As the MV Rachel Corrie, the last boat in the Free Gaza Movement’s Flotilla, is being dragged to Israel’s Ashdod port after being boarded and taken over in the early hours of Saturday, Israel continues to react to its Flotilla attack. Protests have been taking place throughout Israel and the occupied Palestinian Territories. In the meantime, The Real News’ Lia Tarachansky investigates how Israel prepared for the Flotilla attack, and how the media repeatedly portrayed a connection between the activists and terrorism. After the attack, Israel went on the offensive to prove there was indeed a connection to terrorism. The IDF published a press release saying the activists on board the Mavi Marmara ship that was the site of at least 9 deaths on Monday morning were actually al Qaeda mercenaries. When Tarachansky and journalist Max Blumenthaul questioned the IDF for evidence of this allegation, the IDF said it didn’t have any and changed the title of the press release to “attackers of the IDF soldiers found without identification papers.”
At roughly 4:00 a.m. on Monday morning Israeli navy and air force troops intercepted a convoy of six ships that attempted to deliver 10,000 tons of aid to the besieged Gaza strip. The convoy, known as the Gaza Freedom Flotilla, was inspected by several governments and was a highly publicized action. Israeli officials warned the ships they will not be allowed to reach Gaza’s shores, when the ships attempted to do so in order to break the siege on Gaza, the Israeli army attacked them, leaving 20 international activists dead and dozens injured. Hundreds are currently in Israeli jails. The Real News’ Lia Tarachansky investigates what Israeli officials and Israeli media have been reporting about this attack.
(Via The Real News Network)
Despite escalating provocations by the Israeli hard-right settlement movement, indirect talks begin this week between the Israeli and Palestinian leaderships. On Friday, U.S. envoy to the Middle East, George Mitchell, will begin shuttling between the two parties in an attempt to build confidence and create the environment for direct talks. Palestinian public opinion is very divided over the start of the negotiations and prominent officials from both sides have suggested it may be too late to create two states, instead opting for one democratic state where all members are equal.
This program was produced by The Real News for May 7, 2010.
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Report from the Middle East: interview with Michel Warschawski on growing up in Jerusalem.Michel Warschawski is a journalist and writer and a founder of the Alternative Information Center (AIC) in Israel. His books include On the Border and Towards an Open Tomb: The Crisis of Israeli Society.
This program was produced by The Real News for April 5, 2010.
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Four teenagers in the West Bank villages of Iraq Burin and Awarta were killed this weekend by Israeli soldiers. Initially the army denied the use of live ammunition but an X-ray of an M-16 bullet lodged in the skull of one of the killed disproved the claim. In the second incident, where Israeli soldiers detained two teenage farmers, the army claimed the Palestinians were shot (one with five bullets and the other with at least two) because they attempted to attack a soldier with pitchforks, knives, or axes. The Real News’ Lia Tarachansky spoke to Edo Medicks and Jesse Rosenfeld of The Daily Nuisance. Rosenfeld and Medicks attended the funerals at Iraq Burin when the shooting in Awarta took place and investigated what actually took place.
This program was produced by The Real News for March 24, 2010.
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Actions in Jerusalem against military closures and settler provocations met with police repression.
Riots took place all over East Jerusalem this week in protest of settlers threatening to force their way into the Al Aqsa Mosque. As a result, Israeli security forces shut down major areas of the Old City, including the mosque compound to Muslim men under 50. The Real News’ Lia Tarachansky spoke to Toufic Haddad, journalist and author of Between the Lines: Israel the Palestinians, and the U.S. “war on terror” about the real reason for these protests. Haddad explains that Israeli colonization over East Jerusalem led to home demolitions, confiscations, and the flourishing of settlements all over the Palestinian Territories. Because these protests are supported by the government, Palestinian protests are systemically repressed, leading to mass arrests, injuries, and sometimes death. Alternative tactics, such as undercover police often lead to the tensions which are expected to rise as the Jerusalem Municipal Police approved another right-wing settler protest for Sunday through the Palestinian East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan.
This program was produced by The Real News for March 18, 2010.
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This week, the European Union’s Parliament passed a resolution endorsing the implementation of the recommendations of the Goldstone Report, which investigated war crimes in the attack on Gaza last year. While the motion was received with support from many NGOs, such as the Women’s Peace Coalition, it did not indicate specific actions the EU will actually take. The same has been true for the UN’s process as members of the Security Council said they would veto the report. Many are therefore taking it in their own hands to hold Israeli leaders accountable for alleged war crimes. The legal tool they’re using is called universal jurisdiction and refers to the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949 that said countries must be able to prosecute anyone who commits grave crimes. The Real News’ Lia Tarachansky investigates what universal jurisdiction is, how it is used, and how Israel is fighting against it.
This program was produced by The Real News for March 12, 2010.
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Protests in the Occupied Palestinian city of Hebron continue for a fifth consecutive day after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced a new Israeli “heritage” plan. In his plan, national and holy sites in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories will be classified as Israeli “heritage.” This move comes at a time when tensions in the city are already high due to settler takeovers and the commemoration of the 16th annual day of solidarity in memory of the 1994 Cave of the Patriarchs massacre.
This program was produced by The Real News for February 28, 2010.
Michael Ratner reports on his recent visit to the West Bank. Ratner is President of the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) in New York. He has taught at Yale Law School, lectured at Columbia Law School, and was President of the National Lawyers Guild.
This program was produced by The Real News for February 16, 2010.
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In weekly Friday protest in Bi’lin, Palestinian territories, thousands tear through segregation barrier.
During the weekly protest in the Palestinian village of Bil’in, thousands of activists assembled to celebrate five years of non-violent resistance. This form of popular struggle has spread to many other Palestinian villages and areas in East Jerusalem. The protests are made to show opposition to the confiscation of roughly half of the village’s land by the Israeli Jewish-only settlement colony of Modi’in Illit. In 2007, after the village protested every Friday for almost 3 years, the Israeli Supreme Court ruled that the barrier does not serve a security purpose and ordered it rerouted. The Israeli army however, did not start to reroute the barrier until last week and informed the village that it will only return 364 (or 60%) of its 575 taken acres. During this week’s protest the army fired dozens of tear gas canisters, shock grenades, and sprayed the crowd with liquid smelling like sewer and feces.
This program was produced by The Real News for February 21, 2010.
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