIDS epidemic: “Everyone detected with AIDS should be tattooed in the upper forearm to prevent common needle users, and on the buttocks, to prevent the victimization of homosexuals,” he wrote.
In his last years, as honors like the Presidential Medal of Freedom came his way, Mr. Buckley gradually loosened his grip on his intellectual empire. In 1998, he ended his frenetic schedule of public speeches, about 70 a year over 40 years, he once estimated. In 1999, he stopped “Firing Line,” and in 2004, he relinquished his voting stock in National Review. He wrote his last spy novel (the 11th in his series), sold his sailboat and stopped playing the harpsichord publicly. But he began a new historical novel and kept up his columns, including one on the “bewitching power” of “The Sopranos” television series. He commanded wide attention by criticizing the Iraq war as a failure.
On April 15, 2007, his wife, the former Patricia Aldyen Austin Taylor, who had carved out a formidable reputation as a socialite and philanthropist but considered her role as a homemaker, mother and wife most important, died. Mr. and Mrs. Buckley called each other “Ducky.” He is survived by his son, Christopher, of Washington; his sisters Priscilla L. Buckley of Sharon, Conn., Patricia Buckley Bozell of Washington, and Carol Buckley of Columbia, S.C.; his brothers James L., of Sharon, and F. Reid, of Camden, S.C.; a granddaughter; and a grandson
In the end it was Mr. Buckley’s graceful, often self-deprecating wit that endeared him to others. In his spy novel “Who’s on First,” he described the possible impact of his National Review through his character Boris Bolgin. “ Do you ever read the National Review, Jozsef?’ asks Boris Bolgin, the chief of KGB counter intelligence for Western Europe. ‘It is edited by this young bourgeois fanatic."
-End quote-
***
His tenure as an unrepententant CIA agent posted to the CIA's Mexico City station under E. Howard Hunt, and as a member of Skull and Bones, the masonic secret society that numbered among its luminaries George Herbert Walker Bush, George W. Bush and John Kerrey, disqualifies Mr. Buckley for serious consideration as a Christian, despite his renowned ardor for classical music and highbrow culture.
In his play "A Man for All Seasons" Robert Bolt has Thomas More ask the traitor Sir Richard Rich if the selling of his soul was worth gaining the office of Attorney General for Wales. We ask the same of the shade of Wm. F. Buckely Jr: Bill, now that you're burning in hell, is the fawning New York Times obituary by Zionist asset Douglas Martin worth the price of admission?
For the lowdown on Buckley cf. John F. McManus, "William F. Buckley, Jr: Pied Piper for the Establishment," available from Amazon.com It's not the whole enchilada, but it's a spicy dish nonetheless.
They say the devil is a gentleman. If that's the case, then WFB Jr. was the archetype of the stereotype -- an entertaining con-man and scoundrel.
--Michael A. Hoffman II
WILLIAM F. BUCKLEY JR. IS DEAD AT 82.
By Douglas Martin
NY Times (website). Feb. 27, 2008
[Douglas Martin is a Zionist ideologue who filed jaundiced reports on the thought crime trial of dissident German-Canadian publisher Ernst Zundel beginning in 1985. It is appropriate that Mr. Martin would be chosen to burnish the reputation of one of the most successful moles in the history of the Conservative movement].
William F. Buckley Jr., who marshaled polysyllabic exuberance, famously arched eyebrows and a refined, perspicacious mind to elevate conservatism to the center of American political discourse, died Wednesday at his home in Stamford, Conn. He was 82.
Mr. Buckley suffered from diabetes and emphysema, his son Christopher said, although the exact cause of death was not immediately known. He was found at his desk in the study of his home, his son said. “He might have been working on a column,” Mr. Buckley said.
William Buckley, with his winningly capricious personality, his use of ten-dollar words and a darting tongue writers loved to compare to an anteater’s, was the popular host of one of television’s longest-running programs, “Firing Line,” and founded and shepherded the influential conservative magazine “National Review.”
He also found time to write more than 50 books, ranging from sailing odysseys to spy novels to dissertations on harpsichord fingering to celebrations of his own dashing daily life. He edited at least five more.
In 2007, he published a history of the magazine called “Cancel Your Own Goddam Subscription” and a political novel, “The Rake.” His personal memoir of Senator Barry M. Goldwater is scheduled to be published this spring, and at his death was working on a similar work on President Ronald Reagan.
The more than 4.5 million words of his 5,600 twice-weekly newspaper columns, “On the Right,” would fill 45 more medium-sized books. His collected papers, which were donated to Yale University, weigh seven tons.
Mr. Buckley’s greatest achievement was making conservatism — not just electoral Republicanism but conservatism as a system of ideas — respectable in liberal post-World War II America. He mobilized the young enthusiasts who helped nominate Barry Goldwater in 1964 and saw his dreams fulfilled when Reagan and the Bushes captured the Oval Office.
President George W. Bush said Wednesday that Mr. Buckley “brought conservative thought into the political mainstream, and helped lay the intellectual foundation for America’s victory in the Cold War.” To Mr. Buckley’s enormous delight, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., the historian, termed him “the scourge of liberalism.”
In remarks at National Review’s 30th anniversary in 1985, President Reagan joked that he picked up his first issue of the magazine in a plain brown wrapper and still anxiously awaited his copy every two weeks — “without the wrapper. You didn’t just part the Red Sea — you rolled it back, dried it up and left exposed, for all the world to see, the naked desert that is statism,” Mr. Reagan said.
“And then, as if that weren’t enough,” the president continued, “you gave the world something different, something in its weariness it desperately needed, the sound of laughter and the sight of the rich, green uplands of freedom.”
The liberal primacy he challenged had begun with the New Deal and so accelerated in the next generation that Lionel Trilling, one of America’s leading intellectuals, wrote in 1950: “In the United States at this time liberalism is not only the dominant but even the sole intellectual tradition. For it is the plain fact that there are no conservative or reactionary ideas in general circulation.”
Mr. Buckley declared war on this liberal order, beginning with his blistering assault on Yale, from which he graduated with honors in 1950, as a den of atheistic collectivism. “All great biblical stories begin with Genesis,” George Will wrote in National Review in 1980. “And before there was Ronald Reagan, there was Barry Goldwater, and before there was Barry Goldwater there was National Review, and before there was National Review there was Bill Buckley with a spark in his mind, and the spark in 1980 has become a conflagration.” Mr. Buckley wove the tapestry of what became the new American conservatism from libertarian writers like Max Eastman, free-market economists like Milton Friedman, traditionalist scholars like Russell Kirk and anti-Communist writers like Whittaker Chambers. He argued for a conservatism based on the national interest and a higher morality.
His most receptive audience became young conservatives first energized by Barry Goldwater’s emergence at the Republican convention in 1960 as the right-wing alternative to Nixon. Some met in September 1960 at Mr. the Buckley family home in Sharon, Conn., to form Young Americans for Freedom. Their numbers — and influence — grew.
Nicholas Lemann observed in Washington Monthly in 1988 that during the Reagan administration “the 5,000 middle-level officials, journalists and policy intellectuals that it takes to run a government” were “deeply influenced by Buckley’s example.” He suggested that neither moderate Washington insiders nor “Ed Meese-style provincial conservatives” could have pulled off the Reagan tax cut and other policy transformations. Speaking of the true believers, Mr. Lemann continued, “Some of these people had been personally groomed by Buckley, and most of the rest saw him as a role model.”
Mr. Buckley rose to prominence with a generation of talented writers fascinated by political themes, people with names like Mailer, Capote, Vidal, Styron and Baldwin. Like the others, he was a magnet for controversy. Even people on the right — from members of the John Birch Society to disciples of the author Ayn Rand to George Wallace to moderate Republicans — frequently pounced on him.
People of many political stripes came to see his life as something of an art form — from racing through city streets on a motorcycle to a quixotic campaign for mayor of New York in 1965 to voicing startling opinions like favoring the decriminalization of marijuana. He was often described as liberals’ favorite conservative, particularly after suavely playing host to an adaptation of Evelyn Waugh’s “Brideshead Revisited” on public television in 1982.
Norman Mailer may indeed have dismissed Mr. Buckley as a “second-rate intellect incapable of entertaining two serious thoughts in a row,” but he could not help admiring his stage presence. “No other act can project simultaneous hints that he is in the act of playing Commodore of the Yacht Club, Joseph Goebbels, Robert Mitchum, Maverick, Savonarola, the nice prep school kid next door, and the snows of yesteryear,” Mr. Mailer said in an interview with Harpers in 1967.
Mr. Buckley’s vocabulary, sparkling with phrases from distant eras and described in newspaper and magazine profiles as sesquipedalian (characterized by the use of long words), became the stuff of legend. Less kind commentators preferred the adjective “pleonastic” (using more words than necessary). And, inescapably, there was that aurora of pure mischief. In 1985, David Remnick, writing in The Washington Post, said, “He has the eyes of a child who has just displayed a horrid use for the microwave oven and the family cat.”
William Francis Buckley was born in Manhattan on Nov. 24, 1925, the sixth of the 10 children of Aloise Steiner Buckley and William Frank Buckley. His parents had intended to name him after his father, but the priest who christened him insisted on a saint’s name, so Francis was chosen.When the younger William Buckley was 5, he asked to change his middle name to Frank and his parents agreed. At that point, he became William F. Buckley Jr.
The elder Mr. Buckley made a small fortune in the oil fields of Mexico and Venezuela and educated his children with personal tutors at Great Elm, the family estate in Sharon, Conn. They also attended exclusive Roman Catholic schools in England and France. Young William absorbed his family’s conservatism along with its deep Catholicism. At 14, he followed his brothers to the Millbrook School, a preparatory school 15 miles across the New York state line from Sharon. In his spare time at Millbrook, young Bill typed schoolmates’ papers for them, charging $1 a paper, with a 25-cent surcharge for correcting the grammar.
He did not neglect politics, showing up uninvited at a faculty meeting to complain about a teacher’s having abridged his right to free speech and to oppose the United States’ entry into World War II. His father wrote him to suggest he “learn to be more moderate in the expression of your views.” He graduated from Millbrook in 1943, then spent a half a year at the University of Mexico studying Spanish, which had been his first language. He served in the Army from 1944 to 1946 and managed to make second lieutenant after first putting colleagues off with his mannerisms.
In his 1988 book, “William F. Buckley, Jr.: Patron Saint of the Conservatives,” John B. Judis quoted sister Patricia as saying that the army experience changed Mr. Buckley. “He got to understand people more,” she said. Mr. Buckley then entered Yale, where he studied political science, economics and history; established himself as a fearsome debater; was elected chairman of the Yale Daily News; and joined Skull and Bones, the university’s most prestigious (AND SOME WOULD SAY MOST LETHAL --Hoffman) secret society. As a senior, he was given the honor of delivering the speech for Yale’s Alumni Day celebration, but was replaced after the university’s administration objected to his strong attacks on the university. He responded by writing his critique in the book that brought him to national attention, in part because he gave the publisher, Regnery, $10,000 to advertise it.
Published in 1951, “God and Man at Yale: The Superstitions of ‘Academic Freedom,’ ” charged the powers at Yale with having an atheistic and collectivist bent and called for the firing of faculty members who advocated values out of line with what he saw as Yale’s traditional values. Among the avalanche of negative reviews, the one in The Atlantic Monthly by McGeorge Bundy, a Yale graduate, was conspicuous. He found the book “dishonest in its use of facts, false in its theory, and a discredit to its author.” But Peter Viereck, writing in The New York Times Sunday Book Review, viewed the book as “a necessary counterbalance.”
After a year in the Central Intelligence Agency in Mexico City (his case officer was E. Howard Hunt, who went on to participate in the Watergate break-in [AND SOME WOULD SAY THE ASSASSINATION OF JOHN F. KENNEDY]), Mr. Buckley went to work for the American Mercury magazine, but resigned to write on his own.
Over the next few years, Mr. Buckley worked as a freelance writer and lecturer and wrote a second book with his brother-in-law L. Brent Bozell. Published in 1954, “McCarthy and His Enemies” was a sturdy defense of the senator from Wisconsin who was then at the height of his campaign against communists, liberals and the Democratic Party. The book made The New York Times best-seller list. In 1955, Mr. Buckley started National Review as voice for “the disciples of truth, who defend the organic moral order” with a $100,000 gift from his father and $290,000 from outside donors. The first issue, which came out in November, claimed the publication “stands athwart history yelling Stop.”
It proved it by lining up squarely behind Southern segregationists, saying Southern whites had the right to impose their ideas on blacks who were as yet culturally and politically inferior to them. After some conservatives objected, Mr. Buckley suggested instead that both uneducated whites and blacks should be denied the vote.
Mr. Buckley did not accord automatic support to Republicans. For Eisenhower, whom National Review was founded in part to oppose, the magazine ultimately managed only a memorably tepid endorsement: “We prefer Ike.” Circulation increased from 16,000 in 1957 to 70,000 at the time of Goldwater’s candidacy in 1964, to 115,000 in 1972. It is now 166,000. The magazine has always had to be subsidized by readers’ donations, supplemented by Mr. Buckley’s lecturing fees.
Along with offering a forum to big-gun conservatives like Russell Kirk, James Burnham and Robert Nisbet, National Review cultivated the career of several younger writers, including Garry Wills, Joan Didion and John Leonard, who would shake off the conservative attachment and go their leftward ways. National Review also helped define the conservative movement by isolating cranks from Mr. Buckley’s chosen mainstream.
“Bill was responsible for rejecting the John Birch Society and the other kooks who passed off anti-Semitism or some such as conservatism,” Hugh Kenner, a biographer of Ezra Pound and a frequent contributor to National Review, told The Washington Post. “Without Bill — if he had decided to become an academic or a businessman or something else — without him, there probably would be no respectable conservative movement in this country.”
Mr. Buckley’s personal visibility was magnified by his “Firing Line” program, which ran from 1966 to 1999. First carried on WOR-TV and then on public television , it became the longest running program with a single host — beating out Johnny Carson by three years. He taped 1,504 programs, including debates on scores of topics like “Resolved: The women’s movement has been disastrous.”
There were exchanges on foreign policy with Norman Thomas; feminism with Germaine Greer; and race relations with James Baldwin. Not a few viewers thought Mr. Buckley’s toothy grin before he scored a point resembled nothing so much as a switchblade. To the New York City politician Mark Green, he purred: “You’ve been on the show close to 100 times over the years. Tell me, Mark, have you learned anything yet?” But Harold Macmillan, former prime minister of Britain, flummoxed the master. “Isn’t this show over yet?” Macmillan asked.
At the age of 50, Mr. Buckley crossed the Atlantic Ocean in his sailboat and became a novelist. Eleven of his novels are spy tales starring Blackford Oakes, who fights for the American way and beds the Queen of England in the first book.
Others of his books included a historical novel with Elvis Presley as a significant character, another about the Nuremberg trials, a reasoned critique of anti-Semitism and journals that more than succeeded dramatizing a life of taste and wealth — his own. For example, in “Cruising Speed: A Documentary,” published in 1971, he discussed the kind of meals he liked to eat.
“Rawle could give us anything, beginning with lobster Newburgh and ending with Baked Alaska,” he wrote. “We settle on a fish chowder, of which he is surely the supreme practitioner, and cheese and bacon sandwiches, grilled, with a most prickly Riesling picked up at St. Barts for peanuts.” Mr. Buckley’s spirit of fun was apparent in his 1965 campaign for mayor of New York on the ticket of the Conservative Party. When asked what he would do if he won, he answered, “Demand a recount.” He got 13.4 percent of the vote. In retrospect, the mayoral campaign came to be seen as the beginning of the Republican Party’s successful courtship of working-class whites who later became “Reagan Democrats.”
For Murray Kempton, one of his many friends on the left, the Buckley news conference style called up “an Edwardian resident commissioner reading aloud the 39 articles of the Anglican establishment to a conscript of assembled Zulus.” Unlike his brother James, who served as a United States senator from New York, Mr. Buckley generally avoided official government posts. He did serve from 1969 to 1972 as a presidential appointee to the National Advisory Commission on Information and as a member of the United States delegation to the United Nations in 1973.
The merits of the argument aside, Mr. Buckley irrevocably proved that his brand of candor did not lend itself to public life when an Op-Ed article he wrote for The New York Times offered a partial cure for the AIDS epidemic: “Everyone detected with AIDS should be tattooed in the upper forearm to prevent common needle users, and on the buttocks, to prevent the victimization of homosexuals,” he wrote.
In his last years, as honors like the Presidential Medal of Freedom came his way, Mr. Buckley gradually loosened his grip on his intellectual empire. In 1998, he ended his frenetic schedule of public speeches, about 70 a year over 40 years, he once estimated. In 1999, he stopped “Firing Line,” and in 2004, he relinquished his voting stock in National Review. He wrote his last spy novel (the 11th in his series), sold his sailboat and stopped playing the harpsichord publicly. But he began a new historical novel and kept up his columns, including one on the “bewitching power” of “The Sopranos” television series. He commanded wide attention by criticizing the Iraq war as a failure.
On April 15, 2007, his wife, the former Patricia Aldyen Austin Taylor, who had carved out a formidable reputation as a socialite and philanthropist but considered her role as a homemaker, mother and wife most important, died. Mr. and Mrs. Buckley called each other “Ducky.” He is survived by his son, Christopher, of Washington; his sisters Priscilla L. Buckley of Sharon, Conn., Patricia Buckley Bozell of Washington, and Carol Buckley of Columbia, S.C.; his brothers James L., of Sharon, and F. Reid, of Camden, S.C.; a granddaughter; and a grandson
In the end it was Mr. Buckley’s graceful, often self-deprecating wit that endeared him to others. In his spy novel “Who’s on First,” he described the possible impact of his National Review through his character Boris Bolgin. “ Do you ever read the National Review, Jozsef?’ asks Boris Bolgin, the chief of KGB counter intelligence for Western Europe. ‘It is edited by this young bourgeois fanatic."
-End quote-
***
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
U.N: Terrorism is inevitable consequence of Israeli occupation
Findings of the UN Commission on Human Rights:
Palestinian terrorism is the "inevitable consequence of (Israeli) colonialism, apartheid or occupation"
CONTENTS
1. Michael Hoffman's condensed digest of highlights from this eye-opening UN Human Rights Report on Palestine, by Justice John Dugard, Jan. 21, 2008.
2. The FULL-LENGTH Report (highly recommended reading) of the UN Human Rights Jan. 21, 2008. Report on Palestine by Justice John Dugard.
------------------------------------------
1. Michael Hoffman's condensed digest of the Report
www.RevisionistHistory.org
...the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) are guilty of terrorizing innocent Palestinian civilians by military incursions, targeted killings and sonic booms that fail to distinguish between military targets and civilians. All these acts must be condemned and have been condemned.
Common sense...dictates that a distinction must be drawn between acts of mindless terror, such as acts committed by Al Qaeda, and acts committed in the course of a war of national liberation against colonialism, apartheid or military occupation. While such acts cannot be justified, they must be understood as being a painful but inevitable consequence of colonialism, apartheid or occupation.
History is replete with examples of military occupation that have been resisted by violence - acts of terror. The German occupation was resisted by many European countries in the Second World War; the South West Africa People's Organization (SWAPO) resisted South Africa's occupation of Namibia; and Jewish groups resisted British occupation of Palestine - inter alia, by the blowing up of the King David Hotel in 1946 with heavy loss of life, by a group masterminded by Menachem Begin, who later became Prime Minister of Israel.
Acts of terror against military occupation must be seen in historical context. This is why every effort should be made to bring the (Israeli) occupation to a speedy end. Until this is done, peace cannot be expected, and violence will continue. In other situations, for example Namibia, peace has been achieved by the ending of occupation, without setting the end of resistance as a precondition. Israel cannot expect perfect peace and the end of violence as a precondition for the ending of the occupation.
A further comment on terrorism is called for. In the present international climate it is easy for a State to justify its repressive measures as a response to terrorism - and to expect a sympathetic hearing. Israel exploits the present international fear of terrorism to the full. But this will not solve the Palestinian problem. Israel must address the occupation and the violation of human rights and international humanitarian law it engenders, and not invoke the justification of terrorism as a distraction, as a pretext for failure to confront the root cause of Palestinian violence - the occupation.
...In the past two years 668 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli security forces in Gaza. Over half - 359 people - were not involved in hostilities at the time they were killed. Of those killed 126 were minors; 361 were killed by missiles fired from helicopters; and 29 of those killed were targeted for assassination. During the same period, Palestinians fired some 2,800 Qassam rockets and mortar shells into Israel from the Gaza Strip. Four Israeli civilians were killed by Qassam rockets...Four members of the Israeli security forces were killed in attacks originating from Gaza.
Serious questions arise over the proportionality of Israel's military response and its failure to distinguish between military and civilian targets. It is highly arguable that Israel has violated the most fundamental rules of international humanitarian law, which constitute war crimes in terms of article 147 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and article 85 of the Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts (Additional Protocol I). These crimes include direct attacks against civilians and civilian objects, and attacks which fail to distinguish between military targets and civilians and civilian objects (articles 48, 51 (4) and 52 (1) of Protocol I); the excessive use of force arising from disproportionate attacks on civilians and civilian objects (articles 51 (4) and 51 (5) of Protocol I); and the spreading of terror among the civilian population (article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and article 51 (2) of Protocol I).
The indiscriminate and excessive use of force against civilians and civilian objects, the destruction of electricity and water supplies, the bombardment of public buildings, the restrictions on freedom of movement, the closure of crossings and the consequences that these actions have upon public health, food, family life and the psychological well-being of the Palestinian people constitute a gross form of collective punishment.
Since 1967 over 700,000 Palestinians have been imprisoned. At present, there are some 11,000 (Palestinian) prisoners in Israeli jails, a number which includes 376 children, 118 women, 44 members of the Palestinian Legislative Council and some 800 "administrative detainees" (that is, persons not convicted for any offense...).
On 20 July 2004 the General Assembly adopted resolution ES-10/15 which called for Israel to comply with the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice. This resolution was adopted by 150 nations. Six nations (Australia, Micronesia, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau, United States) voted against it. There were 10 abstentions....
Since 2004, the Advisory Opinion has been ignored by the Security Council. While the General Assembly and Human Rights Council have passed several resolutions reaffirming the Opinion, no attempt has been made by the Security Council to compel Israel to comply with the Opinion or to remind States of their obligation to ensure compliance by Israel with the Fourth Geneva Convention.
The reason for this is not hard to find. The Security Council is prevented from giving its backing to the Opinion by the United States, which has refused to accept it.
For 40 years the political organs of the United Nations, States and individuals have accused Israel of consistent, systematic and gross violations of human rights and humanitarian law...
In 2004 the judicial organ of the United Nations, in its Advisory Opinion, affirmed that Israel's actions in the occupied territories do indeed violate fundamental norms of human rights and humanitarian law and cannot be justified on grounds of self-defence or necessity.
If the United Nations is serious about human rights it cannot afford to ignore this Opinion in the deliberations of the Quartet, as it is an authoritative affirmation that Israel is in serious breach of its international commitments.
Failure to attempt to implement, or even to acknowledge, an advisory opinion dealing with international humanitarian law and human rights law, brings the very commitment of the United Nations to human rights into question.
----------------------------------------------------
Investigator Dugard's education, experience and credentials:
LL.D. degree from Cambridge University (1980)
Former Director of the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law at the University of Cambridge (1995-1997)
Former Chairman of the Dept. of Public International Law at Leiden University in the Netherlands (1998)
Judge ad hoc on the International Court of Justice at The Hague (2000)
United Nations "Special Rapporteur" (investigator) for Human Rights (current position)
[The FULL-LENGTH Report:]
GE.08-40229 (E) 290108 UNITED NATIONS General Assembly Distr. GENERAL A/HRC/7/17 21 January 2008
Original: ENGLISH
HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL Seventh session Item 7 of the provisional agenda. Reference: A/HRC/7/17
HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION IN PALESTINE AND OTHER OCCUPIED ARAB TERRITORIES
Report of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967
By JOHN DUGARD
http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G08/402/29/PDF/G0840229.pdf?OpenElement
Summary
This year marks the fortieth anniversary of the occupation of the Palestinian territory. Israel's obligations as an occupying Power have not diminished as a result of the prolonged nature of the occupation.
Israel remains the occupying Power in Gaza despite its claim that Gaza is a "hostile territory". This means that its actions must be measured against the standards of international humanitarian law and human rights law. Judged by these standards Israel is in serious violation of its legal obligations. The collective punishment of Gaza by Israel is expressly prohibited by international humanitarian law and has resulted in a serious humanitarian crisis.
The human rights situation in the West Bank has worsened, despite expectations that it would improve following the removal of Hamas from the Government of the West Bank. Settlements expand, the construction of the wall continues, and checkpoints increase in number. Military incursions and arrests have intensified, 779 Palestinian prisoners have been released but some 11,000 remain in Israeli jails.
The right of self-determination of the Palestinian people is seriously threatened by the separation of Gaza and the West Bank resulting from the seizure of power by Hamas in Gaza in June 2007. Every effort must be made by the international community to restore Palestinian unity.
On 27 November a new peace process was initiated at a meeting in Annapolis. This process must take place within a normative framework that respects international law, international humanitarian law and human rights. The Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice on the Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory1 is an essential feature of this framework and cannot be overlooked by the Annapolis peace process, the Israeli and Palestinian authorities, the Quartet and the United Nations. The Secretary-General as the representative of the United Nations must ensure that the Advisory Opinion, which represents the law of the United Nations, is respected by all parties engaged in the Annapolis process.
Introduction 1. The Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967 visited the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) from 25 September to 1 October 2007. During this time he visited Gaza, Jerusalem, Ramallah, Bethlehem, Jericho and Nablus, where he met with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) - both Palestinian and Israeli - United Nations agencies, Palestinian officials, academics, businessmen and independent interlocutors. The Special Rapporteur spent a considerable amount of time in the field, visiting factories in Gaza, checkpoints, settlements, Palestinian villages affected by the wall near Bethlehem, Nablus and Qalqiliya, and villages and communities in the Jordan valley. On 30 September he delivered a lecture at Al-Najah University in Nablus. The visit of the Special Rapporteur to the OPT was preceded and followed by visits to Jordan where he met with Jordanian officials. The purpose of these meetings was to obtain a Jordanian perspective on the human rights situation in the OPT.
I. CRITICISM OF SPECIAL RAPPORTEUR AND MANDATE
The Special Rapporteur has been criticized for a number of reasons by concerned States. First, reports are repetitious. Second, they fail to address terrorism. Third, they fail to consider human rights violations committed by Palestinians. These criticisms will be briefly considered at the outset of the present report. A. Repetition 3. It is true that reports on the OPT follow a familiar pattern and deal with substantially similar factual situations. They record violations of human rights and international humanitarian law that have occurred in a systematic and consistent manner over many years, some going back to the start of the occupation 40 years ago. Settlements, checkpoints, demolition of houses, torture, closure of crossings and military incursions have characterized the occupation for many decades and have featured regularly in reports. Reports inevitably, and correctly, continue to report on such matters and to record their consequences and frequency in a changing environment.
New violations of human rights and humanitarian law are added as they occur, such as the construction of the wall (since 2003), sonic booms, targeted killings, the use of Palestinians as human shields, and the humanitarian crisis produced by the non-payment of tax money due to the Palestinians. In short, reports are repetitious because the same violations of human rights and humanitarian law continue to occur in the OPT. B. Terrorism Terrorism is a scourge, a serious violation of human rights and international humanitarian law. No attempt is made in the reports to minimize the pain and suffering it causes to victims, their families and the broader community. Palestinians are guilty of terrorizing innocent Israeli civilians by means of suicide bombs and Qassam rockets.
Likewise the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) are guilty of terrorizing innocent Palestinian civilians by military incursions, targeted killings and sonic booms that fail to distinguish between military targets and civilians. All these acts must be condemned and have been condemned.
Common sense, however, dictates that a distinction must be drawn between acts of mindless terror, such as acts committed by Al Qaeda, and acts committed in the course of a war of national liberation against colonialism, apartheid or military occupation. While such acts cannot be justified, they must be understood as being a painful but inevitable consequence of colonialism, apartheid or occupation.
History is replete with examples of military occupation that have been resisted by violence - acts of terror. The German occupation was resisted by many European countries in the Second World War; the South West Africa People's Organization (SWAPO) resisted South Africa's occupation of Namibia; and Jewish groups resisted British occupation of Palestine - inter alia, by the blowing up of the King David Hotel in 1946 with heavy loss of life, by a group masterminded by Menachem Begin, who later became Prime Minister of Israel.
Acts of terror against military occupation must be seen in historical context. This is why every effort should be made to bring the occupation to a speedy end. Until this is done peace cannot be expected, and violence will continue. In other situations, for example Namibia, peace has been achieved by the ending of occupation, without setting the end of resistance as a precondition. Israel cannot expect perfect peace and the end of violence as a precondition for the ending of the occupation.
A further comment on terrorism is called for. In the present international climate it is easy for a State to justify its repressive measures as a response to terrorism - and to expect a sympathetic hearing. Israel exploits the present international fear of terrorism to the full. But this will not solve the Palestinian problem. Israel must address the occupation and the violation of human rights and international humanitarian law it engenders, and not invoke the justification of terrorism as a distraction, as a pretext for failure to confront the root cause of Palestinian violence - the occupation.
Palestinian human rights violations
The mandate of the Special Rapporteur is concerned with violations of human rights and international humanitarian law that are a consequence of military occupation. Although military occupation is tolerated by international law it is not approved and must be brought to a speedy end. The mandate of the Special Rapporteur therefore requires him to report on human rights violations committed by the occupying Power and not by the occupied people. For this reason this report, like previous reports, will not address the violation of the human rights of Israelis by Palestinians. Nor will it address the conflict between Fatah and Hamas, and the human rights violations that this conflict has engendered. Similarly it will not consider the human rights record of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank or of Hamas in Gaza.
The Special Rapporteur is aware of the ongoing violations of human rights committed by Palestinians upon Palestinians and by Palestinians upon Israelis. He is deeply concerned and condemns such violations. However, they find no place in this report because the mandate requires that the report be limited to the consequences of the military occupation of the OPT by Israel.
II. THE OCCUPATION OF THE OCCUPIED PALESTINIAN TERRITORY What distinguishes the case of Palestine from other situations in which violations of human rights occur is the occupation, an occupation which began in 1967, 40 years ago, and which shows no sign of ending. In Israel, complaints are frequently made that criticism of its policies and practices are too much centred on the occupation. But the occupation is a reality, one which is to blame for the present conflict, and the source of the violation of human rights and of international humanitarian law. Consequently, it is necessary to commence this report - again - with comments on the occupation.
Israel has been for 40 years and remains in military occupation of the OPT. This was reaffirmed by the International Court of Justice in its 2004 Advisory Opinion on the Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, when it held that the Palestinian territories (including East Jerusalem) "remain occupied territories and Israel has continued to have the status of occupying Power". The consequence of this, in the opinion of the International Court, is that the Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War (Fourth Geneva Convention) applies to the Occupied Palestinian Territory, as do the International Covenants on Civil and Political Rights and on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.4 Furthermore, Israel's obligations have not diminished as a result of the prolonged nature of the occupation.5 On the contrary, they have increased as a result of it. It is now argued that Israel's occupation has become unlawful as a result of the numerous violations of international law that have occurred during the occupation.
III. THE OCCUPATION OF GAZA
In its Advisory Opinion on the construction of a wall in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, the International Court of Justice was not asked to pronounce on the legal status of Gaza. It, possibly therefore, confined its reaffirmation of the occupied status of the Occupied Palestinian Territory to the West Bank and East Jerusalem.7 The evacuation of Israeli settlements and the withdrawal of the permanent IDF presence from Gaza in 2005, has now given rise to the argument that Gaza is no longer occupied territory. On 15 September 2005 Prime Minister Sharon told the General Assembly that Israel's withdrawal from Gaza meant the end of its responsibility for Gaza.
See Adam Roberts, "Prolonged military occupation: the Israeli occupied territories since 1967", American Journal of International Law, vol. 84 (1990), pp. 55-57 and 95.
O. Ben-Naftali, A.M. Gross and K. Michaeli, "Illegal occupation: framing the Occupied Palestinian Territory", Berkeley Journal of International Law, vol. 23, No. 3 (2005), pp. 551-614.
On 19 September 2007 Israel seemed to give a new status to Gaza when its Security Cabinet declared Gaza to be "hostile territory" - a characterization that was shortly afterwards approved by the United States Secretary of State. Although the legal implications that Israel intends to attach to this "status" remain unclear, the political purpose of this declaration was immediately made known - namely the reduction of the supply of fuel and electricity to Gaza.
The test for determining whether a territory is occupied under international law is effective control,8 and not the permanent physical presence of the occupying Power's military forces in the territory in question. Judged by this test it is clear that Israel remains the occupying Power as technological developments have made it possible for Israel to assert control over the people of Gaza without a permanent military presence.9 Israel's effective control is demonstrated by the following factors:
(a) Substantial control of Gaza's six land crossings: the Erez crossing is effectively closed to Palestinians wishing to cross to Israel or the West Bank. The Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza, which is regulated by the Agreement on Movement and Access entered into between Israel and the Palestinian Authority on 15 November 2005 (brokered by the United States, the European Union and the international community's envoy for the Israeli disengagement from Gaza), has been closed by Israel for lengthy periods since June 2006. The main crossing for goods at Karni is strictly controlled by Israel and since June 2006 this crossing too has been largely closed, with disastrous consequences for the Palestinian economy;
(b) Control through military incursions, rocket attacks and sonic booms: sections of Gaza have been declared "no-go" zones in which residents will be shot if they enter; ( c) Complete control of Gaza's airspace and territorial waters;
(d) Control of the Palestinian Population Registry: the definition of who is "Palestinian" and who is a resident of Gaza and the West Bank is controlled by the Israeli military. Even when the Rafah crossing is open, only holders of Palestinian identity cards can enter Gaza through the crossing; therefore control over the Palestinian Population Registry is also control over who may enter and leave Gaza. Since 2000, with few exceptions, Israel has not permitted additions to the Palestinian Population Registry.
The fact that Gaza remains occupied territory means that Israel's actions towards Gaza must be measured against the standards of international humanitarian law.
See United States of America v. Wilhelm List et al. (The Hostages case) United Nations War Crimes Commission, Law Reports of Trials of War Criminals, vol. III, 1949, p. 56; Democratic Republic of Congo v. Uganda, International Court of Justice, 2005, paras. 173 and 174.
See further on this subject, Sari Bashi and Kenneth Mann, "Disengaged Occupiers: the Legal Status of Gaza", Gisha: Legal Center for Freedom of Movement, January 2007.
IV. ISRAEL'S ACTIONS AGAINST GAZA AND THEIR CONSEQUENCES Israel has taken a number of actions against Gaza since the withdrawal of Israeli settlers and the IDF in 2005.
Military action IDF military incursions into Gaza have continued regularly over the past year; 290 Palestinians were killed in Gaza in 2007. Of this number at least a third were civilians. On 26 September, the day the Special Rapporteur visited Gaza, 12 Palestinian militants were killed by IDF missiles. Since the Annapolis meeting on 27 November 2007, over 70 Palestinians have been killed of whom 8 were killed in a major military operation in southern Gaza on the day before the first round of talks between Israelis and Palestinians following the Annapolis meeting. A further 13 Palestinians were killed in three separate airstrikes on 18 December. The frequency of targeted killings raises a question as to whether the IDF acts within the permissible parameters for such action laid down by the Israeli Supreme Court in its 2006 judgement on targeted killings. Or does the IDF act without regard to its own law as well as international law in carrying out targeted killings?
In the past two years 668 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli security forces in Gaza. Over half - 359 people - were not involved in hostilities at the time they were killed. Of those killed 126 were minors; 361 were killed by missiles fired from helicopters; and 29 of those killed were targeted for assassination. (HOW MANY PALESTINIANS IN GAZA WERE >WOUNDED< BY ISRAELI ATTACKS? --Hoffman)
During the same period, Palestinians fired some 2,800 Qassam rockets and mortar shells into Israel from the Gaza Strip. Four Israeli civilians were killed by Qassam rockets and hundreds were injured. Four members of the Israeli security forces were killed in attacks originating from Gaza.
B. Closure of crossings 15. All the crossings into and out of Gaza are controlled by Israel. Rafah, the crossing point for Gazans to Egypt, and Karni, the commercial crossing for the import and export of goods, are the principal crossing points. They are the subject of the Agreement on Movement and Access, which provides for Gazans to travel freely to Egypt through Rafah and for a substantial increase in the number of export trucks through Karni. Since 25 June 2006, following the capture of Corporal Shalit, and more particularly since mid-June 2007, following the Hamas seizure of power in Gaza, the Rafah crossing has been closed. From mid-June to early August 2007 some 6,000 Palestinians were stranded on the Egyptian side of the border, without adequate accommodation or facilities and denied the right to return home. Over 30 people died while waiting. The Karni crossing has likewise been closed for long periods of time during the past 18 months, and more particularly since mid-June 2007. Karem Shalom and Sufa are now used for the import of goods but the number of trucks bringing goods into Gaza has droppedalarmingly - from 253 a day in April 2007 to 74 a day in November. To make matters worse Sufa is possibly scheduled to close - though on 20 November the Israeli Government decided to permit the export of flowers and strawberries from Gaza to Europe via the Sufa crossing. Erez, previously used as a crossing for persons in need of medical attention in Israel, has also been largely closed for this purpose. On the other hand, in December 2007, Israel allowed several hundred Palestinians who reside abroad to leave Gaza via Israel.
These statistics, provided by B'Tselem, the Israeli Information Centre for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, cover the period 1 September 2005 to 25 July 2007.
C. The reduction of fuel and electricity supplies 16. On 19 September Israel declared Gaza to be a hostile territory and announced that, as a consequence, it would reduce the supply of fuel and electricity to Gaza. Ten Israeli and Palestinian NGOs brought an application before the Israeli High Court of Justice to halt the reduction of fuel and electricity on the ground that this constitutes collective punishment and would cause widespread humanitarian damage but the Israeli High Court has upheld the State's plan to reduce fuel transfers to Gaza. According to the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights fuel supplies have been reduced by more than 50 per cent since the decision to cease fuel supplies on 25 October 2007.
D. Termination of banking facilities 17. Following the designation of Gaza as a hostile territory the only two Israeli commercial banks dealing with financial institutions in Gaza, Bank Hapoalim and Discount Bank, announced that they would cut ties with Gaza. This involves, inter alia, the refusal to clear cheques from Gaza banks and the halting of cash transfers between Israeli banks and Gaza banks. At this stage, the full implications of this decision are not yet clear, but as the Israeli shekel is the official currency in the OPT, in accordance with the Oslo Accords, and must be supplied from Israel, it is likely that this could produce chaos in the Gazan monetary system.
E. The humanitarian crisis in Gaza 18. Regular military incursions, the closure of crossings, the reduction of fuel and the threat to the banking system have produced a humanitarian crisis, which has the following impact on life in Gaza.
1. Food 19. Over 80 per cent of the population of Gaza is dependent on food aid from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) and the World Food Programme (WFP). This takes the form of flour, rice, sugar, sunflower oil, powdered milk and lentils. Fruit and vegetables are no longer available to supplement these basic rations as farmers do not have the money to get their crops picked and marketed. Few can afford meat, and fish is virtually unobtainable as a result of the Israeli prohibition of fishing. Although critical humanitarian food supplies are being allowed in, only 41 per cent of Gaza's food import needs are currently being met.
2. Unemployment and poverty The closure of crossings prevents Gazan farmers and manufacturers from exporting their goods to markets outside Gaza. It also prevents materials from entering Gaza and this has resulted in the end of most construction works and the closure of factories. On 26 September the Special Rapporteur visited the Karni industrial zone and saw factories that had been closed as a result of the failure to import materials and the prohibition on the export of goods. Factory owners are being held responsible by Israeli buyers for non-delivery of goods caused by the closure. Farmers are without income and some 65,000 factory employees are unemployed.
According to the Palestinian Federation of Industries, 95 per cent of Gaza's industrial operations have been suspended as a result of restrictions.11 Fishermen are likewise unemployed as a result of the Israeli ban on fishing along the Gaza coast. On 9 July 2007, UNRWA announced that it had halted all its building projects in Gaza because it had run out of building materials, such as cement. This has affected 121,000 jobs of people building new schools, houses, waterworks, and health centres. In many instances those working in the public sector remain unpaid. Municipal employees in Gaza City have not been paid since March 2007. As a result garbage collection services went on strike in November causing a serious threat to health.
Poverty in Gaza is rife. Over 80 per cent of the population live below the official poverty line.
Health care. Health-care clinics are in short supply of paediatric antibiotics, and 91 key drugs are no longer available. Previously, seriously ill patients were allowed to leave Gaza to receive treatment in Israel, the West Bank, Egypt, Jordan and other countries through the Rafah and Erez crossings. Rafah is now completely closed and the Israeli authorities deny passage through Erez to all but the most "severe and urgent cases". The situation has worsened since the declaration of Gaza as a hostile territory. The World Health Organization reports that while 89.4 per cent of patients who applied for permits during the period January-May 2007 were granted permits, only 77.1 per cent of those who applied were granted permits during October 2007. This has resulted in a drastic increase in the number of patients who have died as a result of restrictions: according to the Israeli NGO Physicians for Human Rights, since June 2007, 44 people have died as a result of denial or delay of access to medical care by the Israeli authorities and 13 died in November alone. Mahmoud Abu Taha, a 21-year-old patient with stomach cancer, arrived at Erez at 16.00 hours on 18 October with a Palestinian intensive care unit ambulance, escorted by his father. The patient's entry was delayed for two and a half hours, after which the IDF asked the father to cross to the Israeli side of Erez. His son, the patient, was to enter on a walker and not with the ambulance.
The patient was denied access after reaching the end of the 500 metre long tunnel, while the father was arrested by the IDF and held for nine days. On 28 October, a second arrangement for the patient was approved and he was admitted to an Israeli hospital, where he died the same night. In November, hospitals were prevented from carrying out operations as a result of the restrictions placed by Israel on nitrous oxide gas that is used for anaesthetics.
"Investing in Palestinian Economic Reform and Development", Report for the Pledging Conference, World Bank, December 2007, para. 13.
4. Education Gaza's children in UNRWA schools lag behind refugee children elsewhere, according to UNRWA, as a result of the Israeli blockade and military violence. Students are prevented from studying abroad. In November 670 students were denied permission to study abroad, including six Fulbright scholars.
5. Fuel, energy and water Gaza is largely dependent on Israel for its supply of fuel and electricity. Already there are frequent power outages as a result of Israel's destruction of the main Gaza power plant in 2006 and subsequent damage to electricity transformers.
(For instance on 14 November the IDF struck an electricity transformer in Beit Hanoun which knocked out power for 5,000 people in the area.) The supply of water is also affected and there is insufficient power for water pumps. As a result, 210,000 people are able to access drinking water supplies for only 1-2 hours a day. Sewage is also a problem: sewage plants require repairs but materials, such as metal pipes and welding machines, have been prohibited by Israel on the grounds that they may be used for making rockets.
At present there is a real danger that sewage plants could overflow. Cutting off fuel and electricity will exacerbate an already dangerous situation. It will endanger the functioning of hospitals, water services and sewage, as well as depriving residents of electricity for refrigerators and household appliances. A humanitarian catastrophe is contemplated if Israel continues to reduce fuel and carries out its threat to reduce electricity supplies.
F. Legal consequences of Israel's actions. Israel has largely justified its attacks and incursions as defensive operations aimed at preventing the launching of Qassam rockets into Israel, the arrest or killing of suspected militants or the destruction of tunnels. Clearly the firing of rockets into Israel by Palestinian militants without any military target, which has resulted in the killing and injury of Israelis, cannot be condoned and constitutes a war crime.
Nevertheless, serious questions arise over the proportionality of Israel's military response and its failure to distinguish between military and civilian targets. It is highly arguable that Israel has violated the most fundamental rules of international humanitarian law, which constitute war crimes in terms of article 147 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and article 85 of the Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts (Additional Protocol I).
These crimes include direct attacks against civilians and civilian objects, and attacks which fail to distinguish between military targets and civilians and civilian objects (articles 48, 51 (4) and 52 (1) of Protocol I); the excessive use of force arising from disproportionate attacks on civilians and civilian objects (articles 51 (4) and 51 (5) of Protocol I); and the spreading of terror among the civilian population (article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and article 51 (2) of Protocol I).
26. Israel's siege of Gaza violates a whole range of obligations under both human rights law and humanitarian law. The provisions of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights that state that everyone has the right to "an adequate standard of living for himself and his family, including adequate food, clothing and housing", freedom from hunger and the right to food (art. 11) and that everyone has the right to health, have been seriously infringed.
Above all, the Government of Israel has violated the prohibition on collective punishment of an occupied people contained in article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention. The indiscriminate and excessive use of force against civilians and civilian objects, the destruction of electricity and water supplies, the bombardment of public buildings, the restrictions on freedom of movement, the closure of crossings and the consequences that these actions have upon public health, food, family life and the psychological well-being of the Palestinian people constitute a gross form of collective punishment.
Gaza is no ordinary State upon which other States may freely impose economic sanctions in order to create a humanitarian crisis or take disproportionate military action that endangers the civilian population in the name of self-defence. It is an occupied territory in whose well-being all States have an interest and whose welfare all States are required to promote. According to the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice, all States parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention have the obligation "to ensure compliance by Israel with international humanitarian law as embodied in that Convention". Israel has violated obligations of an erga omnes character that are the concern of all States and that all States are required to bring to an end. In the first instance, Israel, the occupying Power, is obliged to cease its violations of international humanitarian law. But other States that are a party to the siege of Gaza are likewise in violation of international humanitarian law and obliged to cease their unlawful actions.
V. HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE WEST BANK AND JERUSALEM It was widely expected that the human rights situation would improve in the West Bank following the exclusion of Hamas from the Government of the West Bank. This initially signalled a new rapprochement between Israel and the emergency Government of President Abbas, under the Prime Ministership of Salam Fayyad. Israel has made some gestures of rapprochement, such as the release of 779 prisoners (mainly belonging to Fatah), the payment of some of the tax money due to the Palestinian Authority, the relaxation of travel restrictions in the Jordan Valley, the granting of amnesty to 178 Fatah militants wanted by Israel and the promised granting of residence permits in the West Bank to 3,500 Palestinians. Unfortunately, Israel has not taken steps to dismantle the infrastructure of occupation. On the contrary, it has maintained and expanded the instruments that most seriously violate human rights - military incursions, settlements, the separation wall, restrictions on freedom of movement, the Judaization of Jerusalem and the demolition of houses.
A. Military incursions Military incursions in the West Bank have intensified since June 2007. For instance, in November the IDF carried out 786 raids in the West Bank in the course of which one person was killed, 67 injured and 398 arrested;12 public and private properties were damaged; curfews were imposed; and countless innocent civilians were terrorized by armed soldiers and dogs. Nablus has been particularly affected: on 17 October, the Israeli army raided the city of Nablus and fired tank shells, killing an elderly civilian and one armed individual, and injuring 14 civilians, including 2 children and a journalist. The IDF has frequently failed to distinguish clearly between military targets and civilians. As in the case of Gaza (see paragraph 25) these actions appear to violate rules of international humanitarian law (articles 48, 51 (4) and 52 (1) of Additional Protocol I).
B. Settlements and settlers13 30. There are 149 settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Despite promises by Israel to freeze settlement growth, the number of settlers has increased by 63 per cent since 1993 to its present population of 460,000. At present new construction is under way in 88 settlements and the average growth rate in the settlements is 4.5 per cent compared with the average growth rate of 1.5 per cent in Israel itself. In addition there are 105 "outposts" - that is, informal structures, which serve as a prelude to a new settlement, and are unauthorized but still funded by Government ministries. Despite Israel's undertaking in the road map to dismantle all outposts built after 2001, no such action has been taken in respect of the 51 such outposts. More than 38 per cent of the West Bank consists of settlements, outposts, military areas and Israeli nature reserves that are off limits to Palestinians. Settler roads link settlements to each other and to Israel. These roads are largely closed to Palestinian vehicles. (Israel has therefore introduced a system of "road apartheid", which was unknown in apartheid South Africa.)
In a statement to the Third Committee in October 2007 the Israeli delegate, Ms. Ady Schonmann, stated that the Special Rapporteur had failed to indicate that the Israeli NGO, Peace Now, had retracted a report of October 200614 which showed that nearly 40 per cent of the land held by Israeli settlements in the West Bank is privately owned by Palestinians. The Special Rapporteur has had contact with Peace Now which has indicated that while it made some corrections to its report in response to representations from the Israeli Government, it has not retracted its finding that 40 per cent of land occupied by settlements in the West Bank is privately owned by Palestinians.
Settlements are illegal under international law as they violate article 49, paragraph 6, of the Fourth Geneva Convention. This illegality has been confirmed by the International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion on the construction of the wall, by the High Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention in a declaration published in 2001, and by both the Security Council and the General Assembly. Furthermore settlements constitute a form of colonialism which is contrary to international law.15
See generally, "The Humanitarian Impact on Palestinians of Israeli Settlements and Other Infrastructure in the West Bank", the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), July 2007, available at http://www.ochaopt.org/?module=displaysection& section_id=103&format=html.
Breaking the Law in the West Bank - One Violation Leads to Another: Israeli Settlement Building on Private Palestinian Property, Peace Now, October 2006.
Israel's contempt for international law and opinion is illustrated by recent Government decisions. First, in December shortly after the Annapolis meeting, the Israeli Government announced plans to build 307 new apartments in the settlement of Har Homa. Secondly, in October it announced that it would proceed with plans for the development of E1, a planned new settlement which will have 3,500 apartments, 10 hotels and an industrial park, to accommodate 14,500 settlers, situated adjacent to Maale Adumim.
At present Israel has built a police station on E1 (visited by the Special Rapporteur on 25 September) but is prevented from proceeding with its plans to start construction on E1 by the presence of the main road from East Jerusalem to Jericho, which is used by Palestinians. Israel has now confiscated Palestinian land in Abu Dis, Sawareh, Nabi Moussa and al-Khan al-Ahmar to enable it to build an alternate road for Palestinians to Jericho which will free the area for E1. The road is part of Israel's broader plan to replace territorial contiguity with "transportational contiguity" by artificially connecting Palestinian population centres through an elaborate network of alternate roads and tunnels and creating segregated road networks, one for Palestinians and another for Israeli settlers, in the West Bank.
C. Checkpoints, roadblocks and permits as obstacles to freedom of movement. Checkpoints and roadblocks seriously obstruct the freedom of movement of Palestinians in the West Bank, with disastrous consequences for both personal life and the economy. There are 561 such obstacles to freedom of movement, comprising over 80 manned checkpoints and some 476 unmanned locked gates, earth mounds, concrete blocks and ditches. In addition, thousands of temporary checkpoints, known as flying checkpoints, are set up every year by Israeli army patrols on roads throughout the West Bank for limited periods, ranging from half an hour to several hours. In November 2007 there were 429 flying checkpoints.
35. Palestinians are subjected to numerous prohibitions on travel and to requirements for permits for travel within the West Bank and to East Jerusalem. Checkpoints ensure compliance with the permit regime.
These restrictions violate article 12 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights which has been held to be binding on Israel in the OPT by the International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion on the construction of the wall. Israel's argument that these restrictions are justified as security measures is difficult to accept. Many of the checkpoints and roadblocks are distant from the border of Israel, which is in any event protected by the wall. More likely explanations are to be found in the need to serve the convenience of settlers, to facilitate the travel of settlers through the West Bank and to impress upon the Palestinian people the power and presence of the occupier. According to a report in Yedioth Ahronoth, one quarter of all IDF soldiers who have served at roadblocks in the West Bank reported having witnessed or taken part in an act of abuse against a Palestinian civilian.
Checkpoints serve to humiliate Palestinians and to create feelings of deep hostility towards Israel. In this respect they resemble the "pass laws" of apartheid South Africa, which required black South Africans to demonstrate permission to travel or reside anywhere in South Africa.16 These laws generated widespread humiliation and anger, and were the cause of regular protest action. Israel would do well to consider the South African experience. Restrictions on freedom of movement of the kind applied by Israel do more to create insecurity than to achieve security.
See General Assembly resolution 1514 (XV): Declaration on the granting of independence to colonial countries and peoples.
D. The wall The wall that Israel is at present building, largely in Palestinian territory, is clearly illegal. The International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion on the construction of the wall found that it is contrary to international law and that Israel is under an obligation to discontinue construction of the wall and to dismantle forthwith those sections that have already been built. Israel has abandoned its claim that the wall is a security measure only and now concedes that one of the purposes of the wall is to include settlements within Israel. The fact that 83 per cent of the West Bank settler population and 69 settlements are enclosed within the wall bears this out. The wall is planned to extend for 721 kilometres.
At present 59 per cent of the wall has been completed and 200 kilometres have been constructed since the International Court of Justice handed down its Advisory Opinion declaring the wall to be illegal. When the wall is finished, an estimated 60,000 West Bank Palestinians living in 42 villages and towns will reside in the closed zone between the wall and the Green Line. This area will constitute 10.2 per cent of Palestinian land in the West Bank. There are, however, suggestions that the route of the wall will be revised to include additional Palestinian lands in the south-eastern West Bank near to the Dead Sea. If this plan is implemented some 13 per cent of Palestinian land will be seized by the wall. The closed zone includes many of the West Bank's valuable water resources and its richest agricultural lands.
The wall has serious humanitarian consequences for Palestinians living within the closed zone. They are cut off from places of employment, schools, universities and specialized medical care, and community life is seriously fragmented. Moreover, they do not have 24-hour access to emergency health services. Over 100 persons residing in the closed zone have not received permits to leave the area. Palestinians who live on the eastern side of the wall but whose land lies in the closed zone face serious economic hardship, as they are not able to reach their land to harvest crops or to graze their animals without permits. Permits are not easily granted and the bureaucratic procedures for obtaining them are humiliating and obstructive. The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has estimated that only about 18 per cent of those who used to work land in the closed zone before the construction of the wall receive permits to visit the closed zone today. The opening and closing of the gates leading to the closed zone are regulated in a highly restrictive manner: in 2007 OCHA carried out a survey in 67 communities located close to the wall which showed that only 19 of the 67 gates in the wall were open to Palestinians for use all the year round on a daily basis. To aggravate matters Palestinians coming into and out of the closed zone are frequently subjected to abuse and humiliation at the gates by the IDF. Hardships experienced by Palestinians living within the closed zone and in the precincts of the wall have already resulted in the displacement of some 15,000 persons.
On these laws, see J. Dugard, Human Rights and the South African Legal Order (Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1978).
The plight of the village of Jayyus, visited by the Special Rapporteur on 30 September 2007, illustrates the hardships faced by communities living near to the wall, but in the West Bank. The 3,200 residents of Jayyus are separated by the wall from their farmland; 68 per cent of the village's agricultural land and its six agricultural wells lie in the closed zone between the wall and the Green Line and are off limits to those without a visitor's permit. Scores of greenhouses are situated in the closed zone, producing tomatoes, cucumbers and sweet peppers, which require daily irrigation. Only about 40 per cent of the residents of Jayyus are granted permits to access farms, and gate opening times are both limited and arbitrary. By August 2004, one year after the construction of the wall, local production had fallen from 7 to 4 million kilograms of fruit and vegetables. The situation has further deteriorated over the past three years.
The section of the wall within the Jerusalem Governorate measures 168 kilometres in length. Only 5 kilometres of its completed length runs along the Green Line. The route of the wall runs deep into the West Bank to encircle the settlements of Maale Adumim. In contrast, many Palestinian villages which are currently in the Jerusalem municipality are placed outside the wall and thus separated from Jerusalem. In some places, such as Abu Dis, the wall runs through Palestinian communities, separating neighbours and families. About 25 per cent of the 253,000 Palestinians living in East Jerusalem have been cut off from the city by the wall. This means they can only enter Jerusalem through checkpoints, which makes it difficult to access hospitals, schools, universities, work and holy sites - particularly the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
E. Demolition of houses. The demolition of houses has been a regular feature of Israel's occupation of the OPT. Different reasons or justifications are advanced for such demolitions: military necessity, punishment and failure to obtain a building permit. Although the IDF claims to have discontinued punitive home demolitions, instances of such demolitions still occur. On 29 August 2007, the IDF demolished seven housing units in the Naqar neighbourhood of Qalqiliya, which were home to 48 persons (including 17 children) on the ground that they housed members of the military wing of Hamas. Houses are frequently demolished for "administrative" reasons, on the grounds that no permit has been obtained to build - which Israel defends as a normal feature of town planning. Both law and fact show, however, that houses are not demolished in the course of "normal" town planning operations, but are instead demolished in a discriminatory manner to demonstrate the power of the occupier over the occupied.
See B'Tselem, "Demolition for Alleged Military Purposes".
In both East Jerusalem and that part of the West Bank categorized as Area C (60 per cent of the West Bank, comprising villages and rural districts), houses and structures may not be built without permits. The bureaucratic procedures for obtaining permits are cumbersome and in practice permits are rarely granted. As a result, Palestinians are frequently compelled to build homes without permits. In East Jerusalem house demolitions are implemented in a discriminatory manner:18 Arab homes are destroyed but not Jewish houses. In Area C the IDF has demolished or designated for demolition homes, schools, clinics and mosques on the ground that permits have not been obtained. Between May 2005 and May 2007, 354 Palestinian structures were destroyed by the IDF in Area C.
Many Bedouin communities have had their structures demolished. In September 2007 the Special Rapporteur visited Al Hadidiya in the Jordan Valley where the structures of a Bedouin community of some 200 families, comprising 6,000 people, living near to the Jewish settlement of Roi, were demolished by the IDF. This brought back memories of the practice in apartheid South Africa of destroying black villages (termed "black spots") that were too close to white residents. Article 53 of the Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits the destruction of personal property "except where such destruction is rendered absolutely necessary by military operations". According to B'Tselem, the Israeli Information Centre for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, the destruction of homes in the Naqar neighbourhood of Qalqiliya failed to meet this test. The demolition of homes for administrative reasons can likewise not be justified. Both East Jerusalem and Area C are occupied territory, in respect of which the prohibition contained in article 53 applies.
F. Humanitarian situation The construction of the wall, the expansion of settlements, the restrictions on freedom of movement, house demolitions and military incursions have had a disastrous impact on the economy, health, education, family life and standard of living of Palestinians in the West Bank. Since 2006 the situation has deteriorated further. Israel withholds taxes which it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority on all goods imported into the Occupied Palestinian Territory, amounting to $50-60 million per month (about half of the budget of the Palestinian Authority).
Recently, Israel has transferred $119 million of the tax money it has unlawfully seized to the Palestinian Authority and western States and the Quartet have promised to recommence funding to the Palestinian Authority (insofar as it does not further the interests of Hamas in Gaza). At the time of writing no material change is discernible in the humanitarian situation in the West Bank as a result of the continuing occupation, the human rights violations described in this section of the report and Israel's refusal to transfer all the tax money due in law to the Palestinian Authority. Poverty and unemployment are at their highest levels ever; health and education are undermined by military incursions, the wall and checkpoints; and the social fabric of society is threatened.
Meir Margalit, Discrimination in the Heart of the Holy City (Jerusalem, Al Manar Modern Press, 2006).
G. Conclusion The situation in the West Bank may not be as serious as that of Gaza, however it is all a question of degree. Moreover, as in Gaza, the serious humanitarian situation in the West Bank is largely the result of Israel's violations of international law. The wall violates norms of international humanitarian law and human rights law, according to the International Court of Justice; settlements violate the Fourth Geneva Convention; checkpoints violate the freedom of movement proclaimed in human rights conventions; house demolitions violate the Fourth Geneva Convention; the humanitarian crisis in the West Bank, brought about by Israel's withholding of Palestinian tax money and other violations of international law, violates many of the rights contained in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. As in Gaza, Israel's actions constitute an unlawful collective punishment of the Palestinian people.
VI. THE TREATMENT OF ARRESTED PERSONS AND CONVICTED PRISONERS
It is estimated that since 1967 over 700,000 Palestinians have been imprisoned. At present, there are some 11,000 prisoners in Israeli jails, a number which includes 376 children, 118 women, 44 members of the Palestinian Legislative Council and some 800 "administrative detainees" (that is, persons not convicted for any offence, held for renewable periods of up to six months). Israel sees such prisoners as terrorists or ordinary criminals who have violated the criminal law. Palestinians see them as political prisoners who have committed crimes against the occupier.
History is replete with examples of such competing perspectives - to cite but South Africa and Namibia as examples. Prisoners are a key issue in any peace settlement. That Israel is aware of this is demonstrated by its release of 779 prisoners (although in November 411 persons were arrested). The release of such a small number of prisoners, however, provides little evidence of a bona fide attempt to reach a peaceful settlement on the part of Israel. To make matters worse prisoners are subjected to humiliating and degrading treatment.
A. Arrested and detained persons Following arrest, persons are frequently beaten and stripped in a humiliating manner. The interrogation of subjects is then carried out in a degrading and inhuman manner, sometimes amounting to torture. During 2007, two reports published by Israeli NGOs - Hamoked (Center for the Defence of the Individual) and B'Tselem19 and the Public Committee against Torture in Israel (PCATI)20 - have shown that arrested persons are subjected to beatings, humiliated and deprived of basic needs and that persons suspected of having information that could prevent attacks (so-called "ticking bomb suspects") are deprived of sleep for more than 24 hours, beaten and subjected to physical ill-treatment. The treatment of children is equally disturbing.
According to Defence for Children International (Palestine Section), children are on average detained for between 8 to 21 days before being brought to court; denied the presence of a parent or lawyer during interrogation; cursed, threatened, beaten and kept in solitary confinement during interrogation.
Absolute Prohibition: The Torture and Ill-Treatment of Palestinian Detainees, Hamoked and B'Tselem, May 2007.
"Ticking Bombs" Testimonies of Torture Victims in Israel, Public Committee against Torture in Israel, May 2007.
B. Convicted prisoners and administrative detainees Prison conditions are harsh. Many prisoners are accommodated in tents, which are extremely hot in summer and cold in winter. Food is poor, resulting in anaemia among prisoners, and there is serious overcrowding. Most Palestinian prisoners are held in jails in Israel. This violates article 76 of the Fourth Geneva Convention which requires persons from an occupied territory to be detained in the occupied country, and if convicted, to serve their sentences therein. Family visits are difficult and frequently impossible: all visits for families from Gaza to their relatives detained in Israeli prisons have been suspended since 6 June 2007, affecting some 900 prisoners. On 22 October there was a riot in Ketziot prison in the Negev (in Israel), accommodating some 2,300 prisoners, which resulted in 1 death and some 250 injuries among prisoners.
The role of medical doctors in detention centres and prisons requires attention. These doctors witness the result of inhuman treatment - wounds, swollen hands, signs of violence - but remain silent, acting as if they do not know that torture is taking place. This raises ethical questions that in similar circumstances in South Africa were, after years of silence, addressed by the South African Medical Association and international medical bodies. Why, one must ask, has the responsibility of Israeli medical doctors who examine detainees and prisoners not been questioned by the relevant Israeli and international medical professional bodies?
VII. SELF-DETERMINATION The right of self-determination of the Palestinian people has been recognized by the Security Council, the General Assembly, the International Court of Justice and Israel itself. The territory of the self-determination unit within which this right is to be exercised clearly includes the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza. The right of the Palestinian people to self-determination has been denied and obstructed for nearly 60 years by Israel.
Now it is threatened by the political separation of the West Bank and Gaza, resulting from the seizure of power in Gaza by Hamas in June 2007, followed by the seizure of power in the West Bank by Fatah. The carefully brokered Government of Palestinian national unity has been destroyed by the internecine conflict resulting in the death of several hundred Palestinians, mostly belonging to Fatah.
At the time of writing, there is no immediate prospect of reconciliation between Hamas and Fatah. This is a matter of deep concern to the Special Rapporteur as the right to self-determination is a central and core human right. It must also be a matter of concern to the Quartet and other international institutions committed to the realization of the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination. Such a concern should not take the form of support - political, economic or military - for one faction at the expense of the other, but rather for reconciliation between the two factions so that the right to self-determination may be realized within the 1967 borders of the Palestinian self-determination unit, that is including the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza. Unhappily, the Quartet (which embraces the United Nations) is, at the time of writing, making little attempt to promote Palestinian national unity. On the contrary, it pursues a divisive policy of preferring one faction over the other; of speaking to one faction but not the other; of dealing with one faction while isolating the other.
Semi-Annual Report 2007, Defence for Children International (Palestine Section).
VIII. INTERNATIONAL LAW, THE INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE, THE QUARTET AND THE UNITED NATIONS On 8 December 2003 the General Assembly requested an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice on the legal consequences arising from the construction of the wall being built by Israel in the OPT. Fifty States and international organizations gave written statements to the Court and 15 States and international organizations made oral statements before the Court. The Court provided an advisory opinion23 by 14 votes to 1, which answered many of the legal questions that have been raised over the past 40 years. The principal findings of the Court were as follows: (a) The Palestinian people have the right to self-determination24 and the exercise of this right is violated by the construction of the wall;25 (b) Israel is under a legal obligation to comply with the Fourth Geneva Convention in the OPT26 - a unanimous finding;27 (c) Settlements are illegal as they violate article 49 (6) of the Fourth Geneva Convention28 - a unanimous finding;
Resolution ES-10/14. Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, ICJ, 2004.
(d) Israel is bound by international human rights conventions in the OPT30 - a unanimous finding31 - and consequently its conduct is to be measured against both international human rights conventions and the Fourth Geneva Convention;
(e) The regime in force in the closed zone between the wall and Green Line violates the right to freedom of movement contained in article 12 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights32 and the right to work, health, education and an adequate standard of living contained in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights;
(f) The destruction of property for the construction of the wall violates article 53 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and cannot be justified on grounds of military necessity or national security;
g) The wall cannot be justified as an exercise in self-defence;
(h) The annexation of East Jerusalem is illegal;
(i) The construction of the wall by Israel in the OPT, including in and around East Jerusalem, and its associated regime are contrary to international law; and Israel is obliged in law to cease the construction of the wall, to dismantle it and to make reparation for the construction of the wall;
j) All States are under a legal obligation not to recognize the illegal situation resulting from the wall and to ensure compliance by Israel with the Fourth Geneva Convention;
(k) The United Nations, especially the General Assembly and Security Council, should consider what further action is required to bring an end to the illegal situation resulting from the construction of the wall and associated regime, "taking due account of the present Advisory Opinion".
On 20 July 2004 the General Assembly adopted resolution ES-10/15 which called for Israel to comply with the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice. This resolution was adopted by 150 votes to 6 (Australia, Micronesia, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau, United States) with 10 abstentions. The Russian Federation and member States of the European Union voted in favour of the resolution.
Since 2004, the Advisory Opinion has been ignored by the Security Council. While the General Assembly and Human Rights Council have passed several resolutions reaffirming the Opinion, no attempt has been made by the Security Council to compel Israel to comply with the Opinion or to remind States of their obligation to ensure compliance by Israel with the Fourth Geneva Convention. The reason for this is not hard to find. The Security Council is prevented from giving its backing to the Opinion by the United States which has refused to accept it.
Similarly the United States prevents the Quartet from taking steps to implement the Opinion. No statement issued by the Quartet has ever acknowledged the Opinion.
Although the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice is an authoritative statement of the applicable law and is designed to contribute to the framework for peace in the Middle East, it is not legally binding on States. In law, the United States is well within its right to refuse to accept the Opinion in the Quartet. The same applies to the Russian Federation and the European Union - although both have compromised themselves by giving approval to the Opinion by supporting General Assembly resolution ES-10/15 and subsequent resolutions. The position of the United Nations is, however, very different.
The International Court of Justice is the judicial organ of the United Nations. Moreover the General Assembly has by an overwhelming majority repeatedly given its approval to the Opinion. This means that it is now part of the law of the United Nations. As such the representative of the United Nations in the Quartet - the Secretary-General or his representative - is in law obliged to be guided by the Opinion and to endeavour in good faith to do his or her best to ensure compliance with the Opinion.
If the Secretary-General (or his representative) is politically unable to do so he has two choices: either to withdraw from the Quartet or to explain to his constituency - "we the peoples of the United Nations" in the language of the Charter - why he is unable to do so and how he justifies remaining in the Quartet in the light of its refusal to be guided by the law of the United Nations. The first course is possibly unwise at this time as this would deprive the United Nations of a role in the peace process. This makes the second course essential.
For 40 years the political organs of the United Nations, States and individuals have accused Israel of consistent, systematic and gross violations of human rights and humanitarian law in the OPT. In 2004 the judicial organ of the United Nations, in its Advisory Opinion, affirmed that Israel's actions in the OPT do indeed violate fundamental norms of human rights and humanitarian law and cannot be justified on grounds of self-defence or necessity. If the United Nations is serious about human rights it cannot afford to ignore this Opinion in the deliberations of the Quartet, as it is an authoritative affirmation that Israel is in serious breach of its international commitments. Failure to attempt to implement, or even to acknowledge, an advisory opinion dealing with international humanitarian law and human rights law, brings the very commitment of the United Nations to human rights into question.
See, for example, the draft text in A/62/L.21/Rev.1 adopted on 10 December 2007 which calls on Israel to comply with the Advisory Opinion and on all States to comply with the legal obligations mentioned in the Opinion.
HRC resolution 2/4 of 27 November 2006.
See, for example, the statement of the Quartet of 23 September 2007.
IX. PEACE TALKS At the time of writing negotiations leading to a peace settlement between Israelis and Palestinians have commenced following an initial meeting in Annapolis on 27 November 2007. It is not within the mandate of the Special Rapporteur to comment on what is essentially a political process, except insofar as it has implications for human rights. In this context the
Special Rapporteur wishes to make the following remarks. The Oslo Accords have been criticized for failing to consider normative aspects of the Palestinian issue. In particular they failed to pay adequate attention to international law and to the human rights dimension. It is important that the Annapolis process does not make the same mistake.
Unfortunately the first indications suggest that this is a serious possibility as the joint statement of 27 November agreed to by the parties as a starting point for the negotiations is premised on the proposals contained in the Quartet road map of 2003 rather than on the legal norms proclaimed by the International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion on the construction of the wall.
Indeed the joint statement makes no mention of the Advisory Opinion at all. The Secretary-General in his statement at Annapolis also invoked the road map but made no mention of the Advisory Opinion. In the opinion of the Special Rapporteur, the road map is an inappropriate and unhelpful framework for negotiations for the following reasons.
First, it is outdated as it takes no account of the Advisory Opinion, Palestinian democratic elections, Israel's withdrawal from Gaza and the June 2007 separation of Gaza from the West Bank. Second, Israel attached 14 reservations to the road map in May 2003, which makes Israel's commitment to it unclear. Third, it is, in its own language, "a performance-based and goal driven roadmap" which takes little account of the normative aspect.
It must be recalled that article 47 of the Fourth Geneva Convention provides that persons in an occupied territory shall not be deprived of the benefits of the Convention by any agreement concluded between the authorities of the occupied territory and the occupying Power, or by the annexation by the occupying Power of part of the occupied territory.
This means that any agreement between the Palestinian authorities and the Israeli Government that recognizes settlements within the occupied Palestinian territory, or accepts the annexation by Israel of Palestinian land within the wall, will violate the Fourth Geneva Convention.
This is but one example of the dangers of a peace process between unequals which has no regard to the normative framework of international law. In its approach to previous peace negotiations, the Israeli Government has insisted on negotiations being restricted to the agreed framework. The Annapolis joint statement which refers only to the road map suggests that Israel does not see itself as being bound by the normative framework accepted by the United Nations.
In the opinion of the Special Rapporteur negotiations should take place within a normative framework, with the guiding norms to be found in international law, particularly international humanitarian law and human rights law, the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice, and Security Council resolutions.
Negotiations on issues such as boundaries, settlements, East Jerusalem, the return of refugees and the isolation of Gaza should be informed by such norms and not by political horse-trading. In this respect parties might learn from the experience of the negotiations that led to a democratic South Africa in the mid-1990s, which took place within the framework of accepted democratic principles, the rule of law and international law (with special reference to human rights law).
The creation of a Palestinian State will not heal the wounds of 60 years of conflict. If real peace and security is to be achieved every effort should be made to achieve reconciliation between Palestinians and Israelis. To do this it will be necessary for both people to address the events, actions and sufferings of the past. Consideration should therefore be given to the establishment of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to hear the stories of the sufferings of both peoples. Without truth-telling of this kind tensions between Palestinians and Israelis will remain to threaten peace between the two nations.
--END QUOTE--
Palestinian terrorism is the "inevitable consequence of (Israeli) colonialism, apartheid or occupation"
CONTENTS
1. Michael Hoffman's condensed digest of highlights from this eye-opening UN Human Rights Report on Palestine, by Justice John Dugard, Jan. 21, 2008.
2. The FULL-LENGTH Report (highly recommended reading) of the UN Human Rights Jan. 21, 2008. Report on Palestine by Justice John Dugard.
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1. Michael Hoffman's condensed digest of the Report
www.RevisionistHistory.org
...the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) are guilty of terrorizing innocent Palestinian civilians by military incursions, targeted killings and sonic booms that fail to distinguish between military targets and civilians. All these acts must be condemned and have been condemned.
Common sense...dictates that a distinction must be drawn between acts of mindless terror, such as acts committed by Al Qaeda, and acts committed in the course of a war of national liberation against colonialism, apartheid or military occupation. While such acts cannot be justified, they must be understood as being a painful but inevitable consequence of colonialism, apartheid or occupation.
History is replete with examples of military occupation that have been resisted by violence - acts of terror. The German occupation was resisted by many European countries in the Second World War; the South West Africa People's Organization (SWAPO) resisted South Africa's occupation of Namibia; and Jewish groups resisted British occupation of Palestine - inter alia, by the blowing up of the King David Hotel in 1946 with heavy loss of life, by a group masterminded by Menachem Begin, who later became Prime Minister of Israel.
Acts of terror against military occupation must be seen in historical context. This is why every effort should be made to bring the (Israeli) occupation to a speedy end. Until this is done, peace cannot be expected, and violence will continue. In other situations, for example Namibia, peace has been achieved by the ending of occupation, without setting the end of resistance as a precondition. Israel cannot expect perfect peace and the end of violence as a precondition for the ending of the occupation.
A further comment on terrorism is called for. In the present international climate it is easy for a State to justify its repressive measures as a response to terrorism - and to expect a sympathetic hearing. Israel exploits the present international fear of terrorism to the full. But this will not solve the Palestinian problem. Israel must address the occupation and the violation of human rights and international humanitarian law it engenders, and not invoke the justification of terrorism as a distraction, as a pretext for failure to confront the root cause of Palestinian violence - the occupation.
...In the past two years 668 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli security forces in Gaza. Over half - 359 people - were not involved in hostilities at the time they were killed. Of those killed 126 were minors; 361 were killed by missiles fired from helicopters; and 29 of those killed were targeted for assassination. During the same period, Palestinians fired some 2,800 Qassam rockets and mortar shells into Israel from the Gaza Strip. Four Israeli civilians were killed by Qassam rockets...Four members of the Israeli security forces were killed in attacks originating from Gaza.
Serious questions arise over the proportionality of Israel's military response and its failure to distinguish between military and civilian targets. It is highly arguable that Israel has violated the most fundamental rules of international humanitarian law, which constitute war crimes in terms of article 147 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and article 85 of the Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts (Additional Protocol I). These crimes include direct attacks against civilians and civilian objects, and attacks which fail to distinguish between military targets and civilians and civilian objects (articles 48, 51 (4) and 52 (1) of Protocol I); the excessive use of force arising from disproportionate attacks on civilians and civilian objects (articles 51 (4) and 51 (5) of Protocol I); and the spreading of terror among the civilian population (article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and article 51 (2) of Protocol I).
The indiscriminate and excessive use of force against civilians and civilian objects, the destruction of electricity and water supplies, the bombardment of public buildings, the restrictions on freedom of movement, the closure of crossings and the consequences that these actions have upon public health, food, family life and the psychological well-being of the Palestinian people constitute a gross form of collective punishment.
Since 1967 over 700,000 Palestinians have been imprisoned. At present, there are some 11,000 (Palestinian) prisoners in Israeli jails, a number which includes 376 children, 118 women, 44 members of the Palestinian Legislative Council and some 800 "administrative detainees" (that is, persons not convicted for any offense...).
On 20 July 2004 the General Assembly adopted resolution ES-10/15 which called for Israel to comply with the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice. This resolution was adopted by 150 nations. Six nations (Australia, Micronesia, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau, United States) voted against it. There were 10 abstentions....
Since 2004, the Advisory Opinion has been ignored by the Security Council. While the General Assembly and Human Rights Council have passed several resolutions reaffirming the Opinion, no attempt has been made by the Security Council to compel Israel to comply with the Opinion or to remind States of their obligation to ensure compliance by Israel with the Fourth Geneva Convention.
The reason for this is not hard to find. The Security Council is prevented from giving its backing to the Opinion by the United States, which has refused to accept it.
For 40 years the political organs of the United Nations, States and individuals have accused Israel of consistent, systematic and gross violations of human rights and humanitarian law...
In 2004 the judicial organ of the United Nations, in its Advisory Opinion, affirmed that Israel's actions in the occupied territories do indeed violate fundamental norms of human rights and humanitarian law and cannot be justified on grounds of self-defence or necessity.
If the United Nations is serious about human rights it cannot afford to ignore this Opinion in the deliberations of the Quartet, as it is an authoritative affirmation that Israel is in serious breach of its international commitments.
Failure to attempt to implement, or even to acknowledge, an advisory opinion dealing with international humanitarian law and human rights law, brings the very commitment of the United Nations to human rights into question.
----------------------------------------------------
Investigator Dugard's education, experience and credentials:
LL.D. degree from Cambridge University (1980)
Former Director of the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law at the University of Cambridge (1995-1997)
Former Chairman of the Dept. of Public International Law at Leiden University in the Netherlands (1998)
Judge ad hoc on the International Court of Justice at The Hague (2000)
United Nations "Special Rapporteur" (investigator) for Human Rights (current position)
[The FULL-LENGTH Report:]
GE.08-40229 (E) 290108 UNITED NATIONS General Assembly Distr. GENERAL A/HRC/7/17 21 January 2008
Original: ENGLISH
HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL Seventh session Item 7 of the provisional agenda. Reference: A/HRC/7/17
HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION IN PALESTINE AND OTHER OCCUPIED ARAB TERRITORIES
Report of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967
By JOHN DUGARD
http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G08/402/29/PDF/G0840229.pdf?OpenElement
Summary
This year marks the fortieth anniversary of the occupation of the Palestinian territory. Israel's obligations as an occupying Power have not diminished as a result of the prolonged nature of the occupation.
Israel remains the occupying Power in Gaza despite its claim that Gaza is a "hostile territory". This means that its actions must be measured against the standards of international humanitarian law and human rights law. Judged by these standards Israel is in serious violation of its legal obligations. The collective punishment of Gaza by Israel is expressly prohibited by international humanitarian law and has resulted in a serious humanitarian crisis.
The human rights situation in the West Bank has worsened, despite expectations that it would improve following the removal of Hamas from the Government of the West Bank. Settlements expand, the construction of the wall continues, and checkpoints increase in number. Military incursions and arrests have intensified, 779 Palestinian prisoners have been released but some 11,000 remain in Israeli jails.
The right of self-determination of the Palestinian people is seriously threatened by the separation of Gaza and the West Bank resulting from the seizure of power by Hamas in Gaza in June 2007. Every effort must be made by the international community to restore Palestinian unity.
On 27 November a new peace process was initiated at a meeting in Annapolis. This process must take place within a normative framework that respects international law, international humanitarian law and human rights. The Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice on the Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory1 is an essential feature of this framework and cannot be overlooked by the Annapolis peace process, the Israeli and Palestinian authorities, the Quartet and the United Nations. The Secretary-General as the representative of the United Nations must ensure that the Advisory Opinion, which represents the law of the United Nations, is respected by all parties engaged in the Annapolis process.
Introduction 1. The Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967 visited the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) from 25 September to 1 October 2007. During this time he visited Gaza, Jerusalem, Ramallah, Bethlehem, Jericho and Nablus, where he met with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) - both Palestinian and Israeli - United Nations agencies, Palestinian officials, academics, businessmen and independent interlocutors. The Special Rapporteur spent a considerable amount of time in the field, visiting factories in Gaza, checkpoints, settlements, Palestinian villages affected by the wall near Bethlehem, Nablus and Qalqiliya, and villages and communities in the Jordan valley. On 30 September he delivered a lecture at Al-Najah University in Nablus. The visit of the Special Rapporteur to the OPT was preceded and followed by visits to Jordan where he met with Jordanian officials. The purpose of these meetings was to obtain a Jordanian perspective on the human rights situation in the OPT.
I. CRITICISM OF SPECIAL RAPPORTEUR AND MANDATE
The Special Rapporteur has been criticized for a number of reasons by concerned States. First, reports are repetitious. Second, they fail to address terrorism. Third, they fail to consider human rights violations committed by Palestinians. These criticisms will be briefly considered at the outset of the present report. A. Repetition 3. It is true that reports on the OPT follow a familiar pattern and deal with substantially similar factual situations. They record violations of human rights and international humanitarian law that have occurred in a systematic and consistent manner over many years, some going back to the start of the occupation 40 years ago. Settlements, checkpoints, demolition of houses, torture, closure of crossings and military incursions have characterized the occupation for many decades and have featured regularly in reports. Reports inevitably, and correctly, continue to report on such matters and to record their consequences and frequency in a changing environment.
New violations of human rights and humanitarian law are added as they occur, such as the construction of the wall (since 2003), sonic booms, targeted killings, the use of Palestinians as human shields, and the humanitarian crisis produced by the non-payment of tax money due to the Palestinians. In short, reports are repetitious because the same violations of human rights and humanitarian law continue to occur in the OPT. B. Terrorism Terrorism is a scourge, a serious violation of human rights and international humanitarian law. No attempt is made in the reports to minimize the pain and suffering it causes to victims, their families and the broader community. Palestinians are guilty of terrorizing innocent Israeli civilians by means of suicide bombs and Qassam rockets.
Likewise the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) are guilty of terrorizing innocent Palestinian civilians by military incursions, targeted killings and sonic booms that fail to distinguish between military targets and civilians. All these acts must be condemned and have been condemned.
Common sense, however, dictates that a distinction must be drawn between acts of mindless terror, such as acts committed by Al Qaeda, and acts committed in the course of a war of national liberation against colonialism, apartheid or military occupation. While such acts cannot be justified, they must be understood as being a painful but inevitable consequence of colonialism, apartheid or occupation.
History is replete with examples of military occupation that have been resisted by violence - acts of terror. The German occupation was resisted by many European countries in the Second World War; the South West Africa People's Organization (SWAPO) resisted South Africa's occupation of Namibia; and Jewish groups resisted British occupation of Palestine - inter alia, by the blowing up of the King David Hotel in 1946 with heavy loss of life, by a group masterminded by Menachem Begin, who later became Prime Minister of Israel.
Acts of terror against military occupation must be seen in historical context. This is why every effort should be made to bring the occupation to a speedy end. Until this is done peace cannot be expected, and violence will continue. In other situations, for example Namibia, peace has been achieved by the ending of occupation, without setting the end of resistance as a precondition. Israel cannot expect perfect peace and the end of violence as a precondition for the ending of the occupation.
A further comment on terrorism is called for. In the present international climate it is easy for a State to justify its repressive measures as a response to terrorism - and to expect a sympathetic hearing. Israel exploits the present international fear of terrorism to the full. But this will not solve the Palestinian problem. Israel must address the occupation and the violation of human rights and international humanitarian law it engenders, and not invoke the justification of terrorism as a distraction, as a pretext for failure to confront the root cause of Palestinian violence - the occupation.
Palestinian human rights violations
The mandate of the Special Rapporteur is concerned with violations of human rights and international humanitarian law that are a consequence of military occupation. Although military occupation is tolerated by international law it is not approved and must be brought to a speedy end. The mandate of the Special Rapporteur therefore requires him to report on human rights violations committed by the occupying Power and not by the occupied people. For this reason this report, like previous reports, will not address the violation of the human rights of Israelis by Palestinians. Nor will it address the conflict between Fatah and Hamas, and the human rights violations that this conflict has engendered. Similarly it will not consider the human rights record of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank or of Hamas in Gaza.
The Special Rapporteur is aware of the ongoing violations of human rights committed by Palestinians upon Palestinians and by Palestinians upon Israelis. He is deeply concerned and condemns such violations. However, they find no place in this report because the mandate requires that the report be limited to the consequences of the military occupation of the OPT by Israel.
II. THE OCCUPATION OF THE OCCUPIED PALESTINIAN TERRITORY What distinguishes the case of Palestine from other situations in which violations of human rights occur is the occupation, an occupation which began in 1967, 40 years ago, and which shows no sign of ending. In Israel, complaints are frequently made that criticism of its policies and practices are too much centred on the occupation. But the occupation is a reality, one which is to blame for the present conflict, and the source of the violation of human rights and of international humanitarian law. Consequently, it is necessary to commence this report - again - with comments on the occupation.
Israel has been for 40 years and remains in military occupation of the OPT. This was reaffirmed by the International Court of Justice in its 2004 Advisory Opinion on the Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, when it held that the Palestinian territories (including East Jerusalem) "remain occupied territories and Israel has continued to have the status of occupying Power". The consequence of this, in the opinion of the International Court, is that the Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War (Fourth Geneva Convention) applies to the Occupied Palestinian Territory, as do the International Covenants on Civil and Political Rights and on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.4 Furthermore, Israel's obligations have not diminished as a result of the prolonged nature of the occupation.5 On the contrary, they have increased as a result of it. It is now argued that Israel's occupation has become unlawful as a result of the numerous violations of international law that have occurred during the occupation.
III. THE OCCUPATION OF GAZA
In its Advisory Opinion on the construction of a wall in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, the International Court of Justice was not asked to pronounce on the legal status of Gaza. It, possibly therefore, confined its reaffirmation of the occupied status of the Occupied Palestinian Territory to the West Bank and East Jerusalem.7 The evacuation of Israeli settlements and the withdrawal of the permanent IDF presence from Gaza in 2005, has now given rise to the argument that Gaza is no longer occupied territory. On 15 September 2005 Prime Minister Sharon told the General Assembly that Israel's withdrawal from Gaza meant the end of its responsibility for Gaza.
See Adam Roberts, "Prolonged military occupation: the Israeli occupied territories since 1967", American Journal of International Law, vol. 84 (1990), pp. 55-57 and 95.
O. Ben-Naftali, A.M. Gross and K. Michaeli, "Illegal occupation: framing the Occupied Palestinian Territory", Berkeley Journal of International Law, vol. 23, No. 3 (2005), pp. 551-614.
On 19 September 2007 Israel seemed to give a new status to Gaza when its Security Cabinet declared Gaza to be "hostile territory" - a characterization that was shortly afterwards approved by the United States Secretary of State. Although the legal implications that Israel intends to attach to this "status" remain unclear, the political purpose of this declaration was immediately made known - namely the reduction of the supply of fuel and electricity to Gaza.
The test for determining whether a territory is occupied under international law is effective control,8 and not the permanent physical presence of the occupying Power's military forces in the territory in question. Judged by this test it is clear that Israel remains the occupying Power as technological developments have made it possible for Israel to assert control over the people of Gaza without a permanent military presence.9 Israel's effective control is demonstrated by the following factors:
(a) Substantial control of Gaza's six land crossings: the Erez crossing is effectively closed to Palestinians wishing to cross to Israel or the West Bank. The Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza, which is regulated by the Agreement on Movement and Access entered into between Israel and the Palestinian Authority on 15 November 2005 (brokered by the United States, the European Union and the international community's envoy for the Israeli disengagement from Gaza), has been closed by Israel for lengthy periods since June 2006. The main crossing for goods at Karni is strictly controlled by Israel and since June 2006 this crossing too has been largely closed, with disastrous consequences for the Palestinian economy;
(b) Control through military incursions, rocket attacks and sonic booms: sections of Gaza have been declared "no-go" zones in which residents will be shot if they enter; ( c) Complete control of Gaza's airspace and territorial waters;
(d) Control of the Palestinian Population Registry: the definition of who is "Palestinian" and who is a resident of Gaza and the West Bank is controlled by the Israeli military. Even when the Rafah crossing is open, only holders of Palestinian identity cards can enter Gaza through the crossing; therefore control over the Palestinian Population Registry is also control over who may enter and leave Gaza. Since 2000, with few exceptions, Israel has not permitted additions to the Palestinian Population Registry.
The fact that Gaza remains occupied territory means that Israel's actions towards Gaza must be measured against the standards of international humanitarian law.
See United States of America v. Wilhelm List et al. (The Hostages case) United Nations War Crimes Commission, Law Reports of Trials of War Criminals, vol. III, 1949, p. 56; Democratic Republic of Congo v. Uganda, International Court of Justice, 2005, paras. 173 and 174.
See further on this subject, Sari Bashi and Kenneth Mann, "Disengaged Occupiers: the Legal Status of Gaza", Gisha: Legal Center for Freedom of Movement, January 2007.
IV. ISRAEL'S ACTIONS AGAINST GAZA AND THEIR CONSEQUENCES Israel has taken a number of actions against Gaza since the withdrawal of Israeli settlers and the IDF in 2005.
Military action IDF military incursions into Gaza have continued regularly over the past year; 290 Palestinians were killed in Gaza in 2007. Of this number at least a third were civilians. On 26 September, the day the Special Rapporteur visited Gaza, 12 Palestinian militants were killed by IDF missiles. Since the Annapolis meeting on 27 November 2007, over 70 Palestinians have been killed of whom 8 were killed in a major military operation in southern Gaza on the day before the first round of talks between Israelis and Palestinians following the Annapolis meeting. A further 13 Palestinians were killed in three separate airstrikes on 18 December. The frequency of targeted killings raises a question as to whether the IDF acts within the permissible parameters for such action laid down by the Israeli Supreme Court in its 2006 judgement on targeted killings. Or does the IDF act without regard to its own law as well as international law in carrying out targeted killings?
In the past two years 668 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli security forces in Gaza. Over half - 359 people - were not involved in hostilities at the time they were killed. Of those killed 126 were minors; 361 were killed by missiles fired from helicopters; and 29 of those killed were targeted for assassination. (HOW MANY PALESTINIANS IN GAZA WERE >WOUNDED< BY ISRAELI ATTACKS? --Hoffman)
During the same period, Palestinians fired some 2,800 Qassam rockets and mortar shells into Israel from the Gaza Strip. Four Israeli civilians were killed by Qassam rockets and hundreds were injured. Four members of the Israeli security forces were killed in attacks originating from Gaza.
B. Closure of crossings 15. All the crossings into and out of Gaza are controlled by Israel. Rafah, the crossing point for Gazans to Egypt, and Karni, the commercial crossing for the import and export of goods, are the principal crossing points. They are the subject of the Agreement on Movement and Access, which provides for Gazans to travel freely to Egypt through Rafah and for a substantial increase in the number of export trucks through Karni. Since 25 June 2006, following the capture of Corporal Shalit, and more particularly since mid-June 2007, following the Hamas seizure of power in Gaza, the Rafah crossing has been closed. From mid-June to early August 2007 some 6,000 Palestinians were stranded on the Egyptian side of the border, without adequate accommodation or facilities and denied the right to return home. Over 30 people died while waiting. The Karni crossing has likewise been closed for long periods of time during the past 18 months, and more particularly since mid-June 2007. Karem Shalom and Sufa are now used for the import of goods but the number of trucks bringing goods into Gaza has droppedalarmingly - from 253 a day in April 2007 to 74 a day in November. To make matters worse Sufa is possibly scheduled to close - though on 20 November the Israeli Government decided to permit the export of flowers and strawberries from Gaza to Europe via the Sufa crossing. Erez, previously used as a crossing for persons in need of medical attention in Israel, has also been largely closed for this purpose. On the other hand, in December 2007, Israel allowed several hundred Palestinians who reside abroad to leave Gaza via Israel.
These statistics, provided by B'Tselem, the Israeli Information Centre for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, cover the period 1 September 2005 to 25 July 2007.
C. The reduction of fuel and electricity supplies 16. On 19 September Israel declared Gaza to be a hostile territory and announced that, as a consequence, it would reduce the supply of fuel and electricity to Gaza. Ten Israeli and Palestinian NGOs brought an application before the Israeli High Court of Justice to halt the reduction of fuel and electricity on the ground that this constitutes collective punishment and would cause widespread humanitarian damage but the Israeli High Court has upheld the State's plan to reduce fuel transfers to Gaza. According to the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights fuel supplies have been reduced by more than 50 per cent since the decision to cease fuel supplies on 25 October 2007.
D. Termination of banking facilities 17. Following the designation of Gaza as a hostile territory the only two Israeli commercial banks dealing with financial institutions in Gaza, Bank Hapoalim and Discount Bank, announced that they would cut ties with Gaza. This involves, inter alia, the refusal to clear cheques from Gaza banks and the halting of cash transfers between Israeli banks and Gaza banks. At this stage, the full implications of this decision are not yet clear, but as the Israeli shekel is the official currency in the OPT, in accordance with the Oslo Accords, and must be supplied from Israel, it is likely that this could produce chaos in the Gazan monetary system.
E. The humanitarian crisis in Gaza 18. Regular military incursions, the closure of crossings, the reduction of fuel and the threat to the banking system have produced a humanitarian crisis, which has the following impact on life in Gaza.
1. Food 19. Over 80 per cent of the population of Gaza is dependent on food aid from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) and the World Food Programme (WFP). This takes the form of flour, rice, sugar, sunflower oil, powdered milk and lentils. Fruit and vegetables are no longer available to supplement these basic rations as farmers do not have the money to get their crops picked and marketed. Few can afford meat, and fish is virtually unobtainable as a result of the Israeli prohibition of fishing. Although critical humanitarian food supplies are being allowed in, only 41 per cent of Gaza's food import needs are currently being met.
2. Unemployment and poverty The closure of crossings prevents Gazan farmers and manufacturers from exporting their goods to markets outside Gaza. It also prevents materials from entering Gaza and this has resulted in the end of most construction works and the closure of factories. On 26 September the Special Rapporteur visited the Karni industrial zone and saw factories that had been closed as a result of the failure to import materials and the prohibition on the export of goods. Factory owners are being held responsible by Israeli buyers for non-delivery of goods caused by the closure. Farmers are without income and some 65,000 factory employees are unemployed.
According to the Palestinian Federation of Industries, 95 per cent of Gaza's industrial operations have been suspended as a result of restrictions.11 Fishermen are likewise unemployed as a result of the Israeli ban on fishing along the Gaza coast. On 9 July 2007, UNRWA announced that it had halted all its building projects in Gaza because it had run out of building materials, such as cement. This has affected 121,000 jobs of people building new schools, houses, waterworks, and health centres. In many instances those working in the public sector remain unpaid. Municipal employees in Gaza City have not been paid since March 2007. As a result garbage collection services went on strike in November causing a serious threat to health.
Poverty in Gaza is rife. Over 80 per cent of the population live below the official poverty line.
Health care. Health-care clinics are in short supply of paediatric antibiotics, and 91 key drugs are no longer available. Previously, seriously ill patients were allowed to leave Gaza to receive treatment in Israel, the West Bank, Egypt, Jordan and other countries through the Rafah and Erez crossings. Rafah is now completely closed and the Israeli authorities deny passage through Erez to all but the most "severe and urgent cases". The situation has worsened since the declaration of Gaza as a hostile territory. The World Health Organization reports that while 89.4 per cent of patients who applied for permits during the period January-May 2007 were granted permits, only 77.1 per cent of those who applied were granted permits during October 2007. This has resulted in a drastic increase in the number of patients who have died as a result of restrictions: according to the Israeli NGO Physicians for Human Rights, since June 2007, 44 people have died as a result of denial or delay of access to medical care by the Israeli authorities and 13 died in November alone. Mahmoud Abu Taha, a 21-year-old patient with stomach cancer, arrived at Erez at 16.00 hours on 18 October with a Palestinian intensive care unit ambulance, escorted by his father. The patient's entry was delayed for two and a half hours, after which the IDF asked the father to cross to the Israeli side of Erez. His son, the patient, was to enter on a walker and not with the ambulance.
The patient was denied access after reaching the end of the 500 metre long tunnel, while the father was arrested by the IDF and held for nine days. On 28 October, a second arrangement for the patient was approved and he was admitted to an Israeli hospital, where he died the same night. In November, hospitals were prevented from carrying out operations as a result of the restrictions placed by Israel on nitrous oxide gas that is used for anaesthetics.
"Investing in Palestinian Economic Reform and Development", Report for the Pledging Conference, World Bank, December 2007, para. 13.
4. Education Gaza's children in UNRWA schools lag behind refugee children elsewhere, according to UNRWA, as a result of the Israeli blockade and military violence. Students are prevented from studying abroad. In November 670 students were denied permission to study abroad, including six Fulbright scholars.
5. Fuel, energy and water Gaza is largely dependent on Israel for its supply of fuel and electricity. Already there are frequent power outages as a result of Israel's destruction of the main Gaza power plant in 2006 and subsequent damage to electricity transformers.
(For instance on 14 November the IDF struck an electricity transformer in Beit Hanoun which knocked out power for 5,000 people in the area.) The supply of water is also affected and there is insufficient power for water pumps. As a result, 210,000 people are able to access drinking water supplies for only 1-2 hours a day. Sewage is also a problem: sewage plants require repairs but materials, such as metal pipes and welding machines, have been prohibited by Israel on the grounds that they may be used for making rockets.
At present there is a real danger that sewage plants could overflow. Cutting off fuel and electricity will exacerbate an already dangerous situation. It will endanger the functioning of hospitals, water services and sewage, as well as depriving residents of electricity for refrigerators and household appliances. A humanitarian catastrophe is contemplated if Israel continues to reduce fuel and carries out its threat to reduce electricity supplies.
F. Legal consequences of Israel's actions. Israel has largely justified its attacks and incursions as defensive operations aimed at preventing the launching of Qassam rockets into Israel, the arrest or killing of suspected militants or the destruction of tunnels. Clearly the firing of rockets into Israel by Palestinian militants without any military target, which has resulted in the killing and injury of Israelis, cannot be condoned and constitutes a war crime.
Nevertheless, serious questions arise over the proportionality of Israel's military response and its failure to distinguish between military and civilian targets. It is highly arguable that Israel has violated the most fundamental rules of international humanitarian law, which constitute war crimes in terms of article 147 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and article 85 of the Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts (Additional Protocol I).
These crimes include direct attacks against civilians and civilian objects, and attacks which fail to distinguish between military targets and civilians and civilian objects (articles 48, 51 (4) and 52 (1) of Protocol I); the excessive use of force arising from disproportionate attacks on civilians and civilian objects (articles 51 (4) and 51 (5) of Protocol I); and the spreading of terror among the civilian population (article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and article 51 (2) of Protocol I).
26. Israel's siege of Gaza violates a whole range of obligations under both human rights law and humanitarian law. The provisions of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights that state that everyone has the right to "an adequate standard of living for himself and his family, including adequate food, clothing and housing", freedom from hunger and the right to food (art. 11) and that everyone has the right to health, have been seriously infringed.
Above all, the Government of Israel has violated the prohibition on collective punishment of an occupied people contained in article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention. The indiscriminate and excessive use of force against civilians and civilian objects, the destruction of electricity and water supplies, the bombardment of public buildings, the restrictions on freedom of movement, the closure of crossings and the consequences that these actions have upon public health, food, family life and the psychological well-being of the Palestinian people constitute a gross form of collective punishment.
Gaza is no ordinary State upon which other States may freely impose economic sanctions in order to create a humanitarian crisis or take disproportionate military action that endangers the civilian population in the name of self-defence. It is an occupied territory in whose well-being all States have an interest and whose welfare all States are required to promote. According to the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice, all States parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention have the obligation "to ensure compliance by Israel with international humanitarian law as embodied in that Convention". Israel has violated obligations of an erga omnes character that are the concern of all States and that all States are required to bring to an end. In the first instance, Israel, the occupying Power, is obliged to cease its violations of international humanitarian law. But other States that are a party to the siege of Gaza are likewise in violation of international humanitarian law and obliged to cease their unlawful actions.
V. HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE WEST BANK AND JERUSALEM It was widely expected that the human rights situation would improve in the West Bank following the exclusion of Hamas from the Government of the West Bank. This initially signalled a new rapprochement between Israel and the emergency Government of President Abbas, under the Prime Ministership of Salam Fayyad. Israel has made some gestures of rapprochement, such as the release of 779 prisoners (mainly belonging to Fatah), the payment of some of the tax money due to the Palestinian Authority, the relaxation of travel restrictions in the Jordan Valley, the granting of amnesty to 178 Fatah militants wanted by Israel and the promised granting of residence permits in the West Bank to 3,500 Palestinians. Unfortunately, Israel has not taken steps to dismantle the infrastructure of occupation. On the contrary, it has maintained and expanded the instruments that most seriously violate human rights - military incursions, settlements, the separation wall, restrictions on freedom of movement, the Judaization of Jerusalem and the demolition of houses.
A. Military incursions Military incursions in the West Bank have intensified since June 2007. For instance, in November the IDF carried out 786 raids in the West Bank in the course of which one person was killed, 67 injured and 398 arrested;12 public and private properties were damaged; curfews were imposed; and countless innocent civilians were terrorized by armed soldiers and dogs. Nablus has been particularly affected: on 17 October, the Israeli army raided the city of Nablus and fired tank shells, killing an elderly civilian and one armed individual, and injuring 14 civilians, including 2 children and a journalist. The IDF has frequently failed to distinguish clearly between military targets and civilians. As in the case of Gaza (see paragraph 25) these actions appear to violate rules of international humanitarian law (articles 48, 51 (4) and 52 (1) of Additional Protocol I).
B. Settlements and settlers13 30. There are 149 settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Despite promises by Israel to freeze settlement growth, the number of settlers has increased by 63 per cent since 1993 to its present population of 460,000. At present new construction is under way in 88 settlements and the average growth rate in the settlements is 4.5 per cent compared with the average growth rate of 1.5 per cent in Israel itself. In addition there are 105 "outposts" - that is, informal structures, which serve as a prelude to a new settlement, and are unauthorized but still funded by Government ministries. Despite Israel's undertaking in the road map to dismantle all outposts built after 2001, no such action has been taken in respect of the 51 such outposts. More than 38 per cent of the West Bank consists of settlements, outposts, military areas and Israeli nature reserves that are off limits to Palestinians. Settler roads link settlements to each other and to Israel. These roads are largely closed to Palestinian vehicles. (Israel has therefore introduced a system of "road apartheid", which was unknown in apartheid South Africa.)
In a statement to the Third Committee in October 2007 the Israeli delegate, Ms. Ady Schonmann, stated that the Special Rapporteur had failed to indicate that the Israeli NGO, Peace Now, had retracted a report of October 200614 which showed that nearly 40 per cent of the land held by Israeli settlements in the West Bank is privately owned by Palestinians. The Special Rapporteur has had contact with Peace Now which has indicated that while it made some corrections to its report in response to representations from the Israeli Government, it has not retracted its finding that 40 per cent of land occupied by settlements in the West Bank is privately owned by Palestinians.
Settlements are illegal under international law as they violate article 49, paragraph 6, of the Fourth Geneva Convention. This illegality has been confirmed by the International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion on the construction of the wall, by the High Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention in a declaration published in 2001, and by both the Security Council and the General Assembly. Furthermore settlements constitute a form of colonialism which is contrary to international law.15
See generally, "The Humanitarian Impact on Palestinians of Israeli Settlements and Other Infrastructure in the West Bank", the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), July 2007, available at http://www.ochaopt.org/?module=displaysection& section_id=103&format=html.
Breaking the Law in the West Bank - One Violation Leads to Another: Israeli Settlement Building on Private Palestinian Property, Peace Now, October 2006.
Israel's contempt for international law and opinion is illustrated by recent Government decisions. First, in December shortly after the Annapolis meeting, the Israeli Government announced plans to build 307 new apartments in the settlement of Har Homa. Secondly, in October it announced that it would proceed with plans for the development of E1, a planned new settlement which will have 3,500 apartments, 10 hotels and an industrial park, to accommodate 14,500 settlers, situated adjacent to Maale Adumim.
At present Israel has built a police station on E1 (visited by the Special Rapporteur on 25 September) but is prevented from proceeding with its plans to start construction on E1 by the presence of the main road from East Jerusalem to Jericho, which is used by Palestinians. Israel has now confiscated Palestinian land in Abu Dis, Sawareh, Nabi Moussa and al-Khan al-Ahmar to enable it to build an alternate road for Palestinians to Jericho which will free the area for E1. The road is part of Israel's broader plan to replace territorial contiguity with "transportational contiguity" by artificially connecting Palestinian population centres through an elaborate network of alternate roads and tunnels and creating segregated road networks, one for Palestinians and another for Israeli settlers, in the West Bank.
C. Checkpoints, roadblocks and permits as obstacles to freedom of movement. Checkpoints and roadblocks seriously obstruct the freedom of movement of Palestinians in the West Bank, with disastrous consequences for both personal life and the economy. There are 561 such obstacles to freedom of movement, comprising over 80 manned checkpoints and some 476 unmanned locked gates, earth mounds, concrete blocks and ditches. In addition, thousands of temporary checkpoints, known as flying checkpoints, are set up every year by Israeli army patrols on roads throughout the West Bank for limited periods, ranging from half an hour to several hours. In November 2007 there were 429 flying checkpoints.
35. Palestinians are subjected to numerous prohibitions on travel and to requirements for permits for travel within the West Bank and to East Jerusalem. Checkpoints ensure compliance with the permit regime.
These restrictions violate article 12 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights which has been held to be binding on Israel in the OPT by the International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion on the construction of the wall. Israel's argument that these restrictions are justified as security measures is difficult to accept. Many of the checkpoints and roadblocks are distant from the border of Israel, which is in any event protected by the wall. More likely explanations are to be found in the need to serve the convenience of settlers, to facilitate the travel of settlers through the West Bank and to impress upon the Palestinian people the power and presence of the occupier. According to a report in Yedioth Ahronoth, one quarter of all IDF soldiers who have served at roadblocks in the West Bank reported having witnessed or taken part in an act of abuse against a Palestinian civilian.
Checkpoints serve to humiliate Palestinians and to create feelings of deep hostility towards Israel. In this respect they resemble the "pass laws" of apartheid South Africa, which required black South Africans to demonstrate permission to travel or reside anywhere in South Africa.16 These laws generated widespread humiliation and anger, and were the cause of regular protest action. Israel would do well to consider the South African experience. Restrictions on freedom of movement of the kind applied by Israel do more to create insecurity than to achieve security.
See General Assembly resolution 1514 (XV): Declaration on the granting of independence to colonial countries and peoples.
D. The wall The wall that Israel is at present building, largely in Palestinian territory, is clearly illegal. The International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion on the construction of the wall found that it is contrary to international law and that Israel is under an obligation to discontinue construction of the wall and to dismantle forthwith those sections that have already been built. Israel has abandoned its claim that the wall is a security measure only and now concedes that one of the purposes of the wall is to include settlements within Israel. The fact that 83 per cent of the West Bank settler population and 69 settlements are enclosed within the wall bears this out. The wall is planned to extend for 721 kilometres.
At present 59 per cent of the wall has been completed and 200 kilometres have been constructed since the International Court of Justice handed down its Advisory Opinion declaring the wall to be illegal. When the wall is finished, an estimated 60,000 West Bank Palestinians living in 42 villages and towns will reside in the closed zone between the wall and the Green Line. This area will constitute 10.2 per cent of Palestinian land in the West Bank. There are, however, suggestions that the route of the wall will be revised to include additional Palestinian lands in the south-eastern West Bank near to the Dead Sea. If this plan is implemented some 13 per cent of Palestinian land will be seized by the wall. The closed zone includes many of the West Bank's valuable water resources and its richest agricultural lands.
The wall has serious humanitarian consequences for Palestinians living within the closed zone. They are cut off from places of employment, schools, universities and specialized medical care, and community life is seriously fragmented. Moreover, they do not have 24-hour access to emergency health services. Over 100 persons residing in the closed zone have not received permits to leave the area. Palestinians who live on the eastern side of the wall but whose land lies in the closed zone face serious economic hardship, as they are not able to reach their land to harvest crops or to graze their animals without permits. Permits are not easily granted and the bureaucratic procedures for obtaining them are humiliating and obstructive. The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has estimated that only about 18 per cent of those who used to work land in the closed zone before the construction of the wall receive permits to visit the closed zone today. The opening and closing of the gates leading to the closed zone are regulated in a highly restrictive manner: in 2007 OCHA carried out a survey in 67 communities located close to the wall which showed that only 19 of the 67 gates in the wall were open to Palestinians for use all the year round on a daily basis. To aggravate matters Palestinians coming into and out of the closed zone are frequently subjected to abuse and humiliation at the gates by the IDF. Hardships experienced by Palestinians living within the closed zone and in the precincts of the wall have already resulted in the displacement of some 15,000 persons.
On these laws, see J. Dugard, Human Rights and the South African Legal Order (Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1978).
The plight of the village of Jayyus, visited by the Special Rapporteur on 30 September 2007, illustrates the hardships faced by communities living near to the wall, but in the West Bank. The 3,200 residents of Jayyus are separated by the wall from their farmland; 68 per cent of the village's agricultural land and its six agricultural wells lie in the closed zone between the wall and the Green Line and are off limits to those without a visitor's permit. Scores of greenhouses are situated in the closed zone, producing tomatoes, cucumbers and sweet peppers, which require daily irrigation. Only about 40 per cent of the residents of Jayyus are granted permits to access farms, and gate opening times are both limited and arbitrary. By August 2004, one year after the construction of the wall, local production had fallen from 7 to 4 million kilograms of fruit and vegetables. The situation has further deteriorated over the past three years.
The section of the wall within the Jerusalem Governorate measures 168 kilometres in length. Only 5 kilometres of its completed length runs along the Green Line. The route of the wall runs deep into the West Bank to encircle the settlements of Maale Adumim. In contrast, many Palestinian villages which are currently in the Jerusalem municipality are placed outside the wall and thus separated from Jerusalem. In some places, such as Abu Dis, the wall runs through Palestinian communities, separating neighbours and families. About 25 per cent of the 253,000 Palestinians living in East Jerusalem have been cut off from the city by the wall. This means they can only enter Jerusalem through checkpoints, which makes it difficult to access hospitals, schools, universities, work and holy sites - particularly the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
E. Demolition of houses. The demolition of houses has been a regular feature of Israel's occupation of the OPT. Different reasons or justifications are advanced for such demolitions: military necessity, punishment and failure to obtain a building permit. Although the IDF claims to have discontinued punitive home demolitions, instances of such demolitions still occur. On 29 August 2007, the IDF demolished seven housing units in the Naqar neighbourhood of Qalqiliya, which were home to 48 persons (including 17 children) on the ground that they housed members of the military wing of Hamas. Houses are frequently demolished for "administrative" reasons, on the grounds that no permit has been obtained to build - which Israel defends as a normal feature of town planning. Both law and fact show, however, that houses are not demolished in the course of "normal" town planning operations, but are instead demolished in a discriminatory manner to demonstrate the power of the occupier over the occupied.
See B'Tselem, "Demolition for Alleged Military Purposes".
In both East Jerusalem and that part of the West Bank categorized as Area C (60 per cent of the West Bank, comprising villages and rural districts), houses and structures may not be built without permits. The bureaucratic procedures for obtaining permits are cumbersome and in practice permits are rarely granted. As a result, Palestinians are frequently compelled to build homes without permits. In East Jerusalem house demolitions are implemented in a discriminatory manner:18 Arab homes are destroyed but not Jewish houses. In Area C the IDF has demolished or designated for demolition homes, schools, clinics and mosques on the ground that permits have not been obtained. Between May 2005 and May 2007, 354 Palestinian structures were destroyed by the IDF in Area C.
Many Bedouin communities have had their structures demolished. In September 2007 the Special Rapporteur visited Al Hadidiya in the Jordan Valley where the structures of a Bedouin community of some 200 families, comprising 6,000 people, living near to the Jewish settlement of Roi, were demolished by the IDF. This brought back memories of the practice in apartheid South Africa of destroying black villages (termed "black spots") that were too close to white residents. Article 53 of the Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits the destruction of personal property "except where such destruction is rendered absolutely necessary by military operations". According to B'Tselem, the Israeli Information Centre for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, the destruction of homes in the Naqar neighbourhood of Qalqiliya failed to meet this test. The demolition of homes for administrative reasons can likewise not be justified. Both East Jerusalem and Area C are occupied territory, in respect of which the prohibition contained in article 53 applies.
F. Humanitarian situation The construction of the wall, the expansion of settlements, the restrictions on freedom of movement, house demolitions and military incursions have had a disastrous impact on the economy, health, education, family life and standard of living of Palestinians in the West Bank. Since 2006 the situation has deteriorated further. Israel withholds taxes which it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority on all goods imported into the Occupied Palestinian Territory, amounting to $50-60 million per month (about half of the budget of the Palestinian Authority).
Recently, Israel has transferred $119 million of the tax money it has unlawfully seized to the Palestinian Authority and western States and the Quartet have promised to recommence funding to the Palestinian Authority (insofar as it does not further the interests of Hamas in Gaza). At the time of writing no material change is discernible in the humanitarian situation in the West Bank as a result of the continuing occupation, the human rights violations described in this section of the report and Israel's refusal to transfer all the tax money due in law to the Palestinian Authority. Poverty and unemployment are at their highest levels ever; health and education are undermined by military incursions, the wall and checkpoints; and the social fabric of society is threatened.
Meir Margalit, Discrimination in the Heart of the Holy City (Jerusalem, Al Manar Modern Press, 2006).
G. Conclusion The situation in the West Bank may not be as serious as that of Gaza, however it is all a question of degree. Moreover, as in Gaza, the serious humanitarian situation in the West Bank is largely the result of Israel's violations of international law. The wall violates norms of international humanitarian law and human rights law, according to the International Court of Justice; settlements violate the Fourth Geneva Convention; checkpoints violate the freedom of movement proclaimed in human rights conventions; house demolitions violate the Fourth Geneva Convention; the humanitarian crisis in the West Bank, brought about by Israel's withholding of Palestinian tax money and other violations of international law, violates many of the rights contained in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. As in Gaza, Israel's actions constitute an unlawful collective punishment of the Palestinian people.
VI. THE TREATMENT OF ARRESTED PERSONS AND CONVICTED PRISONERS
It is estimated that since 1967 over 700,000 Palestinians have been imprisoned. At present, there are some 11,000 prisoners in Israeli jails, a number which includes 376 children, 118 women, 44 members of the Palestinian Legislative Council and some 800 "administrative detainees" (that is, persons not convicted for any offence, held for renewable periods of up to six months). Israel sees such prisoners as terrorists or ordinary criminals who have violated the criminal law. Palestinians see them as political prisoners who have committed crimes against the occupier.
History is replete with examples of such competing perspectives - to cite but South Africa and Namibia as examples. Prisoners are a key issue in any peace settlement. That Israel is aware of this is demonstrated by its release of 779 prisoners (although in November 411 persons were arrested). The release of such a small number of prisoners, however, provides little evidence of a bona fide attempt to reach a peaceful settlement on the part of Israel. To make matters worse prisoners are subjected to humiliating and degrading treatment.
A. Arrested and detained persons Following arrest, persons are frequently beaten and stripped in a humiliating manner. The interrogation of subjects is then carried out in a degrading and inhuman manner, sometimes amounting to torture. During 2007, two reports published by Israeli NGOs - Hamoked (Center for the Defence of the Individual) and B'Tselem19 and the Public Committee against Torture in Israel (PCATI)20 - have shown that arrested persons are subjected to beatings, humiliated and deprived of basic needs and that persons suspected of having information that could prevent attacks (so-called "ticking bomb suspects") are deprived of sleep for more than 24 hours, beaten and subjected to physical ill-treatment. The treatment of children is equally disturbing.
According to Defence for Children International (Palestine Section), children are on average detained for between 8 to 21 days before being brought to court; denied the presence of a parent or lawyer during interrogation; cursed, threatened, beaten and kept in solitary confinement during interrogation.
Absolute Prohibition: The Torture and Ill-Treatment of Palestinian Detainees, Hamoked and B'Tselem, May 2007.
"Ticking Bombs" Testimonies of Torture Victims in Israel, Public Committee against Torture in Israel, May 2007.
B. Convicted prisoners and administrative detainees Prison conditions are harsh. Many prisoners are accommodated in tents, which are extremely hot in summer and cold in winter. Food is poor, resulting in anaemia among prisoners, and there is serious overcrowding. Most Palestinian prisoners are held in jails in Israel. This violates article 76 of the Fourth Geneva Convention which requires persons from an occupied territory to be detained in the occupied country, and if convicted, to serve their sentences therein. Family visits are difficult and frequently impossible: all visits for families from Gaza to their relatives detained in Israeli prisons have been suspended since 6 June 2007, affecting some 900 prisoners. On 22 October there was a riot in Ketziot prison in the Negev (in Israel), accommodating some 2,300 prisoners, which resulted in 1 death and some 250 injuries among prisoners.
The role of medical doctors in detention centres and prisons requires attention. These doctors witness the result of inhuman treatment - wounds, swollen hands, signs of violence - but remain silent, acting as if they do not know that torture is taking place. This raises ethical questions that in similar circumstances in South Africa were, after years of silence, addressed by the South African Medical Association and international medical bodies. Why, one must ask, has the responsibility of Israeli medical doctors who examine detainees and prisoners not been questioned by the relevant Israeli and international medical professional bodies?
VII. SELF-DETERMINATION The right of self-determination of the Palestinian people has been recognized by the Security Council, the General Assembly, the International Court of Justice and Israel itself. The territory of the self-determination unit within which this right is to be exercised clearly includes the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza. The right of the Palestinian people to self-determination has been denied and obstructed for nearly 60 years by Israel.
Now it is threatened by the political separation of the West Bank and Gaza, resulting from the seizure of power in Gaza by Hamas in June 2007, followed by the seizure of power in the West Bank by Fatah. The carefully brokered Government of Palestinian national unity has been destroyed by the internecine conflict resulting in the death of several hundred Palestinians, mostly belonging to Fatah.
At the time of writing, there is no immediate prospect of reconciliation between Hamas and Fatah. This is a matter of deep concern to the Special Rapporteur as the right to self-determination is a central and core human right. It must also be a matter of concern to the Quartet and other international institutions committed to the realization of the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination. Such a concern should not take the form of support - political, economic or military - for one faction at the expense of the other, but rather for reconciliation between the two factions so that the right to self-determination may be realized within the 1967 borders of the Palestinian self-determination unit, that is including the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza. Unhappily, the Quartet (which embraces the United Nations) is, at the time of writing, making little attempt to promote Palestinian national unity. On the contrary, it pursues a divisive policy of preferring one faction over the other; of speaking to one faction but not the other; of dealing with one faction while isolating the other.
Semi-Annual Report 2007, Defence for Children International (Palestine Section).
VIII. INTERNATIONAL LAW, THE INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE, THE QUARTET AND THE UNITED NATIONS On 8 December 2003 the General Assembly requested an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice on the legal consequences arising from the construction of the wall being built by Israel in the OPT. Fifty States and international organizations gave written statements to the Court and 15 States and international organizations made oral statements before the Court. The Court provided an advisory opinion23 by 14 votes to 1, which answered many of the legal questions that have been raised over the past 40 years. The principal findings of the Court were as follows: (a) The Palestinian people have the right to self-determination24 and the exercise of this right is violated by the construction of the wall;25 (b) Israel is under a legal obligation to comply with the Fourth Geneva Convention in the OPT26 - a unanimous finding;27 (c) Settlements are illegal as they violate article 49 (6) of the Fourth Geneva Convention28 - a unanimous finding;
Resolution ES-10/14. Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, ICJ, 2004.
(d) Israel is bound by international human rights conventions in the OPT30 - a unanimous finding31 - and consequently its conduct is to be measured against both international human rights conventions and the Fourth Geneva Convention;
(e) The regime in force in the closed zone between the wall and Green Line violates the right to freedom of movement contained in article 12 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights32 and the right to work, health, education and an adequate standard of living contained in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights;
(f) The destruction of property for the construction of the wall violates article 53 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and cannot be justified on grounds of military necessity or national security;
g) The wall cannot be justified as an exercise in self-defence;
(h) The annexation of East Jerusalem is illegal;
(i) The construction of the wall by Israel in the OPT, including in and around East Jerusalem, and its associated regime are contrary to international law; and Israel is obliged in law to cease the construction of the wall, to dismantle it and to make reparation for the construction of the wall;
j) All States are under a legal obligation not to recognize the illegal situation resulting from the wall and to ensure compliance by Israel with the Fourth Geneva Convention;
(k) The United Nations, especially the General Assembly and Security Council, should consider what further action is required to bring an end to the illegal situation resulting from the construction of the wall and associated regime, "taking due account of the present Advisory Opinion".
On 20 July 2004 the General Assembly adopted resolution ES-10/15 which called for Israel to comply with the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice. This resolution was adopted by 150 votes to 6 (Australia, Micronesia, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau, United States) with 10 abstentions. The Russian Federation and member States of the European Union voted in favour of the resolution.
Since 2004, the Advisory Opinion has been ignored by the Security Council. While the General Assembly and Human Rights Council have passed several resolutions reaffirming the Opinion, no attempt has been made by the Security Council to compel Israel to comply with the Opinion or to remind States of their obligation to ensure compliance by Israel with the Fourth Geneva Convention. The reason for this is not hard to find. The Security Council is prevented from giving its backing to the Opinion by the United States which has refused to accept it.
Similarly the United States prevents the Quartet from taking steps to implement the Opinion. No statement issued by the Quartet has ever acknowledged the Opinion.
Although the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice is an authoritative statement of the applicable law and is designed to contribute to the framework for peace in the Middle East, it is not legally binding on States. In law, the United States is well within its right to refuse to accept the Opinion in the Quartet. The same applies to the Russian Federation and the European Union - although both have compromised themselves by giving approval to the Opinion by supporting General Assembly resolution ES-10/15 and subsequent resolutions. The position of the United Nations is, however, very different.
The International Court of Justice is the judicial organ of the United Nations. Moreover the General Assembly has by an overwhelming majority repeatedly given its approval to the Opinion. This means that it is now part of the law of the United Nations. As such the representative of the United Nations in the Quartet - the Secretary-General or his representative - is in law obliged to be guided by the Opinion and to endeavour in good faith to do his or her best to ensure compliance with the Opinion.
If the Secretary-General (or his representative) is politically unable to do so he has two choices: either to withdraw from the Quartet or to explain to his constituency - "we the peoples of the United Nations" in the language of the Charter - why he is unable to do so and how he justifies remaining in the Quartet in the light of its refusal to be guided by the law of the United Nations. The first course is possibly unwise at this time as this would deprive the United Nations of a role in the peace process. This makes the second course essential.
For 40 years the political organs of the United Nations, States and individuals have accused Israel of consistent, systematic and gross violations of human rights and humanitarian law in the OPT. In 2004 the judicial organ of the United Nations, in its Advisory Opinion, affirmed that Israel's actions in the OPT do indeed violate fundamental norms of human rights and humanitarian law and cannot be justified on grounds of self-defence or necessity. If the United Nations is serious about human rights it cannot afford to ignore this Opinion in the deliberations of the Quartet, as it is an authoritative affirmation that Israel is in serious breach of its international commitments. Failure to attempt to implement, or even to acknowledge, an advisory opinion dealing with international humanitarian law and human rights law, brings the very commitment of the United Nations to human rights into question.
See, for example, the draft text in A/62/L.21/Rev.1 adopted on 10 December 2007 which calls on Israel to comply with the Advisory Opinion and on all States to comply with the legal obligations mentioned in the Opinion.
HRC resolution 2/4 of 27 November 2006.
See, for example, the statement of the Quartet of 23 September 2007.
IX. PEACE TALKS At the time of writing negotiations leading to a peace settlement between Israelis and Palestinians have commenced following an initial meeting in Annapolis on 27 November 2007. It is not within the mandate of the Special Rapporteur to comment on what is essentially a political process, except insofar as it has implications for human rights. In this context the
Special Rapporteur wishes to make the following remarks. The Oslo Accords have been criticized for failing to consider normative aspects of the Palestinian issue. In particular they failed to pay adequate attention to international law and to the human rights dimension. It is important that the Annapolis process does not make the same mistake.
Unfortunately the first indications suggest that this is a serious possibility as the joint statement of 27 November agreed to by the parties as a starting point for the negotiations is premised on the proposals contained in the Quartet road map of 2003 rather than on the legal norms proclaimed by the International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion on the construction of the wall.
Indeed the joint statement makes no mention of the Advisory Opinion at all. The Secretary-General in his statement at Annapolis also invoked the road map but made no mention of the Advisory Opinion. In the opinion of the Special Rapporteur, the road map is an inappropriate and unhelpful framework for negotiations for the following reasons.
First, it is outdated as it takes no account of the Advisory Opinion, Palestinian democratic elections, Israel's withdrawal from Gaza and the June 2007 separation of Gaza from the West Bank. Second, Israel attached 14 reservations to the road map in May 2003, which makes Israel's commitment to it unclear. Third, it is, in its own language, "a performance-based and goal driven roadmap" which takes little account of the normative aspect.
It must be recalled that article 47 of the Fourth Geneva Convention provides that persons in an occupied territory shall not be deprived of the benefits of the Convention by any agreement concluded between the authorities of the occupied territory and the occupying Power, or by the annexation by the occupying Power of part of the occupied territory.
This means that any agreement between the Palestinian authorities and the Israeli Government that recognizes settlements within the occupied Palestinian territory, or accepts the annexation by Israel of Palestinian land within the wall, will violate the Fourth Geneva Convention.
This is but one example of the dangers of a peace process between unequals which has no regard to the normative framework of international law. In its approach to previous peace negotiations, the Israeli Government has insisted on negotiations being restricted to the agreed framework. The Annapolis joint statement which refers only to the road map suggests that Israel does not see itself as being bound by the normative framework accepted by the United Nations.
In the opinion of the Special Rapporteur negotiations should take place within a normative framework, with the guiding norms to be found in international law, particularly international humanitarian law and human rights law, the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice, and Security Council resolutions.
Negotiations on issues such as boundaries, settlements, East Jerusalem, the return of refugees and the isolation of Gaza should be informed by such norms and not by political horse-trading. In this respect parties might learn from the experience of the negotiations that led to a democratic South Africa in the mid-1990s, which took place within the framework of accepted democratic principles, the rule of law and international law (with special reference to human rights law).
The creation of a Palestinian State will not heal the wounds of 60 years of conflict. If real peace and security is to be achieved every effort should be made to achieve reconciliation between Palestinians and Israelis. To do this it will be necessary for both people to address the events, actions and sufferings of the past. Consideration should therefore be given to the establishment of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to hear the stories of the sufferings of both peoples. Without truth-telling of this kind tensions between Palestinians and Israelis will remain to threaten peace between the two nations.
--END QUOTE--
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Hillary and Bill Clinton campaign without Serbian protest
An opportunity is being missed
by Michael A. Hoffman II
Picture this: a presidential candidate whose husband facilitated the burning and bombing of Jerusalem, killing hundreds of Judaic civilians and destroying dozens of historic synagogues, is campaigning across the U.S. and is met with crowds of outraged Zionists at every stop who shout "war criminal" at her and her ex-president husband.
The reality: In 1999, while Hillary was First lady, Bill Clinton facilitated NATO's burning and bombing of Belgrade and its trains, buses and schools, killing hundreds of Orthodox Christian civilians and destroying dozens of historic churches and monasteries. But as she and Bill campaign across the U.S. no Serbs or Serbian-Americans have bothered to take advantage of the Clintons' accessibility by protesting and publicly shaming these war criminals.
The difference between Judaic and Christian awareness, memory, energy and willingness to mobilize and protest, is the difference between a victorious and a defeated people.
It is not too late. Serbs: protest Mrs. Clinton's presidential campaign! Take this opportunity to expose her husband's heinous crimes against men, women and children perpetrated under the military leadership of Gen. Wesley Clark and NATO.
Forgive? Yes, it's our Christian duty. Forget? Never.
***
by Michael A. Hoffman II
Picture this: a presidential candidate whose husband facilitated the burning and bombing of Jerusalem, killing hundreds of Judaic civilians and destroying dozens of historic synagogues, is campaigning across the U.S. and is met with crowds of outraged Zionists at every stop who shout "war criminal" at her and her ex-president husband.
The reality: In 1999, while Hillary was First lady, Bill Clinton facilitated NATO's burning and bombing of Belgrade and its trains, buses and schools, killing hundreds of Orthodox Christian civilians and destroying dozens of historic churches and monasteries. But as she and Bill campaign across the U.S. no Serbs or Serbian-Americans have bothered to take advantage of the Clintons' accessibility by protesting and publicly shaming these war criminals.
The difference between Judaic and Christian awareness, memory, energy and willingness to mobilize and protest, is the difference between a victorious and a defeated people.
It is not too late. Serbs: protest Mrs. Clinton's presidential campaign! Take this opportunity to expose her husband's heinous crimes against men, women and children perpetrated under the military leadership of Gen. Wesley Clark and NATO.
Forgive? Yes, it's our Christian duty. Forget? Never.
***
Monday, February 18, 2008
Princess Diana knew of plot to kill her in "Staged Car Crash"
In 1995, two years before her death, Princess Diana warned of a plot to kill her in a "Staged Car Crash"
At an inquest in London, Egyptian-born Mohamed Fayed said he was convinced there was a cover-up of the conspiracy to murder his son and England's Princess Diana because of a note written by the Princess's divorce lawyer, Lord Mishcon, following a 1995 meeting in which she said there was a plot to kill her in a staged car crash. The document was locked in a safe at Scotland Yard and only sent to the coroner in 2003.
Mr Fayed said: "I cannot believe that they sat upon such an important note and did not pass it on. My belief that my son and Princess Diana were murdered was confirmed when I learned that the two leading Commissioners - Lord Condon and Lord Stevens - did not show the coroner the note made by a leading lawyer, Lord Mishcon, detailing the Princess' fears for her life. I believe that they acted unprofessionally and they must have no conscience."
"Diana told me on the telephone that she was pregnant. I'm the only person they told. They told me they were engaged and would announce their engagement on Monday morning. She would speak to her sons when she returned from Paris."
The Harrods department store owner told the High Court hearing in London that he had fought a 10-year battle against a vast conspiracy encompassing both the British and French establishments as he tried to prove that the Princess and his son Dodi were killed by MI6, in a staged car crash in Paris on Aug 31, 1997.
The alleged conspiracy and cover-up included senior royals; MI6; two former Scotland Yard commissioners; French police and medics; the Princess's sister, Lady Sarah McCorquodale.
At the center of Mr Fayed's case was a claim that his son and the Princess telephoned him an hour before the accident to say they were expecting a baby and would announce their engagement after she had told her sons.
Mr Fayed said: "I'm the only person that they told. Princess Diana told me before and during the holiday we shared in July 1997 of her fears. She told me that she knew Prince Philip and Prince Charles were trying to get rid of her."
He went on: "Prince Philip would not accept my son or anyone who is a person of different religion, naturally-tanned, curly hair. They would not accept that he would have anything to do with the future King. Prince Philip rules the country behind the scenes. I think Prince Philip is the actual head of the Royal Family."
Prince Philip was originally a member of the Danish-German House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksburg. The duke later changed his name to Mountbatten.
Mr Burnett said there had been an "avalanche" of evidence from friends of the Princess that she was not pregnant, but Mr Fayed said they were "lying".
He claimed the murder was "executed" by a photographer, James Andanson, who has since died, in a white Fiat Uno and that Mr Andanson was later "got rid of".
He said Mr Andanson was employed by MI6 and "pushed" the couple's Mercedes as strobe lights were flashed to blind their driver Henri Paul, who was also in the pay of MI6 but had been "duped" by them.
After the crash two French pathologists swapped Mr Paul's blood for that of someone else to show he was drunk, he alleged.
Mr Fayed also claimed that Tony Blair, the former premier, was implicated in the plot. He believed the assassins were acting on orders from "the prime minister and his henchmen" as well as the Royal Family.
At one point Lord Justice Scott Baker commented: "A lot of people were involved in the plot."
In a heated exchange Richard Horwell QC, counsel for the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, drew laughter as he suggested the conspiracy seemed to involve everyone including "James Andanson and his dog".
He said: "Can you tell us why James Andanson took his dog on this criminal enterprise? Why the might and power of the Royal Family, the British government and MI6 chose a Fiat Uno, one of the world's lightest and least powerful cars?"
Mr Fayed replied: "Well, it's his own car and he chose to use his own car." He added: "You are talking a lot of rubbish. You are trying to protect the Establishment, the intelligence services and Scotland Yard for something they have done - the crime of the century."
***
At an inquest in London, Egyptian-born Mohamed Fayed said he was convinced there was a cover-up of the conspiracy to murder his son and England's Princess Diana because of a note written by the Princess's divorce lawyer, Lord Mishcon, following a 1995 meeting in which she said there was a plot to kill her in a staged car crash. The document was locked in a safe at Scotland Yard and only sent to the coroner in 2003.
Mr Fayed said: "I cannot believe that they sat upon such an important note and did not pass it on. My belief that my son and Princess Diana were murdered was confirmed when I learned that the two leading Commissioners - Lord Condon and Lord Stevens - did not show the coroner the note made by a leading lawyer, Lord Mishcon, detailing the Princess' fears for her life. I believe that they acted unprofessionally and they must have no conscience."
"Diana told me on the telephone that she was pregnant. I'm the only person they told. They told me they were engaged and would announce their engagement on Monday morning. She would speak to her sons when she returned from Paris."
The Harrods department store owner told the High Court hearing in London that he had fought a 10-year battle against a vast conspiracy encompassing both the British and French establishments as he tried to prove that the Princess and his son Dodi were killed by MI6, in a staged car crash in Paris on Aug 31, 1997.
The alleged conspiracy and cover-up included senior royals; MI6; two former Scotland Yard commissioners; French police and medics; the Princess's sister, Lady Sarah McCorquodale.
At the center of Mr Fayed's case was a claim that his son and the Princess telephoned him an hour before the accident to say they were expecting a baby and would announce their engagement after she had told her sons.
Mr Fayed said: "I'm the only person that they told. Princess Diana told me before and during the holiday we shared in July 1997 of her fears. She told me that she knew Prince Philip and Prince Charles were trying to get rid of her."
He went on: "Prince Philip would not accept my son or anyone who is a person of different religion, naturally-tanned, curly hair. They would not accept that he would have anything to do with the future King. Prince Philip rules the country behind the scenes. I think Prince Philip is the actual head of the Royal Family."
Prince Philip was originally a member of the Danish-German House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksburg. The duke later changed his name to Mountbatten.
Mr Burnett said there had been an "avalanche" of evidence from friends of the Princess that she was not pregnant, but Mr Fayed said they were "lying".
He claimed the murder was "executed" by a photographer, James Andanson, who has since died, in a white Fiat Uno and that Mr Andanson was later "got rid of".
He said Mr Andanson was employed by MI6 and "pushed" the couple's Mercedes as strobe lights were flashed to blind their driver Henri Paul, who was also in the pay of MI6 but had been "duped" by them.
After the crash two French pathologists swapped Mr Paul's blood for that of someone else to show he was drunk, he alleged.
Mr Fayed also claimed that Tony Blair, the former premier, was implicated in the plot. He believed the assassins were acting on orders from "the prime minister and his henchmen" as well as the Royal Family.
At one point Lord Justice Scott Baker commented: "A lot of people were involved in the plot."
In a heated exchange Richard Horwell QC, counsel for the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, drew laughter as he suggested the conspiracy seemed to involve everyone including "James Andanson and his dog".
He said: "Can you tell us why James Andanson took his dog on this criminal enterprise? Why the might and power of the Royal Family, the British government and MI6 chose a Fiat Uno, one of the world's lightest and least powerful cars?"
Mr Fayed replied: "Well, it's his own car and he chose to use his own car." He added: "You are talking a lot of rubbish. You are trying to protect the Establishment, the intelligence services and Scotland Yard for something they have done - the crime of the century."
***
Friday, February 15, 2008
Rowan Williams and Sharia Law in the UK
Under the 1996 Arbitration Act, rabbinic courts are recognized in the law of Great Britain as tribunals to settle civil disputes, if both sides agree to their authority.
If the Talmudists can have their courts in Britain, why not the Muslims?
***
If the Talmudists can have their courts in Britain, why not the Muslims?
***
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Israelis say: Terror bombing 'great achievement for free world'
They Rule By Assassination
ASSASSINATION IS "TERRORISM" WHEN ENEMIES OF THE ISRAELI-AMERICAN CARTEL COMMIT IT
ASSASSINATION IS A "BLESSING" FOR HUMANITY WHEN ISRAELIS OR THE U.S. GOVERNMENT PERPETRATE IT
Ex-Mossad chief: Mughniyah killing 'great achievement for free world'
PMO denies Israeli role in Imad Mughniyah's death
By Yuval Azoulay, Haaretz | Feb. 13, 2008
The Prime Minister's Office on Wendesday denied any Israeli role in the assassination of Hezbollah Deputy Secretary General Imad Mughniyah, who was killed in a bomb blast in Damascus late Tuesday night.
"Israel rejects the attempt by terror groups to attribute to it any involvement in this incident," said the PMO in a statement. "We have nothing further to add."
Former Mossad chief Danny Yatom on Wednesday welcomed Mughniyah's death, calling it "a great achievement for the free world in its fight on terror."
"Mughniyah was one of the most dangerous and cruel terrorists of all time," said the Labor MK. "There are numerous intelligence agencies and countries that have been pursuing him, and the one that was successful in reaching him [has proven itself] - to have a high intelligence and operational capability."
Yatom called Mughniyah's death a serious blow to Hezbollah, both in terms of morale and in terms of its operational capabilities, saying the assassination could only have been made possible by penetrating deep into the organization.
"Whoever can take him out can take out anyone in Hezbollah," he said. "It will take Hezbollah a long time to find an heir."
"Mughniyah was responsible for the deaths of many Jews, Israelis, Americans, and was solely and directly responsible for Hezbollah attacks abroad, through close cooperation with Iran," he said.
Environment Minister Gideon Ezra, formerly a senior intelligence officer, also hailed the killing of the top Hezbollah commander. "I, of course, do not know who carried out the assassination of Imad, but he should be blessed," he said.
Hamas slammed the assassination. "We condemn this crime and we emphasize the Muslim nation must rise up to confront the Zionist devil which is back by the Americans," said a Hamas spokesman in Gaza, Samir Abu Zuhri.
***
ASSASSINATION IS "TERRORISM" WHEN ENEMIES OF THE ISRAELI-AMERICAN CARTEL COMMIT IT
ASSASSINATION IS A "BLESSING" FOR HUMANITY WHEN ISRAELIS OR THE U.S. GOVERNMENT PERPETRATE IT
Ex-Mossad chief: Mughniyah killing 'great achievement for free world'
PMO denies Israeli role in Imad Mughniyah's death
By Yuval Azoulay, Haaretz | Feb. 13, 2008
The Prime Minister's Office on Wendesday denied any Israeli role in the assassination of Hezbollah Deputy Secretary General Imad Mughniyah, who was killed in a bomb blast in Damascus late Tuesday night.
"Israel rejects the attempt by terror groups to attribute to it any involvement in this incident," said the PMO in a statement. "We have nothing further to add."
Former Mossad chief Danny Yatom on Wednesday welcomed Mughniyah's death, calling it "a great achievement for the free world in its fight on terror."
"Mughniyah was one of the most dangerous and cruel terrorists of all time," said the Labor MK. "There are numerous intelligence agencies and countries that have been pursuing him, and the one that was successful in reaching him [has proven itself] - to have a high intelligence and operational capability."
Yatom called Mughniyah's death a serious blow to Hezbollah, both in terms of morale and in terms of its operational capabilities, saying the assassination could only have been made possible by penetrating deep into the organization.
"Whoever can take him out can take out anyone in Hezbollah," he said. "It will take Hezbollah a long time to find an heir."
"Mughniyah was responsible for the deaths of many Jews, Israelis, Americans, and was solely and directly responsible for Hezbollah attacks abroad, through close cooperation with Iran," he said.
Environment Minister Gideon Ezra, formerly a senior intelligence officer, also hailed the killing of the top Hezbollah commander. "I, of course, do not know who carried out the assassination of Imad, but he should be blessed," he said.
Hamas slammed the assassination. "We condemn this crime and we emphasize the Muslim nation must rise up to confront the Zionist devil which is back by the Americans," said a Hamas spokesman in Gaza, Samir Abu Zuhri.
***
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Anglican leader Rowan Williams and Sharia Law in the UK
Hoffman's Preface:
Rowan Williams, the leader of the Anglican Church in Britain has sparked a "row" as the English say, with his comments on the prospects for some sort of accommodation with certain aspects of Islamic Sharia law in Britain.
The Zionists are fiercely opposed and their gentile mouthpieces have sallied on to the field of media combat to do battle with Archbishop Williams while waving a copy of the Magna Carta. They are full of talk of "British values" and "our immemorial heritage."
Can the English be so sunk in Talmudic indoctrination that they imagine that their nation, which seems to have an Orwellian surveillance camera on every corner, which bans the people from having guns, which taxes them at extortionate rates and builds its economy upon usury, while permitting homosexual acts between adults and teenagers and abortion on demand, is in some sense a "Christian" nation? How many pints of bitters does one have to imbibe to be put in the frame of mind to believe that England is anything other than Shylock's Talmudic colony?
England doesn't have Sharia law or Bible law, it has the law of the rabbis and the Zionists. And yet there is no protest of this invasive usurpation from the Bulldog Breed about the fact that, long before the Muslims arrived in Britain, the Talmudists had arrived and shifted the courts, the government and laws away from the Bible and Magna Carta, toward the Mishnah and Gemara, with hardly a pipsqueak from those muscular right wingers now thumping their chests in outrage at Rowan William's remarks about Islam, printed here below in their entirety.
Archbishop's Lecture - Civil and Religious Law in England: a Religious Perspective
February 7, 2008
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams gave the foundation lecture at the Royal Courts of Justice in England:
The title of this series of lectures signals the existence of what is very widely felt to be a growing challenge in our society – that is, the presence of communities which, while no less 'law-abiding' than the rest of the population, relate to something other than the British legal system alone.
But, as I hope to suggest, the issues that arise around what level of public or legal recognition, if any, might be allowed to the legal provisions of a religious group, are not peculiar to Islam: we might recall that, while the law of the Church of England is the law of the land, its daily operation is in the hands of authorities to whom considerable independence is granted. And beyond the specific issues that arise in relation to the practicalities of recognition or delegation, there are large questions in the background about what we understand by and expect from the law, questions that are more sharply focused than ever in a largely secular social environment. I shall therefore be concentrating on certain issues around Islamic law to begin with, in order to open up some of these wider matters.
Among the manifold anxieties that haunt the discussion of the place of Muslims in British society, one of the strongest, reinforced from time to time by the sensational reporting of opinion polls, is that Muslim communities in this country seek the freedom to live under sharia law. And what most people think they know of sharia is that it is repressive towards women and wedded to archaic and brutal physical punishments; just a few days ago, it was reported that a 'forced marriage' involving a young woman with learning difficulties had been 'sanctioned under sharia law' – the kind of story that, in its assumption that we all 'really' know what is involved in the practice of sharia, powerfully reinforces the image of – at best – a pre-modern system in which human rights have no role.
The problem is freely admitted by Muslim scholars. 'In the West', writes Tariq Ramadan in his groundbreaking Western Muslims and the Future of Islam, 'the idea of Sharia calls up all the darkest images of Islam...It has reached the extent that many Muslim intellectuals do not dare even to refer to the concept for fear of frightening people or arousing suspicion of all their work by the mere mention of the word' (p.31). Even when some of the more dramatic fears are set aside, there remains a great deal of uncertainty about what degree of accommodation the law of the land can and should give to minority communities with their own strongly entrenched legal and moral codes.
As such, this is not only an issue about Islam but about other faith groups, including Orthodox Judaism; and indeed it spills over into some of the questions which have surfaced sharply in the last twelve months about the right of religious believers in general to opt out of certain legal provisions – as in the problems around Roman Catholic adoption agencies which emerged in relation to the Sexual Orientation Regulations last spring.
This lecture will not attempt a detailed discussion of the nature of sharia, which would be far beyond my competence; my aim is only, as I have said, to tease out some of the broader issues around the rights of religious groups within a secular state, with a few thought about what might be entailed in crafting a just and constructive relationship between Islamic law and the statutory law of the United Kingdom.
But it is important to begin by dispelling one or two myths about sharia; so far from being a monolithic system of detailed enactments, sharia designates primarily – to quote Ramadan again – 'the expression of the universal principles of Islam [and] the framework and the thinking that makes for their actualization in human history' (32). Universal principles: as any Muslim commentator will insist, what is in view is the eternal and absolute will of God for the universe and for its human inhabitants in particular; but also something that has to be 'actualized', not a ready-made system. If shar' designates the essence of the revealed Law, sharia is the practice of actualizing and applying it; while certain elements of the sharia are specified fairly exactly in the Qur'an and Sunna and in the hadith recognised as authoritative in this respect, there is no single code that can be identified as 'the' sharia.
And when certain states impose what they refer to as sharia or when certain Muslim activists demand its recognition alongside secular jurisdictions, they are usually referring not to a universal and fixed code established once for all but to some particular concretisation of it at the hands of a tradition of jurists. In the hands of contemporary legal traditionalists, this means simply that the application of sharia must be governed by the judgements of representatives of the classical schools of legal interpretation. But there are a good many voices arguing for an extension of the liberty of ijtihad – basically reasoning from first principles rather than simply the collation of traditional judgements (see for example Louis Gardet, 'Un prealable aux questions soulevees par les droits de l'homme: l'actualisation de la Loi religieuse musulmane aujourd'hui', Islamochristiana 9, 1983, 1-12, and Abdullah Saeed, 'Trends in Contemporary Islam: a Preliminary Attempt at a Classification', The Muslim World, 97:3, 2007, 395-404, esp. 401-2).
Thus, in contrast to what is sometimes assumed, we do not simply have a standoff between two rival legal systems when we discuss Islamic and British law. On the one hand, sharia depends for its legitimacy not on any human decision, not on votes or preferences, but on the conviction that it represents the mind of God; on the other, it is to some extent unfinished business so far as codified and precise provisions are concerned.
To recognise sharia is to recognise a method of jurisprudence governed by revealed texts rather than a single system. In a discussion based on a paper from Mona Siddiqui at a conference last year at Al Akhawayn University in Morocco, the point was made by one or two Muslim scholars that an excessively narrow understanding sharia as simply codified rules can have the effect of actually undermining the universal claims of the Qur'an.
But while such universal claims are not open for renegotiation, they also assume the voluntary consent or submission of the believer, the free decision to be and to continue a member of the ummaSharia is not, in that sense, intrinsically to do with any demand for Muslim dominance over non-Muslims.
Both historically and in the contemporary context, Muslim states have acknowledged that membership of the umma is not coterminous with membership in a particular political society: in modern times, the clearest articulation of this was in the foundation of the Pakistani state under Jinnah; but other examples (Morocco, Jordan) could be cited of societies where there is a concept of citizenship that is not identical with belonging to the umma.
Such societies, while not compromising or weakening the possibility of unqualified belief in the authority and universality of sharia, or even the privileged status of Islam in a nation, recognise that there can be no guarantee that the state is religiously homogeneous and that the relationships in which the individual stands and which define him or her are not exclusively with other Muslims. There has therefore to be some concept of common good that is not prescribed solely in terms of revealed Law, however provisional or imperfect such a situation is thought to be. And this implies in turn that the Muslim, even in a predominantly Muslim state, has something of a dual identity, as citizen and as believer within the community of the faithful.
It is true that this account would be hotly contested by some committed Islamic primitivists, by followers of Sayyid Qutb and similar polemicists; but it is fair to say that the great body of serious jurists in the Islamic world would recognise this degree of political plurality as consistent with Muslim integrity. In this sense, while (as I have said) we are not talking about two rival systems on the same level, there is some community of understanding between Islamic social thinking and the categories we might turn to in the non-Muslim world for the understanding of law in the most general context.
There is a recognition that our social identities are not constituted by one exclusive set of relations or mode of belonging – even if one of those sets is regarded as relating to the most fundamental and non-negotiable level of reality, as established by a 'covenant' between the divine and the human (as in Jewish and Christian thinking; once again, we are not talking about an exclusively Muslim problem). The danger arises not only when there is an assumption on the religious side that membership of the community (belonging to the umma or the Church or whatever) is the only significant category, so that participation in other kinds of socio-political arrangement is a kind of betrayal.
It also occurs when secular government assumes a monopoly in terms of defining public and political identity. There is a position – not at all unfamiliar in contemporary discussion – which says that to be a citizen is essentially and simply to be under the rule of the uniform law of a sovereign state, in such a way that any other relations, commitments or protocols of behaviour belong exclusively to the realm of the private and of individual choice.
As I have maintained in several other contexts, this is a very unsatisfactory account of political reality in modern societies; but it is also a problematic basis for thinking of the legal category of citizenship and the nature of human interdependence. Maleiha Malik, following Alasdair MacIntyre, argues in an essay on 'Faith and the State of Jurisprudence' (Faith in Law: Essays in Legal Theory, ed. Peter Oliver, Sionaidh Douglas Scott and Victor Tadros, 2000, pp.129-49) that there is a risk of assuming that 'mainstreram' jurisprudence should routinely and unquestioningly bypass the variety of ways in which actions are as a matter of fact understood by agents in the light of the diverse sorts of communal belonging they are involved in.
If that is the assumption, 'the appropriate temporal unit for analysis tends to be the basic action. Instead of concentrating on the history of the individual or the origins of the social practice which provides the context within which the act is performed, conduct tends to be studied as an isolated and one-off act' (139-40). And another essay in the same collection, Anthony Bradney's 'Faced by Faith' (89-105) offers some examples of legal rulings which have disregarded the account offered by religious believers of the motives for their own decisions, on the grounds that the court alone is competent to assess the coherence or even sincerity of their claims.
And when courts attempt to do this on the grounds of what is 'generally acceptable' behaviour in a society, they are open, Bradney claims (102-3) to the accusation of undermining the principle of liberal pluralism by denying someone the right to speak in their own voice. The distinguished ecclesiastical lawyer, Chancellor Mark Hill, has also underlined in a number of recent papers the degree of confusion that has bedevilled recent essays in adjudicating disputes with a religious element, stressing the need for better definition of the kind of protection for religious conscience that the law intends (see particularly his essay with Russell Sandberg, 'Is Nothing Sacred? Clashing Symbols in a Secular World', Public Law 3, 2007, pp.488-506).
I have argued recently in a discussion of the moral background to legislation about incitement to religious hatred that any crime involving religious offence has to be thought about in terms of its tendency to create or reinforce a position in which a religious person or group could be gravely disadvantaged in regard to access to speaking in public in their own right: offence needs to be connected to issues of power and status, so that a powerful individual or group making derogatory or defamatory statements about a disadvantaged minority might be thought to be increasing that disadvantage.
The point I am making here is similar. If the law of the land takes no account of what might be for certain agents a proper rationale for behaviour – for protest against certain unforeseen professional requirements, for instance, which would compromise religious discipline or belief – it fails in a significant way to communicate with someone involved in the legal process (or indeed to receive their communication), and so, on at least one kind of legal theory (expounded recently, for example, by R.A. Duff), fails in one of its purposes.
The implications are twofold. There is a plain procedural question – and neither Bradney nor Malik goes much beyond this – about how existing courts function and what weight is properly give to the issues we have been discussing. But there is a larger theoretical and practical issue about what it is to live under more than one jurisdiction., which takes us back to the question we began with – the role of sharia (or indeed Orthodox Jewish practice) in relation to the routine jurisdiction of the British courts. In general, when there is a robust affirmation that the law of the land should protect individuals on the grounds of their corporate religious identity and secure their freedom to fulfil religious duties, a number of queries are regularly raised.
I want to look at three such difficulties briefly. They relate both to the question of whether there should be a higher level of attention to religious identity and communal rights in the practice of the law, and to the larger issue I mentioned of something like a delegation of certain legal functions to the religious courts of a community; and this latter question, it should be remembered, is relevant not only to Islamic law but also to areas of Orthodox Jewish practice.
The first objection to a higher level of public legal regard being paid to communal identity is that it leaves legal process (including ordinary disciplinary process within organisations) at the mercy of what might be called vexatious appeals to religious scruple. A recent example might be the reported refusal of a Muslim woman employed by Marks and Spencer to handle a book of Bible stories. Or we might think of the rather more serious cluster of questions around forced marriages, where again it is crucial to distinguish between cultural and strictly religious dimensions.
While Bradney rightly cautions against the simple dismissal of alleged scruple by judicial authorities who have made no attempt to understand its workings in the construction of people's social identities, it should be clear also that any recognition of the need for such sensitivity must also have a recognised means of deciding the relative seriousness of conscience-related claims, a way of distinguishing purely cultural habits from seriously-rooted matters of faith and discipline, and distinguishing uninformed prejudice from religious prescription.
There needs to be access to recognised authority acting for a religious group: there is already, of course, an Islamic Shari'a Council, much in demand for rulings on marital questions in the UK; and if we were to see more latitude given in law to rights and scruples rooted in religious identity, we should need a much enhanced and quite sophisticated version of such a body, with increased resource and a high degree of community recognition, so that 'vexatious' claims could be summarily dealt with. The secular lawyer needs to know where the potential conflict is real, legally and religiously serious, and where it is grounded in either nuisance or ignorance. There can be no blank cheques given to unexamined scruples.
The second issue, a very serious one, is that recognition of 'supplementary jurisdiction' in some areas, especially family law, could have the effect of reinforcing in minority communities some of the most repressive or retrograde elements in them, with particularly serious consequences for the role and liberties of women.
The 'forced marriage' question is the one most often referred to here, and it is at the moment undoubtedly a very serious and scandalous one; but precisely because it has to do with custom and culture rather than directly binding enactments by religious authority, I shall refer to another issue. It is argued that the provision for the inheritance of widows under a strict application of sharia has the effect of disadvantaging them in what the majority community might regard as unacceptable ways.
A legal (in fact Qur'anic) provision which in its time served very clearly to secure a widow's position at a time when this was practically unknown in the culture becomes, if taken absolutely literally, a generator of relative insecurity in a new context (see, for example, Ann Elizabeth Mayer, Islam and Human Rights. Tradition and Politics, 1999, p.111).
The problem here is that recognising the authority of a communal religious court to decide finally and authoritatively about such a question would in effect not merely allow an additional layer of legal routes for resolving conflicts and ordering behaviour but would actually deprive members of the minority community of rights and liberties that they were entitled to enjoy as citizens; and while a legal system might properly admit structures or protocols that embody the diversity of moral reasoning in a plural society by allowing scope for a minority group to administer its affairs according to its own convictions, it can hardly admit or 'license' protocols that effectively take away the rights it acknowledges as generally valid.
To put the question like that is already to see where an answer might lie, though it is not an answer that will remove the possibility of some conflict. If any kind of plural jurisdiction is recognised, it would presumably have to be under the rubric that no 'supplementary' jurisdiction could have the power to deny access to the rights granted to other citizens or to punish its members for claiming those rights. This is in effect to mirror what a minority might themselves be requesting – that the situation should not arise where membership of one group restricted the freedom to live also as a member of an overlapping group, that (in this case) citizenship in a secular society should not necessitate the abandoning of religious discipline, any more than religious discipline should deprive one of access to liberties secured by the law of the land, to the common benefits of secular citizenship – or, better, to recognise that citizenship itself is a complex phenomenon not bound up with any one level of communal belonging but involving them all.
But this does not guarantee an absence of conflict. In the particular case we have mentioned, the inheritance rights of widows, it is already true that some Islamic societies have themselves proved flexible (Malaysia is a case in point). But let us take a more neuralgic matter still: what about the historic Islamic prohibition against apostasy, and the draconian penalties entailed? In a society where freedom of religion is secured by law, it is obviously impossible for any group to claim that conversion to another faith is simply disallowed or to claim the right to inflict punishment on a convert. We touch here on one of the most sensitive areas not only in thinking about legal practice but also in interfaith relations.
A significant number of contemporary Islamic jurists and scholars would say that the Qur'anic pronouncements on apostasy which have been regarded as the ground for extreme penalties reflect a situation in which abandoning Islam was equivalent to adopting an active stance of violent hostility to the community, so that extreme penalties could be compared to provisions in other jurisdictions for punishing spies or traitors in wartime; but that this cannot be regarded as bearing on the conditions now existing in the world.
Of course such a reading is wholly unacceptable to 'primitivists' in Islam, for whom this would be an example of a rationalising strategy, a style of interpretation (ijtihad) uncontrolled by proper traditional norms. But, to use again the terminology suggested a moment ago, as soon as it is granted that – even in a dominantly Islamic society – citizens have more than one set of defining relationships under the law of the state, it becomes hard to justify enactments that take it for granted that the only mode of contact between these sets of relationships is open enmity; in which case, the appropriateness of extreme penalties for conversion is not obvious even within a fairly strict Muslim frame of reference.
Conversely, where the dominant legal culture is non-Islamic, but there is a level of serious recognition of the corporate reality and rights of the umma, there can be no assumption that outside the umma the goal of any other jurisdiction is its destruction. Once again, there has to be a recognition that difference of conviction is not automatically a lethal threat.
As I have said, this is a delicate and complex matter involving what is mostly a fairly muted but nonetheless real debate among Muslim scholars in various contexts. I mention it partly because of its gravity as an issue in interfaith relations and in discussions of human rights and the treatment of minorities, partly to illustrate how the recognition of what I have been calling membership in different but overlapping sets of social relationship (what others have called 'multiple affiliations') can provide a framework for thinking about these neuralgic questions of the status of women and converts. Recognising a supplementary jurisdiction cannot mean recognising a liberty to exert a sort of local monopoly in some areas.
The Jewish legal theorist Ayelet Shachar, in a highly original and significant monograph on Multicultural Jurisdictions: Cultural Differences and Women's Rights (2001), explores the risks of any model that ends up 'franchising' a non-state jurisdiction so as to reinforce its most problematic features and further disadvantage its weakest members: 'we must be alert', she writes, 'to the potentially injurious effects of well-meaning external protections upon different categories of group members here – effects which may unwittingly exacerbate preexisting internal power hierarchies' (113).
She argues that if we are serious in trying to move away from a model that treats one jurisdiction as having a monopoly of socially defining roles and relations, we do not solve any problems by a purely uncritical endorsement of a communal legal structure which can only be avoided by deciding to leave the community altogether. We need, according to Shachar, to 'work to overcome the ultimatum of "either your culture or your rights"' (114).
So the second objection to an increased legal recognition of communal religious identities can be met if we are prepared to think about the basic ground rules that might organise the relationship between jurisdictions, making sure that we do not collude with unexamined systems that have oppressive effect or allow shared public liberties to be decisively taken away by a supplementary jurisdiction. Once again, there are no blank cheques.
I shall return to some of the details of Shachar's positive proposal; but I want to move on to the third objection, which grows precisely out of the complexities of clarifying the relations between jurisdictions. Is it not both theoretically and practically mistaken to qualify our commitment to legal monopoly? So much of our thinking in the modern world, dominated by European assumptions about universal rights, rests, surely, on the basis that the law is the law; that everyone stands before the public tribunal on exactly equal terms, so that recognition of corporate identities or, more seriously, of supplementary jurisdictions is simply incoherent if we want to preserve the great political and social advances of Western legality.
There is a bit of a risk here in the way we sometimes talk about the universal vision of post-Enlightenment politics. The great protest of the Enlightenment was against authority that appealed only to tradition and refused to justify itself by other criteria – by open reasoned argument or by standards of successful provision of goods and liberties for the greatest number. Its claim to override traditional forms of governance and custom by looking towards a universal tribunal was entirely intelligible against the background of despotism and uncritical inherited privilege which prevailed in so much of early modern Europe.
The most positive aspect of this moment in our cultural history was its focus on equal levels of accountability for all and equal levels of access for all to legal process. In this respect, it was in fact largely the foregrounding and confirming of what was already encoded in longstanding legal tradition, Roman and mediaeval, which had consistently affirmed the universality and primacy of law (even over the person of the monarch). But this set of considerations alone is not adequate to deal with the realities of complex societies: it is not enough to say that citizenship as an abstract form of equal access and equal accountability is either the basis or the entirety of social identity and personal motivation.
Where this has been enforced, it has proved a weak vehicle for the life of a society and has often brought violent injustice in its wake (think of the various attempts to reduce citizenship to rational equality in the France of the 1790's or the China of the 1970's). Societies that are in fact ethnically, culturally and religiously diverse are societies in which identity is formed, as we have noted by different modes and contexts of belonging, 'multiple affiliation'. The danger is in acting as if the authority that managed the abstract level of equal citizenship represented a sovereign order which then allowed other levels to exist. But if the reality of society is plural – as many political theorists have pointed out – this is a damagingly inadequate account of common life, in which certain kinds of affiliation are marginalised or privatised to the extent that what is produced is a ghettoised pattern of social life, in which particular sorts of interest and of reasoning are tolerated as private matters but never granted legitimacy in public as part of a continuing debate about shared goods and priorities.
But this means that we have to think a little harder about the role and rule of law in a plural society of overlapping identities. Perhaps it helps to see the universalist vision of law as guaranteeing equal accountability and access primarily in a negative rather than a positive sense – that is, to see it as a mechanism whereby any human participant in a society is protected against the loss of certain elementary liberties of self-determination and guaranteed the freedom to demand reasons for any actions on the part of others for actions and policies that infringe self-determination. This is a slightly more gentle or tactful way of expressing what some legal theorists will describe as the 'monopoly of legitimate violence' by the law of a state, the absolute restriction of powers of forcible restraint to those who administer statutory law.
This is not to reduce society itself primarily to an uneasy alliance of self-determining individuals arguing about the degree to which their freedom is limited by one another and needing forcible restraint in a war of all against all – though that is increasingly the model which a narrowly rights-based culture fosters, producing a manically litigious atmosphere and a conviction of the inadequacy of customary ethical restraints and traditions – of what was once called 'civility'. The picture will not be unfamiliar, and there is a modern legal culture which loves to have it so.
But the point of defining legal universalism as a negative thing is that it allows us to assume, as I think we should, that the important springs of moral vision in a society will be in those areas which a systematic abstract universalism regards as 'private' – in religion above all, but also in custom and habit. The role of 'secular' law is not the dissolution of these things in the name of universalism but the monitoring of such affiliations to prevent the creation of mutually isolated communities in which human liberties are seen in incompatible ways and individual persons are subjected to restraints or injustices for which there is no public redress.
The rule of law is thus not the enshrining of priority for the universal/abstract dimension of social existence but the establishing of a space accessible to everyone in which it is possible to affirm and defend a commitment to human dignity as such, independent of membership in any specific human community or tradition, so that when specific communities or traditions are in danger of claiming finality for their own boundaries of practice and understanding, they are reminded that they have to come to terms with the actuality of human diversity - and that the only way of doing this is to acknowledge the category of 'human dignity as such' – a non-negotiable assumption that each agent (with his or her historical and social affiliations) could be expected to have a voice in the shaping of some common project for the well-being and order of a human group. It is not to claim that specific community understandings are 'superseded' by this universal principle, rather to claim that they all need to be undergirded by it.
The rule of law is – and this may sound rather counterintuitive – a way of honouring what in the human constitution is not captured by any one form of corporate belonging or any particular history, even though the human constitution never exists without those other determinations. Our need, as Raymond Plant has well expressed it, is for the construction of 'a moral framework which could expand outside the boundaries of particular narratives while, at the same time, respecting the narratives as the cultural contexts in which the language [of common dignity and mutually intelligible commitments to work for certain common moral priorities] is learned and taught' (Politics, Theology and History, 2001, pp.357-8).
I'd add in passing that this is arguably a place where more reflection is needed about the theology of law; if my analysis is right, the sort of foundation I have sketched for a universal principle of legal right requires both a certain valuation of the human as such and a conviction that the human subject is always endowed with some degree of freedom over against any and every actual system of human social life; both of these things are historically rooted in Christian theology, even when they have acquired a life of their own in isolation from that theology. It never does any harm to be reminded that without certain themes consistently and strongly emphasised by the 'Abrahamic' faiths, themes to do with the unconditional possibility for every human subject to live in conscious relation with God and in free and constructive collaboration with others, there is no guarantee that a 'universalist' account of human dignity would ever have seemed plausible or even emerged with clarity.
Slave societies and assumptions about innate racial superiority are as widespread a feature as any in human history (and they have persistently infected even Abrahamic communities, which is perhaps why the Enlightenment was a necessary wake-up call to religion...).
But to return to our main theme: I have been arguing that a defence of an unqualified secular legal monopoly in terms of the need for a universalist doctrine of human right or dignity is to misunderstand the circumstances in which that doctrine emerged, and that the essential liberating (and religiously informed) vision it represents is not imperilled by a loosening of the monopolistic framework. At the moment, as I mentioned at the beginning of this lecture, one of the most frequently noted problems in the law in this area is the reluctance of a dominant rights-based philosophy to acknowledge the liberty of conscientious opting-out from collaboration in procedures or practices that are in tension with the demands of particular religious groups: the assumption, in rather misleading shorthand, that if a right or liberty is granted there is a corresponding duty upon every individual to 'activate' this whenever called upon.
Earlier on, I proposed that the criterion for recognising and collaborating with communal religious discipline should be connected with whether a communal jurisdiction actively interfered with liberties guaranteed by the wider society in such a way as definitively to block access to the exercise of those liberties; clearly the refusal of a religious believer to act upon the legal recognition of a right is not, given the plural character of society, a denial to anyone inside or outside the community of access to that right. The point has been granted in respect of medical professionals who may be asked to perform or co-operate in performing abortions – a perfectly reasonable example of the law doing what I earlier defined as its job, securing space for those aspects of human motivation and behaviour that cannot be finally determined by any corporate or social system. It is difficult to see quite why the principle cannot be extended in other areas. But it is undeniable that there is pressure from some quarters to insist that conscientious disagreement should always be overruled by a monopolistic understanding of jurisdiction.
I labour the point because what at first seems to be a somewhat narrow point about how Islamic law and Islamic identity should or might be regarded in our legal system in fact opens up a very wide range of current issues, and requires some general thinking about the character of law.
It would be a pity if the immense advances in the recognition of human rights led, because of a misconception about legal universality, to a situation where a person was defined primarily as the possessor of a set of abstract liberties and the law's function was accordingly seen as nothing but the securing of those liberties irrespective of the custom and conscience of those groups which concretely compose a plural modern society.
Certainly, no-one is likely to suppose that a scheme allowing for supplementary jurisdiction will be simple, and the history of experiments in this direction amply illustrates the problems. But if one approaches it along the lines sketched by Shachar in the monograph quoted earlier, it might be possible to think in terms of what she calls 'transformative accommodation': a scheme in which individuals retain the liberty to choose the jurisdiction under which they will seek to resolve certain carefully specified matters, so that 'power-holders are forced to compete for the loyalty of their shared constituents' (122).
This may include aspects of marital law, the regulation of financial transactions and authorised structures of mediation and conflict resolution – the main areas that have been in question where supplementary jurisdictions have been tried, with native American communities in Canada as well as with religious groups like Islamic minority communities in certain contexts. In such schemes, both jurisdictional stakeholders may need to examine the way they operate; a communal/religious nomos, to borrow Shachar's vocabulary, has to think through the risks of alienating its people by inflexible or over-restrictive applications of traditional law, and a universalist Enlightenment system has to weigh the possible consequences of ghettoising and effectively disenfranchising a minority, at real cost to overall social cohesion and creativity. Hence 'transformative accommodation': both jurisdictional parties may be changed by their encounter over time, and we avoid the sterility of mutually exclusive monopolies.
It is uncomfortably true that this introduces into our thinking about law what some would see as a 'market' element, a competition for loyalty as Shachar admits. But if what we want socially is a pattern of relations in which a plurality of divers and overlapping affiliations work for a common good, and in which groups of serious and profound conviction are not systematically faced with the stark alternatives of cultural loyalty or state loyalty, it seems unavoidable.
In other settings, I have spoken about the idea of 'interactive pluralism' as a political desideratum; this seems to be one manifestation of such an ideal, comparable to the arrangements that allow for shared responsibility in education: the best argument for faith schools from the point of view of any aspiration towards social harmony and understanding is that they bring communal loyalties into direct relation with the wider society and inevitably lead to mutual questioning and sometimes mutual influence towards change, without compromising the distinctiveness of the essential elements of those communal loyalties.
In conclusion, it seems that if we are to think intelligently about the relations between Islam and British law, we need a fair amount of 'deconstruction' of crude oppositions and mythologies, whether of the nature of sharia or the nature of the Enlightenment.
But as I have hinted, I do not believe this can be done without some thinking also about the very nature of law. It is always easy to take refuge in some form of positivism; and what I have called legal universalism, when divorced from a serious theoretical (and, I would argue, religious) underpinning, can turn into a positivism as sterile as any other variety. If the paradoxical idea which I have sketched is true – that universal law and universal right are a way of recognising what is least fathomable and controllable in the human subject – theology still waits for us around the corner of these debates, however hard our culture may try to keep it out. And, as you can imagine, I am not going to complain about that.
***
Rowan Williams, the leader of the Anglican Church in Britain has sparked a "row" as the English say, with his comments on the prospects for some sort of accommodation with certain aspects of Islamic Sharia law in Britain.
The Zionists are fiercely opposed and their gentile mouthpieces have sallied on to the field of media combat to do battle with Archbishop Williams while waving a copy of the Magna Carta. They are full of talk of "British values" and "our immemorial heritage."
Can the English be so sunk in Talmudic indoctrination that they imagine that their nation, which seems to have an Orwellian surveillance camera on every corner, which bans the people from having guns, which taxes them at extortionate rates and builds its economy upon usury, while permitting homosexual acts between adults and teenagers and abortion on demand, is in some sense a "Christian" nation? How many pints of bitters does one have to imbibe to be put in the frame of mind to believe that England is anything other than Shylock's Talmudic colony?
England doesn't have Sharia law or Bible law, it has the law of the rabbis and the Zionists. And yet there is no protest of this invasive usurpation from the Bulldog Breed about the fact that, long before the Muslims arrived in Britain, the Talmudists had arrived and shifted the courts, the government and laws away from the Bible and Magna Carta, toward the Mishnah and Gemara, with hardly a pipsqueak from those muscular right wingers now thumping their chests in outrage at Rowan William's remarks about Islam, printed here below in their entirety.
Archbishop's Lecture - Civil and Religious Law in England: a Religious Perspective
February 7, 2008
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams gave the foundation lecture at the Royal Courts of Justice in England:
The title of this series of lectures signals the existence of what is very widely felt to be a growing challenge in our society – that is, the presence of communities which, while no less 'law-abiding' than the rest of the population, relate to something other than the British legal system alone.
But, as I hope to suggest, the issues that arise around what level of public or legal recognition, if any, might be allowed to the legal provisions of a religious group, are not peculiar to Islam: we might recall that, while the law of the Church of England is the law of the land, its daily operation is in the hands of authorities to whom considerable independence is granted. And beyond the specific issues that arise in relation to the practicalities of recognition or delegation, there are large questions in the background about what we understand by and expect from the law, questions that are more sharply focused than ever in a largely secular social environment. I shall therefore be concentrating on certain issues around Islamic law to begin with, in order to open up some of these wider matters.
Among the manifold anxieties that haunt the discussion of the place of Muslims in British society, one of the strongest, reinforced from time to time by the sensational reporting of opinion polls, is that Muslim communities in this country seek the freedom to live under sharia law. And what most people think they know of sharia is that it is repressive towards women and wedded to archaic and brutal physical punishments; just a few days ago, it was reported that a 'forced marriage' involving a young woman with learning difficulties had been 'sanctioned under sharia law' – the kind of story that, in its assumption that we all 'really' know what is involved in the practice of sharia, powerfully reinforces the image of – at best – a pre-modern system in which human rights have no role.
The problem is freely admitted by Muslim scholars. 'In the West', writes Tariq Ramadan in his groundbreaking Western Muslims and the Future of Islam, 'the idea of Sharia calls up all the darkest images of Islam...It has reached the extent that many Muslim intellectuals do not dare even to refer to the concept for fear of frightening people or arousing suspicion of all their work by the mere mention of the word' (p.31). Even when some of the more dramatic fears are set aside, there remains a great deal of uncertainty about what degree of accommodation the law of the land can and should give to minority communities with their own strongly entrenched legal and moral codes.
As such, this is not only an issue about Islam but about other faith groups, including Orthodox Judaism; and indeed it spills over into some of the questions which have surfaced sharply in the last twelve months about the right of religious believers in general to opt out of certain legal provisions – as in the problems around Roman Catholic adoption agencies which emerged in relation to the Sexual Orientation Regulations last spring.
This lecture will not attempt a detailed discussion of the nature of sharia, which would be far beyond my competence; my aim is only, as I have said, to tease out some of the broader issues around the rights of religious groups within a secular state, with a few thought about what might be entailed in crafting a just and constructive relationship between Islamic law and the statutory law of the United Kingdom.
But it is important to begin by dispelling one or two myths about sharia; so far from being a monolithic system of detailed enactments, sharia designates primarily – to quote Ramadan again – 'the expression of the universal principles of Islam [and] the framework and the thinking that makes for their actualization in human history' (32). Universal principles: as any Muslim commentator will insist, what is in view is the eternal and absolute will of God for the universe and for its human inhabitants in particular; but also something that has to be 'actualized', not a ready-made system. If shar' designates the essence of the revealed Law, sharia is the practice of actualizing and applying it; while certain elements of the sharia are specified fairly exactly in the Qur'an and Sunna and in the hadith recognised as authoritative in this respect, there is no single code that can be identified as 'the' sharia.
And when certain states impose what they refer to as sharia or when certain Muslim activists demand its recognition alongside secular jurisdictions, they are usually referring not to a universal and fixed code established once for all but to some particular concretisation of it at the hands of a tradition of jurists. In the hands of contemporary legal traditionalists, this means simply that the application of sharia must be governed by the judgements of representatives of the classical schools of legal interpretation. But there are a good many voices arguing for an extension of the liberty of ijtihad – basically reasoning from first principles rather than simply the collation of traditional judgements (see for example Louis Gardet, 'Un prealable aux questions soulevees par les droits de l'homme: l'actualisation de la Loi religieuse musulmane aujourd'hui', Islamochristiana 9, 1983, 1-12, and Abdullah Saeed, 'Trends in Contemporary Islam: a Preliminary Attempt at a Classification', The Muslim World, 97:3, 2007, 395-404, esp. 401-2).
Thus, in contrast to what is sometimes assumed, we do not simply have a standoff between two rival legal systems when we discuss Islamic and British law. On the one hand, sharia depends for its legitimacy not on any human decision, not on votes or preferences, but on the conviction that it represents the mind of God; on the other, it is to some extent unfinished business so far as codified and precise provisions are concerned.
To recognise sharia is to recognise a method of jurisprudence governed by revealed texts rather than a single system. In a discussion based on a paper from Mona Siddiqui at a conference last year at Al Akhawayn University in Morocco, the point was made by one or two Muslim scholars that an excessively narrow understanding sharia as simply codified rules can have the effect of actually undermining the universal claims of the Qur'an.
But while such universal claims are not open for renegotiation, they also assume the voluntary consent or submission of the believer, the free decision to be and to continue a member of the ummaSharia is not, in that sense, intrinsically to do with any demand for Muslim dominance over non-Muslims.
Both historically and in the contemporary context, Muslim states have acknowledged that membership of the umma is not coterminous with membership in a particular political society: in modern times, the clearest articulation of this was in the foundation of the Pakistani state under Jinnah; but other examples (Morocco, Jordan) could be cited of societies where there is a concept of citizenship that is not identical with belonging to the umma.
Such societies, while not compromising or weakening the possibility of unqualified belief in the authority and universality of sharia, or even the privileged status of Islam in a nation, recognise that there can be no guarantee that the state is religiously homogeneous and that the relationships in which the individual stands and which define him or her are not exclusively with other Muslims. There has therefore to be some concept of common good that is not prescribed solely in terms of revealed Law, however provisional or imperfect such a situation is thought to be. And this implies in turn that the Muslim, even in a predominantly Muslim state, has something of a dual identity, as citizen and as believer within the community of the faithful.
It is true that this account would be hotly contested by some committed Islamic primitivists, by followers of Sayyid Qutb and similar polemicists; but it is fair to say that the great body of serious jurists in the Islamic world would recognise this degree of political plurality as consistent with Muslim integrity. In this sense, while (as I have said) we are not talking about two rival systems on the same level, there is some community of understanding between Islamic social thinking and the categories we might turn to in the non-Muslim world for the understanding of law in the most general context.
There is a recognition that our social identities are not constituted by one exclusive set of relations or mode of belonging – even if one of those sets is regarded as relating to the most fundamental and non-negotiable level of reality, as established by a 'covenant' between the divine and the human (as in Jewish and Christian thinking; once again, we are not talking about an exclusively Muslim problem). The danger arises not only when there is an assumption on the religious side that membership of the community (belonging to the umma or the Church or whatever) is the only significant category, so that participation in other kinds of socio-political arrangement is a kind of betrayal.
It also occurs when secular government assumes a monopoly in terms of defining public and political identity. There is a position – not at all unfamiliar in contemporary discussion – which says that to be a citizen is essentially and simply to be under the rule of the uniform law of a sovereign state, in such a way that any other relations, commitments or protocols of behaviour belong exclusively to the realm of the private and of individual choice.
As I have maintained in several other contexts, this is a very unsatisfactory account of political reality in modern societies; but it is also a problematic basis for thinking of the legal category of citizenship and the nature of human interdependence. Maleiha Malik, following Alasdair MacIntyre, argues in an essay on 'Faith and the State of Jurisprudence' (Faith in Law: Essays in Legal Theory, ed. Peter Oliver, Sionaidh Douglas Scott and Victor Tadros, 2000, pp.129-49) that there is a risk of assuming that 'mainstreram' jurisprudence should routinely and unquestioningly bypass the variety of ways in which actions are as a matter of fact understood by agents in the light of the diverse sorts of communal belonging they are involved in.
If that is the assumption, 'the appropriate temporal unit for analysis tends to be the basic action. Instead of concentrating on the history of the individual or the origins of the social practice which provides the context within which the act is performed, conduct tends to be studied as an isolated and one-off act' (139-40). And another essay in the same collection, Anthony Bradney's 'Faced by Faith' (89-105) offers some examples of legal rulings which have disregarded the account offered by religious believers of the motives for their own decisions, on the grounds that the court alone is competent to assess the coherence or even sincerity of their claims.
And when courts attempt to do this on the grounds of what is 'generally acceptable' behaviour in a society, they are open, Bradney claims (102-3) to the accusation of undermining the principle of liberal pluralism by denying someone the right to speak in their own voice. The distinguished ecclesiastical lawyer, Chancellor Mark Hill, has also underlined in a number of recent papers the degree of confusion that has bedevilled recent essays in adjudicating disputes with a religious element, stressing the need for better definition of the kind of protection for religious conscience that the law intends (see particularly his essay with Russell Sandberg, 'Is Nothing Sacred? Clashing Symbols in a Secular World', Public Law 3, 2007, pp.488-506).
I have argued recently in a discussion of the moral background to legislation about incitement to religious hatred that any crime involving religious offence has to be thought about in terms of its tendency to create or reinforce a position in which a religious person or group could be gravely disadvantaged in regard to access to speaking in public in their own right: offence needs to be connected to issues of power and status, so that a powerful individual or group making derogatory or defamatory statements about a disadvantaged minority might be thought to be increasing that disadvantage.
The point I am making here is similar. If the law of the land takes no account of what might be for certain agents a proper rationale for behaviour – for protest against certain unforeseen professional requirements, for instance, which would compromise religious discipline or belief – it fails in a significant way to communicate with someone involved in the legal process (or indeed to receive their communication), and so, on at least one kind of legal theory (expounded recently, for example, by R.A. Duff), fails in one of its purposes.
The implications are twofold. There is a plain procedural question – and neither Bradney nor Malik goes much beyond this – about how existing courts function and what weight is properly give to the issues we have been discussing. But there is a larger theoretical and practical issue about what it is to live under more than one jurisdiction., which takes us back to the question we began with – the role of sharia (or indeed Orthodox Jewish practice) in relation to the routine jurisdiction of the British courts. In general, when there is a robust affirmation that the law of the land should protect individuals on the grounds of their corporate religious identity and secure their freedom to fulfil religious duties, a number of queries are regularly raised.
I want to look at three such difficulties briefly. They relate both to the question of whether there should be a higher level of attention to religious identity and communal rights in the practice of the law, and to the larger issue I mentioned of something like a delegation of certain legal functions to the religious courts of a community; and this latter question, it should be remembered, is relevant not only to Islamic law but also to areas of Orthodox Jewish practice.
The first objection to a higher level of public legal regard being paid to communal identity is that it leaves legal process (including ordinary disciplinary process within organisations) at the mercy of what might be called vexatious appeals to religious scruple. A recent example might be the reported refusal of a Muslim woman employed by Marks and Spencer to handle a book of Bible stories. Or we might think of the rather more serious cluster of questions around forced marriages, where again it is crucial to distinguish between cultural and strictly religious dimensions.
While Bradney rightly cautions against the simple dismissal of alleged scruple by judicial authorities who have made no attempt to understand its workings in the construction of people's social identities, it should be clear also that any recognition of the need for such sensitivity must also have a recognised means of deciding the relative seriousness of conscience-related claims, a way of distinguishing purely cultural habits from seriously-rooted matters of faith and discipline, and distinguishing uninformed prejudice from religious prescription.
There needs to be access to recognised authority acting for a religious group: there is already, of course, an Islamic Shari'a Council, much in demand for rulings on marital questions in the UK; and if we were to see more latitude given in law to rights and scruples rooted in religious identity, we should need a much enhanced and quite sophisticated version of such a body, with increased resource and a high degree of community recognition, so that 'vexatious' claims could be summarily dealt with. The secular lawyer needs to know where the potential conflict is real, legally and religiously serious, and where it is grounded in either nuisance or ignorance. There can be no blank cheques given to unexamined scruples.
The second issue, a very serious one, is that recognition of 'supplementary jurisdiction' in some areas, especially family law, could have the effect of reinforcing in minority communities some of the most repressive or retrograde elements in them, with particularly serious consequences for the role and liberties of women.
The 'forced marriage' question is the one most often referred to here, and it is at the moment undoubtedly a very serious and scandalous one; but precisely because it has to do with custom and culture rather than directly binding enactments by religious authority, I shall refer to another issue. It is argued that the provision for the inheritance of widows under a strict application of sharia has the effect of disadvantaging them in what the majority community might regard as unacceptable ways.
A legal (in fact Qur'anic) provision which in its time served very clearly to secure a widow's position at a time when this was practically unknown in the culture becomes, if taken absolutely literally, a generator of relative insecurity in a new context (see, for example, Ann Elizabeth Mayer, Islam and Human Rights. Tradition and Politics, 1999, p.111).
The problem here is that recognising the authority of a communal religious court to decide finally and authoritatively about such a question would in effect not merely allow an additional layer of legal routes for resolving conflicts and ordering behaviour but would actually deprive members of the minority community of rights and liberties that they were entitled to enjoy as citizens; and while a legal system might properly admit structures or protocols that embody the diversity of moral reasoning in a plural society by allowing scope for a minority group to administer its affairs according to its own convictions, it can hardly admit or 'license' protocols that effectively take away the rights it acknowledges as generally valid.
To put the question like that is already to see where an answer might lie, though it is not an answer that will remove the possibility of some conflict. If any kind of plural jurisdiction is recognised, it would presumably have to be under the rubric that no 'supplementary' jurisdiction could have the power to deny access to the rights granted to other citizens or to punish its members for claiming those rights. This is in effect to mirror what a minority might themselves be requesting – that the situation should not arise where membership of one group restricted the freedom to live also as a member of an overlapping group, that (in this case) citizenship in a secular society should not necessitate the abandoning of religious discipline, any more than religious discipline should deprive one of access to liberties secured by the law of the land, to the common benefits of secular citizenship – or, better, to recognise that citizenship itself is a complex phenomenon not bound up with any one level of communal belonging but involving them all.
But this does not guarantee an absence of conflict. In the particular case we have mentioned, the inheritance rights of widows, it is already true that some Islamic societies have themselves proved flexible (Malaysia is a case in point). But let us take a more neuralgic matter still: what about the historic Islamic prohibition against apostasy, and the draconian penalties entailed? In a society where freedom of religion is secured by law, it is obviously impossible for any group to claim that conversion to another faith is simply disallowed or to claim the right to inflict punishment on a convert. We touch here on one of the most sensitive areas not only in thinking about legal practice but also in interfaith relations.
A significant number of contemporary Islamic jurists and scholars would say that the Qur'anic pronouncements on apostasy which have been regarded as the ground for extreme penalties reflect a situation in which abandoning Islam was equivalent to adopting an active stance of violent hostility to the community, so that extreme penalties could be compared to provisions in other jurisdictions for punishing spies or traitors in wartime; but that this cannot be regarded as bearing on the conditions now existing in the world.
Of course such a reading is wholly unacceptable to 'primitivists' in Islam, for whom this would be an example of a rationalising strategy, a style of interpretation (ijtihad) uncontrolled by proper traditional norms. But, to use again the terminology suggested a moment ago, as soon as it is granted that – even in a dominantly Islamic society – citizens have more than one set of defining relationships under the law of the state, it becomes hard to justify enactments that take it for granted that the only mode of contact between these sets of relationships is open enmity; in which case, the appropriateness of extreme penalties for conversion is not obvious even within a fairly strict Muslim frame of reference.
Conversely, where the dominant legal culture is non-Islamic, but there is a level of serious recognition of the corporate reality and rights of the umma, there can be no assumption that outside the umma the goal of any other jurisdiction is its destruction. Once again, there has to be a recognition that difference of conviction is not automatically a lethal threat.
As I have said, this is a delicate and complex matter involving what is mostly a fairly muted but nonetheless real debate among Muslim scholars in various contexts. I mention it partly because of its gravity as an issue in interfaith relations and in discussions of human rights and the treatment of minorities, partly to illustrate how the recognition of what I have been calling membership in different but overlapping sets of social relationship (what others have called 'multiple affiliations') can provide a framework for thinking about these neuralgic questions of the status of women and converts. Recognising a supplementary jurisdiction cannot mean recognising a liberty to exert a sort of local monopoly in some areas.
The Jewish legal theorist Ayelet Shachar, in a highly original and significant monograph on Multicultural Jurisdictions: Cultural Differences and Women's Rights (2001), explores the risks of any model that ends up 'franchising' a non-state jurisdiction so as to reinforce its most problematic features and further disadvantage its weakest members: 'we must be alert', she writes, 'to the potentially injurious effects of well-meaning external protections upon different categories of group members here – effects which may unwittingly exacerbate preexisting internal power hierarchies' (113).
She argues that if we are serious in trying to move away from a model that treats one jurisdiction as having a monopoly of socially defining roles and relations, we do not solve any problems by a purely uncritical endorsement of a communal legal structure which can only be avoided by deciding to leave the community altogether. We need, according to Shachar, to 'work to overcome the ultimatum of "either your culture or your rights"' (114).
So the second objection to an increased legal recognition of communal religious identities can be met if we are prepared to think about the basic ground rules that might organise the relationship between jurisdictions, making sure that we do not collude with unexamined systems that have oppressive effect or allow shared public liberties to be decisively taken away by a supplementary jurisdiction. Once again, there are no blank cheques.
I shall return to some of the details of Shachar's positive proposal; but I want to move on to the third objection, which grows precisely out of the complexities of clarifying the relations between jurisdictions. Is it not both theoretically and practically mistaken to qualify our commitment to legal monopoly? So much of our thinking in the modern world, dominated by European assumptions about universal rights, rests, surely, on the basis that the law is the law; that everyone stands before the public tribunal on exactly equal terms, so that recognition of corporate identities or, more seriously, of supplementary jurisdictions is simply incoherent if we want to preserve the great political and social advances of Western legality.
There is a bit of a risk here in the way we sometimes talk about the universal vision of post-Enlightenment politics. The great protest of the Enlightenment was against authority that appealed only to tradition and refused to justify itself by other criteria – by open reasoned argument or by standards of successful provision of goods and liberties for the greatest number. Its claim to override traditional forms of governance and custom by looking towards a universal tribunal was entirely intelligible against the background of despotism and uncritical inherited privilege which prevailed in so much of early modern Europe.
The most positive aspect of this moment in our cultural history was its focus on equal levels of accountability for all and equal levels of access for all to legal process. In this respect, it was in fact largely the foregrounding and confirming of what was already encoded in longstanding legal tradition, Roman and mediaeval, which had consistently affirmed the universality and primacy of law (even over the person of the monarch). But this set of considerations alone is not adequate to deal with the realities of complex societies: it is not enough to say that citizenship as an abstract form of equal access and equal accountability is either the basis or the entirety of social identity and personal motivation.
Where this has been enforced, it has proved a weak vehicle for the life of a society and has often brought violent injustice in its wake (think of the various attempts to reduce citizenship to rational equality in the France of the 1790's or the China of the 1970's). Societies that are in fact ethnically, culturally and religiously diverse are societies in which identity is formed, as we have noted by different modes and contexts of belonging, 'multiple affiliation'. The danger is in acting as if the authority that managed the abstract level of equal citizenship represented a sovereign order which then allowed other levels to exist. But if the reality of society is plural – as many political theorists have pointed out – this is a damagingly inadequate account of common life, in which certain kinds of affiliation are marginalised or privatised to the extent that what is produced is a ghettoised pattern of social life, in which particular sorts of interest and of reasoning are tolerated as private matters but never granted legitimacy in public as part of a continuing debate about shared goods and priorities.
But this means that we have to think a little harder about the role and rule of law in a plural society of overlapping identities. Perhaps it helps to see the universalist vision of law as guaranteeing equal accountability and access primarily in a negative rather than a positive sense – that is, to see it as a mechanism whereby any human participant in a society is protected against the loss of certain elementary liberties of self-determination and guaranteed the freedom to demand reasons for any actions on the part of others for actions and policies that infringe self-determination. This is a slightly more gentle or tactful way of expressing what some legal theorists will describe as the 'monopoly of legitimate violence' by the law of a state, the absolute restriction of powers of forcible restraint to those who administer statutory law.
This is not to reduce society itself primarily to an uneasy alliance of self-determining individuals arguing about the degree to which their freedom is limited by one another and needing forcible restraint in a war of all against all – though that is increasingly the model which a narrowly rights-based culture fosters, producing a manically litigious atmosphere and a conviction of the inadequacy of customary ethical restraints and traditions – of what was once called 'civility'. The picture will not be unfamiliar, and there is a modern legal culture which loves to have it so.
But the point of defining legal universalism as a negative thing is that it allows us to assume, as I think we should, that the important springs of moral vision in a society will be in those areas which a systematic abstract universalism regards as 'private' – in religion above all, but also in custom and habit. The role of 'secular' law is not the dissolution of these things in the name of universalism but the monitoring of such affiliations to prevent the creation of mutually isolated communities in which human liberties are seen in incompatible ways and individual persons are subjected to restraints or injustices for which there is no public redress.
The rule of law is thus not the enshrining of priority for the universal/abstract dimension of social existence but the establishing of a space accessible to everyone in which it is possible to affirm and defend a commitment to human dignity as such, independent of membership in any specific human community or tradition, so that when specific communities or traditions are in danger of claiming finality for their own boundaries of practice and understanding, they are reminded that they have to come to terms with the actuality of human diversity - and that the only way of doing this is to acknowledge the category of 'human dignity as such' – a non-negotiable assumption that each agent (with his or her historical and social affiliations) could be expected to have a voice in the shaping of some common project for the well-being and order of a human group. It is not to claim that specific community understandings are 'superseded' by this universal principle, rather to claim that they all need to be undergirded by it.
The rule of law is – and this may sound rather counterintuitive – a way of honouring what in the human constitution is not captured by any one form of corporate belonging or any particular history, even though the human constitution never exists without those other determinations. Our need, as Raymond Plant has well expressed it, is for the construction of 'a moral framework which could expand outside the boundaries of particular narratives while, at the same time, respecting the narratives as the cultural contexts in which the language [of common dignity and mutually intelligible commitments to work for certain common moral priorities] is learned and taught' (Politics, Theology and History, 2001, pp.357-8).
I'd add in passing that this is arguably a place where more reflection is needed about the theology of law; if my analysis is right, the sort of foundation I have sketched for a universal principle of legal right requires both a certain valuation of the human as such and a conviction that the human subject is always endowed with some degree of freedom over against any and every actual system of human social life; both of these things are historically rooted in Christian theology, even when they have acquired a life of their own in isolation from that theology. It never does any harm to be reminded that without certain themes consistently and strongly emphasised by the 'Abrahamic' faiths, themes to do with the unconditional possibility for every human subject to live in conscious relation with God and in free and constructive collaboration with others, there is no guarantee that a 'universalist' account of human dignity would ever have seemed plausible or even emerged with clarity.
Slave societies and assumptions about innate racial superiority are as widespread a feature as any in human history (and they have persistently infected even Abrahamic communities, which is perhaps why the Enlightenment was a necessary wake-up call to religion...).
But to return to our main theme: I have been arguing that a defence of an unqualified secular legal monopoly in terms of the need for a universalist doctrine of human right or dignity is to misunderstand the circumstances in which that doctrine emerged, and that the essential liberating (and religiously informed) vision it represents is not imperilled by a loosening of the monopolistic framework. At the moment, as I mentioned at the beginning of this lecture, one of the most frequently noted problems in the law in this area is the reluctance of a dominant rights-based philosophy to acknowledge the liberty of conscientious opting-out from collaboration in procedures or practices that are in tension with the demands of particular religious groups: the assumption, in rather misleading shorthand, that if a right or liberty is granted there is a corresponding duty upon every individual to 'activate' this whenever called upon.
Earlier on, I proposed that the criterion for recognising and collaborating with communal religious discipline should be connected with whether a communal jurisdiction actively interfered with liberties guaranteed by the wider society in such a way as definitively to block access to the exercise of those liberties; clearly the refusal of a religious believer to act upon the legal recognition of a right is not, given the plural character of society, a denial to anyone inside or outside the community of access to that right. The point has been granted in respect of medical professionals who may be asked to perform or co-operate in performing abortions – a perfectly reasonable example of the law doing what I earlier defined as its job, securing space for those aspects of human motivation and behaviour that cannot be finally determined by any corporate or social system. It is difficult to see quite why the principle cannot be extended in other areas. But it is undeniable that there is pressure from some quarters to insist that conscientious disagreement should always be overruled by a monopolistic understanding of jurisdiction.
I labour the point because what at first seems to be a somewhat narrow point about how Islamic law and Islamic identity should or might be regarded in our legal system in fact opens up a very wide range of current issues, and requires some general thinking about the character of law.
It would be a pity if the immense advances in the recognition of human rights led, because of a misconception about legal universality, to a situation where a person was defined primarily as the possessor of a set of abstract liberties and the law's function was accordingly seen as nothing but the securing of those liberties irrespective of the custom and conscience of those groups which concretely compose a plural modern society.
Certainly, no-one is likely to suppose that a scheme allowing for supplementary jurisdiction will be simple, and the history of experiments in this direction amply illustrates the problems. But if one approaches it along the lines sketched by Shachar in the monograph quoted earlier, it might be possible to think in terms of what she calls 'transformative accommodation': a scheme in which individuals retain the liberty to choose the jurisdiction under which they will seek to resolve certain carefully specified matters, so that 'power-holders are forced to compete for the loyalty of their shared constituents' (122).
This may include aspects of marital law, the regulation of financial transactions and authorised structures of mediation and conflict resolution – the main areas that have been in question where supplementary jurisdictions have been tried, with native American communities in Canada as well as with religious groups like Islamic minority communities in certain contexts. In such schemes, both jurisdictional stakeholders may need to examine the way they operate; a communal/religious nomos, to borrow Shachar's vocabulary, has to think through the risks of alienating its people by inflexible or over-restrictive applications of traditional law, and a universalist Enlightenment system has to weigh the possible consequences of ghettoising and effectively disenfranchising a minority, at real cost to overall social cohesion and creativity. Hence 'transformative accommodation': both jurisdictional parties may be changed by their encounter over time, and we avoid the sterility of mutually exclusive monopolies.
It is uncomfortably true that this introduces into our thinking about law what some would see as a 'market' element, a competition for loyalty as Shachar admits. But if what we want socially is a pattern of relations in which a plurality of divers and overlapping affiliations work for a common good, and in which groups of serious and profound conviction are not systematically faced with the stark alternatives of cultural loyalty or state loyalty, it seems unavoidable.
In other settings, I have spoken about the idea of 'interactive pluralism' as a political desideratum; this seems to be one manifestation of such an ideal, comparable to the arrangements that allow for shared responsibility in education: the best argument for faith schools from the point of view of any aspiration towards social harmony and understanding is that they bring communal loyalties into direct relation with the wider society and inevitably lead to mutual questioning and sometimes mutual influence towards change, without compromising the distinctiveness of the essential elements of those communal loyalties.
In conclusion, it seems that if we are to think intelligently about the relations between Islam and British law, we need a fair amount of 'deconstruction' of crude oppositions and mythologies, whether of the nature of sharia or the nature of the Enlightenment.
But as I have hinted, I do not believe this can be done without some thinking also about the very nature of law. It is always easy to take refuge in some form of positivism; and what I have called legal universalism, when divorced from a serious theoretical (and, I would argue, religious) underpinning, can turn into a positivism as sterile as any other variety. If the paradoxical idea which I have sketched is true – that universal law and universal right are a way of recognising what is least fathomable and controllable in the human subject – theology still waits for us around the corner of these debates, however hard our culture may try to keep it out. And, as you can imagine, I am not going to complain about that.
***
Monday, February 11, 2008
Poland Resists Talmudists
Krakow church holds service slamming 'kikes who spit on us'
By Anshel Pfeffer, Haaretz Correspondent
Haaretz | Feb. 12, 2008
WARSAW - This was not a pogrom, but it was close. Sunday's incident in Krakow at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart of Jesus was rife with overtones of hatred. "The Jews are attacking us! We need to defend ourselves," shouted Prof. Bogoslav Wolniewicz, to stormy applause.
About 1,000 people gathered for special services Sunday at the church, organized by the Committee Against Defamation of the Church and For Polishness, along with the anti-Semitic Radio Maryja. Local residents were informed of the service by posters that proclaimed: "The kikes will not continue to spit on us."
The huge church was packed. People sat on the stairs and stood in the aisles. The service opened, as usual, with prayer and song, but after about half an hour, the 91-year-old bishop of Krakow, Albin Malysiak, began inflaming the crowd with his sermon.
"A man who does not love his homeland, but some sort of international entity, apparently also does not love his nearest and dearest," he said.
Afterward, Radio Maryja staffers ascended the dais, headed by Jerzy Robert Nowak, the station's expert on Jewish affairs. He spoke about the new and controversial book by Jan Gross, "Fear: Anti-Semitism in Poland after Auschwitz." Nowak, who was less ambiguous than the bishop, said to applause from the crowd: "It's important that we carry our fight to its conclusion, because Gross and his supporters are marginal, and we will not permit anyone to punish Poland. Leave us in peace. Leave us alone."
The speakers directed their anger at Gross, at Jews in general, at Jews from Brooklyn in particular, at Poles who are willing to sell them anything for money, at Righteous Among the Nations Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, at a minister in the Prime Minister's Office responsible for Jewish-Polish affairs; and at the newspaper that, in their eyes, represents the Polish left, Gazeta Wyborcza, and its editor, Adam Michnik.
There were questions from the audience at the end, mostly of the "how do we defend ourselves against attacks on the church and on Poland" variety. "The best thing is to get organized," Nowak responded. (End quote from Haaretz)
HOFFMAN'S AFTERWORD: Spitting on the Cross, or when the name of Jesus is pronounced or when Christians are passing by, is a rabbinic practice with a long pedigree. Haaretz puts the word "spitting" in the headline of this report, then tells us nothing about it or how the Poles may have suffered it at the hands of Talmudists. I still find it shocking to see editorializing, in what is supposed to be a straight news report: a media outlet, in this case a Polish-Christian radio station, is pejoratively described as "anti-semitic;" the speakers "inflame the crowd. We are being told what to think by these editorial remarks, We never see in the mainstream media, any Israeli or Hollywood outlet described as anti-gentile, however. That scientific-sounding nonsense-phrase, "anti-semitism" continues to render idiotic whomever wields it. What does it mean? That Radio Maryja dislikes Arabs? Assyrians?
The Poles want their future back. I can't blame them. But go about it without falling into the old, tired ruts of the past. Rather, love your enemies. Bless them that curse you. Don't act a part in someone else's script. Expose the evil, by all means. Christ did that. But in all things, act as He counseled. And God forbid any violence or hate. Those are rabbinic attributes, not Christian ones.
***
By Anshel Pfeffer, Haaretz Correspondent
Haaretz | Feb. 12, 2008
WARSAW - This was not a pogrom, but it was close. Sunday's incident in Krakow at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart of Jesus was rife with overtones of hatred. "The Jews are attacking us! We need to defend ourselves," shouted Prof. Bogoslav Wolniewicz, to stormy applause.
About 1,000 people gathered for special services Sunday at the church, organized by the Committee Against Defamation of the Church and For Polishness, along with the anti-Semitic Radio Maryja. Local residents were informed of the service by posters that proclaimed: "The kikes will not continue to spit on us."
The huge church was packed. People sat on the stairs and stood in the aisles. The service opened, as usual, with prayer and song, but after about half an hour, the 91-year-old bishop of Krakow, Albin Malysiak, began inflaming the crowd with his sermon.
"A man who does not love his homeland, but some sort of international entity, apparently also does not love his nearest and dearest," he said.
Afterward, Radio Maryja staffers ascended the dais, headed by Jerzy Robert Nowak, the station's expert on Jewish affairs. He spoke about the new and controversial book by Jan Gross, "Fear: Anti-Semitism in Poland after Auschwitz." Nowak, who was less ambiguous than the bishop, said to applause from the crowd: "It's important that we carry our fight to its conclusion, because Gross and his supporters are marginal, and we will not permit anyone to punish Poland. Leave us in peace. Leave us alone."
The speakers directed their anger at Gross, at Jews in general, at Jews from Brooklyn in particular, at Poles who are willing to sell them anything for money, at Righteous Among the Nations Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, at a minister in the Prime Minister's Office responsible for Jewish-Polish affairs; and at the newspaper that, in their eyes, represents the Polish left, Gazeta Wyborcza, and its editor, Adam Michnik.
There were questions from the audience at the end, mostly of the "how do we defend ourselves against attacks on the church and on Poland" variety. "The best thing is to get organized," Nowak responded. (End quote from Haaretz)
HOFFMAN'S AFTERWORD: Spitting on the Cross, or when the name of Jesus is pronounced or when Christians are passing by, is a rabbinic practice with a long pedigree. Haaretz puts the word "spitting" in the headline of this report, then tells us nothing about it or how the Poles may have suffered it at the hands of Talmudists. I still find it shocking to see editorializing, in what is supposed to be a straight news report: a media outlet, in this case a Polish-Christian radio station, is pejoratively described as "anti-semitic;" the speakers "inflame the crowd. We are being told what to think by these editorial remarks, We never see in the mainstream media, any Israeli or Hollywood outlet described as anti-gentile, however. That scientific-sounding nonsense-phrase, "anti-semitism" continues to render idiotic whomever wields it. What does it mean? That Radio Maryja dislikes Arabs? Assyrians?
The Poles want their future back. I can't blame them. But go about it without falling into the old, tired ruts of the past. Rather, love your enemies. Bless them that curse you. Don't act a part in someone else's script. Expose the evil, by all means. Christ did that. But in all things, act as He counseled. And God forbid any violence or hate. Those are rabbinic attributes, not Christian ones.
***
Thursday, February 07, 2008
Pope's Conversion Prayer: Day Two
Fooling some of the people, some of the time
by Michael A. Hoffman II
www.RevisionistHistory.org
Most traditional Catholics who are not "sedevacantists" are giddy with joy today over Pope Benedict's change in the conversion prayer which will be recited at Good Friday services only of the Tridentine rite (which presently serves a few hundred thousand of the estimated one billion Catholics worldwide).
Yesterday we wrote in this column that the prayer was an appeasement of Judaism, even though certain Zionists (ADL) and rabbis (chief rabbi of Rome) would demand more. Their incessant demands are being used by traditional Catholics to claim that Benedict's alteration is a positive move for the Church. Zionists and Rabbis provide Benedict with the cover for his change-agent role. Recall that the prayer was altered in the first place by rabbinic demand and the Pope submitted to it, instead of telling them where to get off -- Until you remove the 12th (formerly the 19th) "blessing" from your Amidah prayer (which curses Christ and Christians), we will not even consider your demands.
Christ-like thunder like that has been so long absent from the Vatican that Catholics on the Right no longer conceive of it. They celebrate crumbs which are not even what they appear to be. They don't understand that there is a chess game afoot in which appearances are deceiving and image prevails over substance. Celebrity culture has had a "wow" effect on their minds that curtails their powers of analysis and leaves them with their vigilance relaxed. Wow, Ratzinger did not give the Holy People everything they demanded. Ergo, he's our new knight of the faith!
Yes indeed, a "knight" who is dragging in his wake the perfidious cardinals and bishops ( Roger Mahony of Los Angeles, Bernard Law; William S. Skylstad of Spokane, ad nauseum) who are documented to have facilitated the homosexual predation of Catholic children, which destroyed the minds and souls of tens of thousands of them, even leading to their suicide, in some cases. These clerical monsters remain in their palatial residences thanks to the protection which Benedict XVI affords them. Mahony and Skylstad still rule over whole swaths of Catholic territory. Bernard Law is ensconced in a basilica in Rome as arch-priest. He is subject to arrest if he returns to Massachusetts, but he's in good standing in his hideout in the "conservative" Vatican.
One of the leading defenders of the Pope's altered conversion prayer for the minority Tridentine rite, is attorney Christopher Ferrara, who terms it a "papal masterstroke." That it is, but not for the reasons Mr. Ferrara puts forth. Three years ago, Ferrara was not so obtuse. He pretty much had Benedict ("Cardinal Ratzinger" at that time) spotted for what he is:
"More and more it becomes apparent that this man is perhaps the most industrious ecclesial termite of the post-conciliar epoch, tearing down even as he makes busy with the appearance of building up. The longer Ratzinger 'guards' Catholic doctrine, the more porous the barriers that protect it become.
"Indeed, as I have pointed out more than once on these pages, it was Ratzinger who wrote in 1987 (in the second edition of his Principles of Catholic Theology) that the “demolition of bastions” in the Church is 'a long-overdue task.' The Church, he declared, 'must relinquish many of the things that have hitherto spelled security for her and that she has taken for granted. She must demolish longstanding bastions and trust solely the shield of faith.' Now it seems that with the bastions all but demolished, even the shield of faith is about to clatter to the ground." (Christopher A. Ferrara, "Ratzinger Personally Consecrates Neo-Modernist Bishop," The Remnant, February, 2005)
Three years later and voila, Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict, has somehow been transformed into the great champion of Christ and the old Church.
In this stage of the Vatican chess game, shoring up its Right wing is the objective of Benedict XVI's pontificate. Right wing Catholics need to be made to believe again in the Vatican and the occupant of the "Chair of Peter." Not for any principled reason based on the Gospel or Catholic tradition, but because Right wingers make for obedient troops and reliable money-givers and they were alienated under Paul VI and John Paul II and still haven't entirely reconciled themselves with Benedict's harboring of several notorious child molester-facilitators in the Church hierarchy.
A similar reading of the zeitgeist prevails here in the U.S., where everyone in the Republican party is suddenly a "conservative," including a Rockefeller Republican like Senator John McCain.
Because the Cryptocracy wants Americans -- and Catholics -- to continue to believe in the System and pay into the System, they must pose as "conservatives," even if most of their actions testify that they are not.
Mr. Ferrara is part of the Catholic "Remnant" newspaper group which has a system of censorship in place that rivals the Zionist NY Times. They keep a tight grip over their audience by keeping letters out of their pages from maligned priests like Christopher Hunter, who they were pleased to attack as an Americanist, but refused him the right to defend his reputation in a letter to the editor. Their latest censorship ploy is to never recommend on the news links section of their website, alternative voices like that of Maurice Pinay, which seriously challenge The Remnant's party line.
If you are at all interested in intelligence about the Vatican, then Pinay, who attends a chapel of the Society of St. Pius X, is indispensable for daily or weekly reading. He's also obscure, due to the aforementioned censorship. I obtained the Ferrara quote from his "Maurice Pinay Blog" (http://mauricepinay.blogspot.com), as well as the following gifted analysis of the latest Vatican betrayal, which reflects this writer's own sentiments precisely:
"As anticipated, the prayer didn't do away with the idea of conversion. However, this should not be taken to indicate that Vatican prelates now seek conversion of 'the Jews.' If that was the case they would change the Good Friday prayer in their ordinary rite (Novus Ordo). But there is no indication that the Novus Ordo Good Friday prayer, with its Orwellian praises about the 'the faithfulness to the covenant' of 'the Jewish people' will be changed.
"The net effect here is that the Latin liturgy is gradually 'updated' at a pace suitable to "traditional" sensibilities. Most will be aware that this is the second change to the Latin Good Friday prayer for the Jews in 50 years. More changes in the same direction will come if "trads" are gauged to be ripe for them.
"The change is clever because it swaps 'offensive' biblical language for other apparently more positive biblical language, rather than dropping the 'offensive' words from the 1962 prayer. This is most certainly intended to project an image of conservatism. It's from the Bible, after all. Who can argue against that?
"The problem with the new prayer, despite its hearkening to Romans 11:25-26, is that it takes the present-time intention of the original prayer and thrusts it into the realm of mystery and prophesy dealing with the future. The intention and meaning of the original prayer was perfectly clear: Christians pray for the conversion of the Jews HERE AND NOW. Romans 11:25-26 deals with a mystery prophesied to take place in the future at the last days. The message seems to be that we should pray for the end-times to come quickly so the 'Jews' will convert, and that they don't need Christ in the meantime.
"This is not, nor has it ever been the position of the Church. The Church always sought the conversion of Jews--real and fake 'Jews' alike--not just at the Second Coming, but from Pentecost until the time of the Second Vatican Council--at all times. St. Vincent Ferrer and all of the evangelists knew nothing of the new theology of the "elder brothers." Apparently, he was wrong?
"The mysterious nature of Romans 11:25-26 is exploited as a playground by Judaizers such as 'Hebrew Catholics' like Roy Schoeman, who use it as 'support' for their crazy theses, which have it that prophesy is being fulfilled by Talmudic/Kabbalistic/Zionist Khazars dragging their baggage into the Church. Judging from my study of the new theology of the 'elder brothers' (i.e. Jews are our elder brothers in the faith) emanating from Rome, that is the thinking that this new prayer intends to promote--in the traditionalist fold.
"The end-times nature of this new prayer calls to mind the Vatican document The Jewish People and their Sacred Scripture in the Christian Bible prefaced and signed by Benedict/Ratzinger as Prefect for the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, in which it is stated:
"Jewish messianic expectation is not in vain. It can become for us Christians a powerful stimulant to keep alive the eschatological dimension of our faith. Like them, we too live in expectation. The difference is that for us the One who is to come will have the traits of the Jesus who has already come and is already present and active among us.'
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/pcb_documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20020212_popolo-ebraico_en.html
"No, Herr Ratzinger, I'm afraid that the 'one who is to come' whom Jesus Christ said will come in his own name and who "the Jews" will accept as their 'messiah' will not be Jesus Christ, nor will he have the traits of Jesus Christ.
SOURCE: http://mauricepinay.blogspot.com
***
by Michael A. Hoffman II
www.RevisionistHistory.org
Most traditional Catholics who are not "sedevacantists" are giddy with joy today over Pope Benedict's change in the conversion prayer which will be recited at Good Friday services only of the Tridentine rite (which presently serves a few hundred thousand of the estimated one billion Catholics worldwide).
Yesterday we wrote in this column that the prayer was an appeasement of Judaism, even though certain Zionists (ADL) and rabbis (chief rabbi of Rome) would demand more. Their incessant demands are being used by traditional Catholics to claim that Benedict's alteration is a positive move for the Church. Zionists and Rabbis provide Benedict with the cover for his change-agent role. Recall that the prayer was altered in the first place by rabbinic demand and the Pope submitted to it, instead of telling them where to get off -- Until you remove the 12th (formerly the 19th) "blessing" from your Amidah prayer (which curses Christ and Christians), we will not even consider your demands.
Christ-like thunder like that has been so long absent from the Vatican that Catholics on the Right no longer conceive of it. They celebrate crumbs which are not even what they appear to be. They don't understand that there is a chess game afoot in which appearances are deceiving and image prevails over substance. Celebrity culture has had a "wow" effect on their minds that curtails their powers of analysis and leaves them with their vigilance relaxed. Wow, Ratzinger did not give the Holy People everything they demanded. Ergo, he's our new knight of the faith!
Yes indeed, a "knight" who is dragging in his wake the perfidious cardinals and bishops ( Roger Mahony of Los Angeles, Bernard Law; William S. Skylstad of Spokane, ad nauseum) who are documented to have facilitated the homosexual predation of Catholic children, which destroyed the minds and souls of tens of thousands of them, even leading to their suicide, in some cases. These clerical monsters remain in their palatial residences thanks to the protection which Benedict XVI affords them. Mahony and Skylstad still rule over whole swaths of Catholic territory. Bernard Law is ensconced in a basilica in Rome as arch-priest. He is subject to arrest if he returns to Massachusetts, but he's in good standing in his hideout in the "conservative" Vatican.
One of the leading defenders of the Pope's altered conversion prayer for the minority Tridentine rite, is attorney Christopher Ferrara, who terms it a "papal masterstroke." That it is, but not for the reasons Mr. Ferrara puts forth. Three years ago, Ferrara was not so obtuse. He pretty much had Benedict ("Cardinal Ratzinger" at that time) spotted for what he is:
"More and more it becomes apparent that this man is perhaps the most industrious ecclesial termite of the post-conciliar epoch, tearing down even as he makes busy with the appearance of building up. The longer Ratzinger 'guards' Catholic doctrine, the more porous the barriers that protect it become.
"Indeed, as I have pointed out more than once on these pages, it was Ratzinger who wrote in 1987 (in the second edition of his Principles of Catholic Theology) that the “demolition of bastions” in the Church is 'a long-overdue task.' The Church, he declared, 'must relinquish many of the things that have hitherto spelled security for her and that she has taken for granted. She must demolish longstanding bastions and trust solely the shield of faith.' Now it seems that with the bastions all but demolished, even the shield of faith is about to clatter to the ground." (Christopher A. Ferrara, "Ratzinger Personally Consecrates Neo-Modernist Bishop," The Remnant, February, 2005)
Three years later and voila, Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict, has somehow been transformed into the great champion of Christ and the old Church.
In this stage of the Vatican chess game, shoring up its Right wing is the objective of Benedict XVI's pontificate. Right wing Catholics need to be made to believe again in the Vatican and the occupant of the "Chair of Peter." Not for any principled reason based on the Gospel or Catholic tradition, but because Right wingers make for obedient troops and reliable money-givers and they were alienated under Paul VI and John Paul II and still haven't entirely reconciled themselves with Benedict's harboring of several notorious child molester-facilitators in the Church hierarchy.
A similar reading of the zeitgeist prevails here in the U.S., where everyone in the Republican party is suddenly a "conservative," including a Rockefeller Republican like Senator John McCain.
Because the Cryptocracy wants Americans -- and Catholics -- to continue to believe in the System and pay into the System, they must pose as "conservatives," even if most of their actions testify that they are not.
Mr. Ferrara is part of the Catholic "Remnant" newspaper group which has a system of censorship in place that rivals the Zionist NY Times. They keep a tight grip over their audience by keeping letters out of their pages from maligned priests like Christopher Hunter, who they were pleased to attack as an Americanist, but refused him the right to defend his reputation in a letter to the editor. Their latest censorship ploy is to never recommend on the news links section of their website, alternative voices like that of Maurice Pinay, which seriously challenge The Remnant's party line.
If you are at all interested in intelligence about the Vatican, then Pinay, who attends a chapel of the Society of St. Pius X, is indispensable for daily or weekly reading. He's also obscure, due to the aforementioned censorship. I obtained the Ferrara quote from his "Maurice Pinay Blog" (http://mauricepinay.blogspot.com), as well as the following gifted analysis of the latest Vatican betrayal, which reflects this writer's own sentiments precisely:
"As anticipated, the prayer didn't do away with the idea of conversion. However, this should not be taken to indicate that Vatican prelates now seek conversion of 'the Jews.' If that was the case they would change the Good Friday prayer in their ordinary rite (Novus Ordo). But there is no indication that the Novus Ordo Good Friday prayer, with its Orwellian praises about the 'the faithfulness to the covenant' of 'the Jewish people' will be changed.
"The net effect here is that the Latin liturgy is gradually 'updated' at a pace suitable to "traditional" sensibilities. Most will be aware that this is the second change to the Latin Good Friday prayer for the Jews in 50 years. More changes in the same direction will come if "trads" are gauged to be ripe for them.
"The change is clever because it swaps 'offensive' biblical language for other apparently more positive biblical language, rather than dropping the 'offensive' words from the 1962 prayer. This is most certainly intended to project an image of conservatism. It's from the Bible, after all. Who can argue against that?
"The problem with the new prayer, despite its hearkening to Romans 11:25-26, is that it takes the present-time intention of the original prayer and thrusts it into the realm of mystery and prophesy dealing with the future. The intention and meaning of the original prayer was perfectly clear: Christians pray for the conversion of the Jews HERE AND NOW. Romans 11:25-26 deals with a mystery prophesied to take place in the future at the last days. The message seems to be that we should pray for the end-times to come quickly so the 'Jews' will convert, and that they don't need Christ in the meantime.
"This is not, nor has it ever been the position of the Church. The Church always sought the conversion of Jews--real and fake 'Jews' alike--not just at the Second Coming, but from Pentecost until the time of the Second Vatican Council--at all times. St. Vincent Ferrer and all of the evangelists knew nothing of the new theology of the "elder brothers." Apparently, he was wrong?
"The mysterious nature of Romans 11:25-26 is exploited as a playground by Judaizers such as 'Hebrew Catholics' like Roy Schoeman, who use it as 'support' for their crazy theses, which have it that prophesy is being fulfilled by Talmudic/Kabbalistic/Zionist Khazars dragging their baggage into the Church. Judging from my study of the new theology of the 'elder brothers' (i.e. Jews are our elder brothers in the faith) emanating from Rome, that is the thinking that this new prayer intends to promote--in the traditionalist fold.
"The end-times nature of this new prayer calls to mind the Vatican document The Jewish People and their Sacred Scripture in the Christian Bible prefaced and signed by Benedict/Ratzinger as Prefect for the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, in which it is stated:
"Jewish messianic expectation is not in vain. It can become for us Christians a powerful stimulant to keep alive the eschatological dimension of our faith. Like them, we too live in expectation. The difference is that for us the One who is to come will have the traits of the Jesus who has already come and is already present and active among us.'
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/pcb_documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20020212_popolo-ebraico_en.html
"No, Herr Ratzinger, I'm afraid that the 'one who is to come' whom Jesus Christ said will come in his own name and who "the Jews" will accept as their 'messiah' will not be Jesus Christ, nor will he have the traits of Jesus Christ.
SOURCE: http://mauricepinay.blogspot.com
***
Tuesday, February 05, 2008
Pope softens conversion prayer to appease the Pharisees
Same old, same old: more defeatist tactics on the road to ruin
The Pope softens conversion prayer to appease the Pharisees
by Michael A. Hoffman II | Copyright ©2008 All Rights Reserved
Papa Benny has put his ermine tail firmly between his satin-clad legs and made the Catholic Tridentine prayer for the conversion of the "Jews" less likely to give offense to the eternally offended ones. Here is the 1962 Good Friday Prayer of the Tridentine Latin rite:
"Let us pray also for the Jews: that almighty God may remove the veil from their hearts; so that they too may acknowledge Jesus Christ our Lord. Let us pray. Let us kneel. Arise. Almighty and eternal God, who dost also not exclude from thy mercy the Jews: hear our prayers, which we offer for the blindness of that people; that acknowledging the light of thy Truth, which is Christ, they may be delivered from their darkness. Through the same Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with thee in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen."
That prayer has now been suppressed. The new "traditional" prayer substituted by Pope Benedict XVI reads as follows: "We pray for the Jews. That our God and Lord enlighten their hearts so that they recognize Jesus Christ, the Saviour of all mankind. Let us pray. Kneel down. Arise. Eternal God Almighty, you want all people to be saved and to arrive at the knowledge of the Truth, graciously grant that by that the fullness of the Gentiles all Israel will be saved. Through Christ our Lord."
Gone are references to "a veil on their hearts," their "blindness" and their "dwelling in darkness."
The irony is that the 1962 prayer is itself an emasculation of the original Tridentine Good Friday Prayer which referred to unbelieving "perfidious Jews." This prayer was suppressed by Pope John XXIII.
It used to be that Protestants like England's King Edward VI and Queen Elizabeth I, and Communists in Poland and Hungary were the ones who banned traditional Catholic prayers. Now it is the popes themselves who perform this service on behalf of the Orwellian New World Order. All this for "fear of the Jews." After Pentecost, Christians were to no longer have that fear. Could it be that many of those who say they are Christians are not, but are impostors? Is Benedict XVI an impostor pope? Or just a Machiavellian-Kabbalist, Medici-style pontiff in the Leo X mold?
I long for the day when there will be one prominent Christian leader, Roman Catholic, Russian Orthodox, or Protestant, with a substantial national following and a great deal to lose materially and career-wise, who will publicly expose Judaism for what it is and follow through on that exposure with decisive, definitive and consistent educational and evangelical efforts along those lines.
I've been waiting for more than thirty-five years and it hasn't happened yet.
Oh yes, I almost forgot. Because the eternally offended ones have taken offense at even the newly revised prayer, Right wing fans of Pope Benedict are defending him.
In addition to the eternally offended, we also have the eternally imbecilic.
(Hoffman is the author of the forthcoming book, "Judaism Discovered").
www.RevisionistHistory.org
***
The Pope softens conversion prayer to appease the Pharisees
by Michael A. Hoffman II | Copyright ©2008 All Rights Reserved
Papa Benny has put his ermine tail firmly between his satin-clad legs and made the Catholic Tridentine prayer for the conversion of the "Jews" less likely to give offense to the eternally offended ones. Here is the 1962 Good Friday Prayer of the Tridentine Latin rite:
"Let us pray also for the Jews: that almighty God may remove the veil from their hearts; so that they too may acknowledge Jesus Christ our Lord. Let us pray. Let us kneel. Arise. Almighty and eternal God, who dost also not exclude from thy mercy the Jews: hear our prayers, which we offer for the blindness of that people; that acknowledging the light of thy Truth, which is Christ, they may be delivered from their darkness. Through the same Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with thee in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen."
That prayer has now been suppressed. The new "traditional" prayer substituted by Pope Benedict XVI reads as follows: "We pray for the Jews. That our God and Lord enlighten their hearts so that they recognize Jesus Christ, the Saviour of all mankind. Let us pray. Kneel down. Arise. Eternal God Almighty, you want all people to be saved and to arrive at the knowledge of the Truth, graciously grant that by that the fullness of the Gentiles all Israel will be saved. Through Christ our Lord."
Gone are references to "a veil on their hearts," their "blindness" and their "dwelling in darkness."
The irony is that the 1962 prayer is itself an emasculation of the original Tridentine Good Friday Prayer which referred to unbelieving "perfidious Jews." This prayer was suppressed by Pope John XXIII.
It used to be that Protestants like England's King Edward VI and Queen Elizabeth I, and Communists in Poland and Hungary were the ones who banned traditional Catholic prayers. Now it is the popes themselves who perform this service on behalf of the Orwellian New World Order. All this for "fear of the Jews." After Pentecost, Christians were to no longer have that fear. Could it be that many of those who say they are Christians are not, but are impostors? Is Benedict XVI an impostor pope? Or just a Machiavellian-Kabbalist, Medici-style pontiff in the Leo X mold?
I long for the day when there will be one prominent Christian leader, Roman Catholic, Russian Orthodox, or Protestant, with a substantial national following and a great deal to lose materially and career-wise, who will publicly expose Judaism for what it is and follow through on that exposure with decisive, definitive and consistent educational and evangelical efforts along those lines.
I've been waiting for more than thirty-five years and it hasn't happened yet.
Oh yes, I almost forgot. Because the eternally offended ones have taken offense at even the newly revised prayer, Right wing fans of Pope Benedict are defending him.
In addition to the eternally offended, we also have the eternally imbecilic.
(Hoffman is the author of the forthcoming book, "Judaism Discovered").
www.RevisionistHistory.org
***
Saturday, February 02, 2008
Amnesty International: Israelis Killed Hundreds of Children in Lebanon in 2006
Amnesty Int'l: Winograd report fails to address Israel's war crimes
Haaretz | Feb. 2, 2008
Human rights organization Amnesty International on Thursday called the Winograd Commission's final report on Israel's conduct during the Second Lebanon War, published Wednesday, "deeply flawed," in its failure to address war crimes committed by Israel.
The organization said that the report failed to investigate government policies and military strategies that didn't discriminate between the Lebanese civilian population and Hezbollah combatants and between civilian property and infrastructure and military targets.
"This was yet another missed opportunity to address the policies and decisions behind the grave violations of international humanitarian law , including war crimes, committed by Israeli forces," said Malcolm Smart, Director of Amnesty International's Middle East and North Africa Program.
"The indiscriminate killings of many Lebanese civilians not involved in the hostilities and the deliberate and wanton destruction of civilian properties and infrastructure on a massive scale were given no more than token consideration by the commission," said Smart.
The press release explained that that though the Winograd inquiry committee was not vested with the powers of an official state commission of investigation, it had the power to subpoena witnesses and recommend the prosecution of officials it found to have been responsible for willful or negligent criminal conduct.
According to Amnesty International, "the [Winograd Commission] chose to limit its work to reviewing military strategy and political decisions...and made to effort to recommend measures for holding those responsible for [serious violations] to account. It recommends the development of mechanisms to ensure the effectiveness of fighting within the framework of international humanitarian law standards [and] immediate investigations by the army when there are concerns that international humanitarian law was violated and better preparedness for responding to humanitarian problems arising from military action."
"But it essentially brushed aside available evidence of serious violations of international law, claiming that interpretations of international humanitarian law are controversial, that it did not have the capacity to deal with the volume of data, that the alleged violations were already being investigated by other bodies, and that such allegations are used as propaganda against Israel, whereas it did scrutinize military strategies and the conduct of certain operations in detail, including in cases which were already being investigated separately."
Based on its on-the-ground research and analysis of the conduct of hostilities in 2006, Amnesty International concluded that the Lebanese civilian population paid the heaviest price for the Israel Defense Force attacks.
"Of some 1,190 people killed, the vast majority were civilians not involved in the hostilities, among them hundreds of children. The overwhelming majority of homes, properties and infrastructure targeted in air strikes and artillery attacks were likewise civilian."
"Although the Winograd Commission recommended that the army review its policies on the use of cluster bombs to ensure that the use of these weapons will not violate international humanitarian law and army discipline, it did not propose any concrete measures," said Smart.
Amnesty International called on Israel's government to provide data on the use of cluster bombs during the Second Lebanon War, establish an independent and impartial investigation into evidence indicating that IDF forces committed serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law during the conflict, and ensure that those responsible are brought to justice.
HOFFMAN'S AFTERWORD: The Talmud and halacha (rabbinic law) rule that "no one may judge Israel." With all the perpetual hand-wringing and weeping over the Nazi "Holocaust," Israeli war crimes are never prosecuted, and seldom publicized or commemorated. The "Holocaust" has nothing to do with universal human rights and everything to do with creating a religion of Judaism for gentiles, "Holocaustianity." In the eyes of true believers in that new religious creed, Israelis can do no wrong, while Arabs, including Arab Christians, are always wrong. Their deaths don't count. Their blood is cheap, like the Talmud says.
***
Haaretz | Feb. 2, 2008
Human rights organization Amnesty International on Thursday called the Winograd Commission's final report on Israel's conduct during the Second Lebanon War, published Wednesday, "deeply flawed," in its failure to address war crimes committed by Israel.
The organization said that the report failed to investigate government policies and military strategies that didn't discriminate between the Lebanese civilian population and Hezbollah combatants and between civilian property and infrastructure and military targets.
"This was yet another missed opportunity to address the policies and decisions behind the grave violations of international humanitarian law , including war crimes, committed by Israeli forces," said Malcolm Smart, Director of Amnesty International's Middle East and North Africa Program.
"The indiscriminate killings of many Lebanese civilians not involved in the hostilities and the deliberate and wanton destruction of civilian properties and infrastructure on a massive scale were given no more than token consideration by the commission," said Smart.
The press release explained that that though the Winograd inquiry committee was not vested with the powers of an official state commission of investigation, it had the power to subpoena witnesses and recommend the prosecution of officials it found to have been responsible for willful or negligent criminal conduct.
According to Amnesty International, "the [Winograd Commission] chose to limit its work to reviewing military strategy and political decisions...and made to effort to recommend measures for holding those responsible for [serious violations] to account. It recommends the development of mechanisms to ensure the effectiveness of fighting within the framework of international humanitarian law standards [and] immediate investigations by the army when there are concerns that international humanitarian law was violated and better preparedness for responding to humanitarian problems arising from military action."
"But it essentially brushed aside available evidence of serious violations of international law, claiming that interpretations of international humanitarian law are controversial, that it did not have the capacity to deal with the volume of data, that the alleged violations were already being investigated by other bodies, and that such allegations are used as propaganda against Israel, whereas it did scrutinize military strategies and the conduct of certain operations in detail, including in cases which were already being investigated separately."
Based on its on-the-ground research and analysis of the conduct of hostilities in 2006, Amnesty International concluded that the Lebanese civilian population paid the heaviest price for the Israel Defense Force attacks.
"Of some 1,190 people killed, the vast majority were civilians not involved in the hostilities, among them hundreds of children. The overwhelming majority of homes, properties and infrastructure targeted in air strikes and artillery attacks were likewise civilian."
"Although the Winograd Commission recommended that the army review its policies on the use of cluster bombs to ensure that the use of these weapons will not violate international humanitarian law and army discipline, it did not propose any concrete measures," said Smart.
Amnesty International called on Israel's government to provide data on the use of cluster bombs during the Second Lebanon War, establish an independent and impartial investigation into evidence indicating that IDF forces committed serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law during the conflict, and ensure that those responsible are brought to justice.
HOFFMAN'S AFTERWORD: The Talmud and halacha (rabbinic law) rule that "no one may judge Israel." With all the perpetual hand-wringing and weeping over the Nazi "Holocaust," Israeli war crimes are never prosecuted, and seldom publicized or commemorated. The "Holocaust" has nothing to do with universal human rights and everything to do with creating a religion of Judaism for gentiles, "Holocaustianity." In the eyes of true believers in that new religious creed, Israelis can do no wrong, while Arabs, including Arab Christians, are always wrong. Their deaths don't count. Their blood is cheap, like the Talmud says.
***
Friday, February 01, 2008
Methodists Renew Drive for Divestment from Israeli Regime
Methodist Church Renews Drive For Divestment From Israel
Battle Lines Drawn Between Jewish Groups and Protestant Churches
By Nathan Guttman | Forward (NY newspaper) | Jan 30, 2008
EXCERPT: Among the statements in the report that irked Jewish community activists are a reference to the founding of the State of Israel as “the original sin,” a passage calling Israeli founding father David Ben-Gurion an “extremist” and a passage defining Israeli actions as acts of “terror.” Discussing the impact of the Holocaust on Israeli society, the Methodist report claims it has been the cause for “hysteria” and “paranoiac sense” among Israelis.
WASHINGTON D.C. - Tensions are re-emerging between Jewish organizations and some mainline Protestant churches in the wake of a renewed drive for churches to divest from companies doing business with Israel.
The United Methodist Church opened discussions last Friday on a resolution calling for divestment from Caterpillar, the tractor manufacturer, because the company supplies Israel with bulldozers used in building the separation barrier and in demolishing Palestinian homes. The divestment resolution comes only months after the publication of a church-sponsored report referring to the creation of the State of Israel as the “original sin.”
Relations with the Presbyterian Church (USA) are also strained, following remarks by church officials criticizing Israel because of the Gaza closure. A recent study by an affiliate of the Presbyterian Church called on American Jews to “get a life” instead of focusing on defending Israeli policies.
“This reflects a very disturbing trend in these churches,” said Ethan Felson, assistant executive director of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs. “These developments are a result of work of several very wicked forces that play in the church.”
The divestment campaign, thought by many in the Jewish community to be dormant, is still active among mainline Protestant churches and is re-emerging as a main issue on the agenda of Jewish groups. Attempts to block the divestment drive, which began four years ago, have proved only partially successful. Interreligious dialogue efforts and public pressure managed to mute some churchwide calls for divestment, but other initiatives are still gaining support.
The Methodist meeting, held on January 25 in Fort Worth, Texas, was an initial orientation meeting for delegation heads who will lead their groups at the church’s quadrennial conference in April. Delegation leaders were presented with speakers both supportive and opposed to the draft divestment resolution, which calls for removing all Methodist pension fund holdings from Caterpillar. “The United Methodist Church holds $141 million of pension funds in companies that sustain the occupation,” said Susan Hoder, a member of the church’s Interfaith Peace Initiative. “This has to stop. We have to cut our ties to the occupation.”
Hoder, who strongly favors passage of divestment measures, went on to claim that American taxpayer dollars are used to fund Israeli military. “A lot of this money goes into the pockets of Israeli military leaders and politicians who get rich while the population of Israel suffers,” she said. With 11 million members, The United Methodist Church is the largest mainline Protestant denomination in the U.S. The upcoming April general conference, the church’s main forum for making policy decisions, will first discuss the divestment resolution in a subcommittee. Afterward, the panel’s recommendations will be put to a general vote to make them official policy. A spokesman for the United Methodist Church did not return calls from the Forward seeking comments on the divestment drive.
Arrangers of the pre-conference meeting last Friday in Fort Worth allowed a representative of the organized Jewish community to speak on the issue. Rabbi Gary Greenebaum, the American Jewish Committee’s director of interreligious affairs, told the Methodist delegates that the Jewish community was concerned about the resolution. “I told them that while they may think it is not anti-Israel and not anti-Jewish, for us it feels anti-Israel and feels anti-Jewish,” Greenebaum told the Forward after the meeting. At the same time, Greenebaum warned the Jewish community against overreacting to anti-Israel sentiments in the church. Protestant churches, he said, “care very deeply about their relations with the Jewish community.”
What prompted Jewish activists to take action was not only the renewed divestment drive but also a report from the women’s division of the Methodist church, which addressed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The 225-page report, compiled by the Rev. Stephen Goldstein, attempts to outline the historical and current contours of the conflict, but according to Felson, the report amounts to “the most egregious thing that has crossed my desk that was not put out by an overt hate group.”
Among the statements in the report that irked Jewish community activists are a reference to the founding of the State of Israel as “the original sin,” a passage calling Israeli founding father David Ben-Gurion an “extremist” and a passage defining Israeli actions as acts of “terror.” Discussing the impact of the Holocaust on Israeli society, the Methodist report claims it has been the cause for “hysteria” and “paranoiac sense” among Israelis.
“Are we not called to testify when oppressors use their identity as the oppressed with stories of sixty years ago but through some failure of perception cannot see what transpires now in the shadow of the Holocaust?” the report goes on to ask.
After letting four months pass without a formal response, last week four Jewish women’s groups sent a letter to heads of the Methodist church, calling the report “inflammatory, inaccurate, and polemical.” Hadassah and women’s groups affiliated with Conservative Judaism, Reform Judaism and United Jewish Communities signed the letter.
Another expected step by Jewish organizations is the launching of a new Web site that will call for a “return to civility” and condemn anti-Israeli voices among Protestant churches.
The Presbyterian Church, the first to come up with resolutions calling for divestment, has so far avoided taking action on this issue, but it still supports a line seen by Jewish activists as anti-Israel. In recent weeks, a heated exchange of letters took place between Jewish community leaders and heads of the Presbyterian Church, following the church’s criticism of Israel over the situation in Gaza. In a letter to the Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, head of the church’s general assembly, 12 Jewish organizational leaders complained that “the anti-Israel tone of your statement calls into serious question whether the season of mutual understanding we welcomed in July 2006 has yet arrived.”
Kirkpatrick responded with a letter asking the Jewish organizations, “Do you not share our concern that such regular violent responses by Israel, despite their intent to safeguard security, and no matter how carefully conducted to avoid unnecessary civilian casualties, only lead to continued violence in return?”
This exchange came shortly after a presentation of the Israel/Palestine Mission Network, a group chartered by the Presbyterian Church though not formally speaking for it. In a slideshow presentation calling for “reframing the debate,” the group argued that the “Jewish community in the Diaspora must get a life,” referring to Jewish reactions to Christian groups’ calls for changes in policy toward the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
***
Battle Lines Drawn Between Jewish Groups and Protestant Churches
By Nathan Guttman | Forward (NY newspaper) | Jan 30, 2008
EXCERPT: Among the statements in the report that irked Jewish community activists are a reference to the founding of the State of Israel as “the original sin,” a passage calling Israeli founding father David Ben-Gurion an “extremist” and a passage defining Israeli actions as acts of “terror.” Discussing the impact of the Holocaust on Israeli society, the Methodist report claims it has been the cause for “hysteria” and “paranoiac sense” among Israelis.
WASHINGTON D.C. - Tensions are re-emerging between Jewish organizations and some mainline Protestant churches in the wake of a renewed drive for churches to divest from companies doing business with Israel.
The United Methodist Church opened discussions last Friday on a resolution calling for divestment from Caterpillar, the tractor manufacturer, because the company supplies Israel with bulldozers used in building the separation barrier and in demolishing Palestinian homes. The divestment resolution comes only months after the publication of a church-sponsored report referring to the creation of the State of Israel as the “original sin.”
Relations with the Presbyterian Church (USA) are also strained, following remarks by church officials criticizing Israel because of the Gaza closure. A recent study by an affiliate of the Presbyterian Church called on American Jews to “get a life” instead of focusing on defending Israeli policies.
“This reflects a very disturbing trend in these churches,” said Ethan Felson, assistant executive director of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs. “These developments are a result of work of several very wicked forces that play in the church.”
The divestment campaign, thought by many in the Jewish community to be dormant, is still active among mainline Protestant churches and is re-emerging as a main issue on the agenda of Jewish groups. Attempts to block the divestment drive, which began four years ago, have proved only partially successful. Interreligious dialogue efforts and public pressure managed to mute some churchwide calls for divestment, but other initiatives are still gaining support.
The Methodist meeting, held on January 25 in Fort Worth, Texas, was an initial orientation meeting for delegation heads who will lead their groups at the church’s quadrennial conference in April. Delegation leaders were presented with speakers both supportive and opposed to the draft divestment resolution, which calls for removing all Methodist pension fund holdings from Caterpillar. “The United Methodist Church holds $141 million of pension funds in companies that sustain the occupation,” said Susan Hoder, a member of the church’s Interfaith Peace Initiative. “This has to stop. We have to cut our ties to the occupation.”
Hoder, who strongly favors passage of divestment measures, went on to claim that American taxpayer dollars are used to fund Israeli military. “A lot of this money goes into the pockets of Israeli military leaders and politicians who get rich while the population of Israel suffers,” she said. With 11 million members, The United Methodist Church is the largest mainline Protestant denomination in the U.S. The upcoming April general conference, the church’s main forum for making policy decisions, will first discuss the divestment resolution in a subcommittee. Afterward, the panel’s recommendations will be put to a general vote to make them official policy. A spokesman for the United Methodist Church did not return calls from the Forward seeking comments on the divestment drive.
Arrangers of the pre-conference meeting last Friday in Fort Worth allowed a representative of the organized Jewish community to speak on the issue. Rabbi Gary Greenebaum, the American Jewish Committee’s director of interreligious affairs, told the Methodist delegates that the Jewish community was concerned about the resolution. “I told them that while they may think it is not anti-Israel and not anti-Jewish, for us it feels anti-Israel and feels anti-Jewish,” Greenebaum told the Forward after the meeting. At the same time, Greenebaum warned the Jewish community against overreacting to anti-Israel sentiments in the church. Protestant churches, he said, “care very deeply about their relations with the Jewish community.”
What prompted Jewish activists to take action was not only the renewed divestment drive but also a report from the women’s division of the Methodist church, which addressed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The 225-page report, compiled by the Rev. Stephen Goldstein, attempts to outline the historical and current contours of the conflict, but according to Felson, the report amounts to “the most egregious thing that has crossed my desk that was not put out by an overt hate group.”
Among the statements in the report that irked Jewish community activists are a reference to the founding of the State of Israel as “the original sin,” a passage calling Israeli founding father David Ben-Gurion an “extremist” and a passage defining Israeli actions as acts of “terror.” Discussing the impact of the Holocaust on Israeli society, the Methodist report claims it has been the cause for “hysteria” and “paranoiac sense” among Israelis.
“Are we not called to testify when oppressors use their identity as the oppressed with stories of sixty years ago but through some failure of perception cannot see what transpires now in the shadow of the Holocaust?” the report goes on to ask.
After letting four months pass without a formal response, last week four Jewish women’s groups sent a letter to heads of the Methodist church, calling the report “inflammatory, inaccurate, and polemical.” Hadassah and women’s groups affiliated with Conservative Judaism, Reform Judaism and United Jewish Communities signed the letter.
Another expected step by Jewish organizations is the launching of a new Web site that will call for a “return to civility” and condemn anti-Israeli voices among Protestant churches.
The Presbyterian Church, the first to come up with resolutions calling for divestment, has so far avoided taking action on this issue, but it still supports a line seen by Jewish activists as anti-Israel. In recent weeks, a heated exchange of letters took place between Jewish community leaders and heads of the Presbyterian Church, following the church’s criticism of Israel over the situation in Gaza. In a letter to the Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, head of the church’s general assembly, 12 Jewish organizational leaders complained that “the anti-Israel tone of your statement calls into serious question whether the season of mutual understanding we welcomed in July 2006 has yet arrived.”
Kirkpatrick responded with a letter asking the Jewish organizations, “Do you not share our concern that such regular violent responses by Israel, despite their intent to safeguard security, and no matter how carefully conducted to avoid unnecessary civilian casualties, only lead to continued violence in return?”
This exchange came shortly after a presentation of the Israel/Palestine Mission Network, a group chartered by the Presbyterian Church though not formally speaking for it. In a slideshow presentation calling for “reframing the debate,” the group argued that the “Jewish community in the Diaspora must get a life,” referring to Jewish reactions to Christian groups’ calls for changes in policy toward the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
***
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