Jamaica formally recognizes Palestine as a state

Decision announced by Foreign Minister Kamina Johnson Smith following debate in Cabinet

Laura Gamba |24.04.2024 -


BOGOTA, Colombia

Jamaica decided to officially recognize the State of Palestine on Tuesday following deliberations in the Cabinet the previous day.

“Jamaica continues to advocate for a two-state solution as the only viable option to resolve the longstanding (Israeli-Palestinian) conflict, guarantee the security of Israel and uphold the dignity and rights of Palestinians. By recognizing the State of Palestine, Jamaica strengthens its advocacy towards a peaceful solution,” Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade Kamina Johnson Smith said in a press statement.

“The decision is in line with Jamaica’s strong commitment to the principles of the Charter of the United Nations, which aim to establish mutual respect and peaceful coexistence among States, as well as the recognition of the right of peoples to self-determination,” she added.

​​Johnson Smith reaffirmed Jamaica’s support for a cease-fire, the release of hostages and access to humanitarian aid for the people of Gaza.

“Jamaica continues to support all efforts for de-escalation and the establishment of lasting peace in the region, imploring all parties to consider the dire consequences of further conflict and commit to diplomatic solutions ensuring the safety and sovereignty of all,” she said.

Jamaica now joins around 140 UN member states and the 11 Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries that have recognized the State of Palestine, including Ecuador, Egypt, India, Iceland, Romania, Poland, Burundi, Thailand, Tanzania, Iraq, Sweden, Russia, Guyana, Haiti, Suriname, Cuba and the Dominican Republic.

CARICOM said on Oct. 9 last year that it “abhorred the attacks in Israel and the counter attacks in the Palestinian territory of Gaza” and 12 of its countries voted for a UN General Assembly resolution supporting “the ongoing efforts of the UN towards a two-state solution as the best way to achieve comprehensive peace, security and tranquility between Israel and Palestine.”

“The ongoing harsh conditions under which the Palestinians live in veritable colonialism and Israel’s sense of insecurity will contribute to a cycle of violence until those realities are definitively addressed,” a CARICOM statement said.

Jamaica's Prime Minister, Andrew Holness, had showed solidarity with Israel and called for a cessation of hostilities and a return to peace within internationally agreed guidelines, but he refrained from commenting on Israel's attacks on Gaza. ​​​​​​​

Exclusive: Israel Military Purge Escalating, Will Topple More Major Officials

‘Avalanche’ of exits to include defense minister, IDF commander, Shin Bet chief, sources tell SpyTalk

JONATHAN BRODER
APR 23, 2024

SpyTalk

Gone: IDF Military Intelligence chief Aharon Haliva, shown here speaking at a Tel Aviv conference in 2022 (photo credit: TOMER NEUBERG/FLASH90)

A major purge of senior Israeli military and intelligence officials is underway over their failure to prevent the devastating Oct. 7 Hamas attack.

On Monday, Maj. Gen. Aharon Haliva, the head of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) intelligence branch, resigned. He’s the first senior Israeli official to step down for failing to prevent the assault, in which Hamas militants killed some 1,200 Israelis and took more than 250 others hostage in the worst terrorist attack in Israel’s history

But he won’t be the last. As military investigators deepen their internal probe into the events surrounding the Oct. 7 attack, many others in the IDF’s intelligence branch, as well as Israel’s Shin Bet domestic intelligence agency, are expected to leave their posts in disgrace, knowledgeable Israeli sources told SpyTalk.

“The intelligence directorate under my command did not live up to the task we were entrusted with,” Haliva wrote in his anguished resignation letter. “I carry that black day with me ever since, day after day, night after night. I will carry the horrible pain of the war with me forever.”

Haliva’s resignation is expected to set off an avalanche of departures from the top echelons of Israel’s military and intelligence establishments, these sources say. Others who are expected to resign in the following months include Defense Minister Yoav Gallant; Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzl Halevi, the IDF’s top commanding officer; and Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar. All have publicly accepted responsibility for the Oct. 7 failure. But have continued to serve amid the demands of Israel’s war against Hamas, now in its sixth month.

“It’s not clear how quickly it will happen, but I’m sure more resignations will come,” Yossi Kucik, who served as chief of staff for former Prime Minister Ehud Barak, said in a telephone interview.

According to Amos Harel, the military correspondent for the daily Ha’aretz, others who played a role in the failures of Oct. 7 are poised to leave their posts, including several senior Shin Bet officials, the current and previous commander of IDF’s Southern command, the head of the IDF’s Operations Division, and the commander of the Gaza Division

Shin Bet boss Ronen Bar, seen here exiting his home in Oct. 2021, is expected to resign soon, sources tell SpyTalk. (Flash90 photo)

But a former senior government official says that lawyers for these officers are urging them to remain in their posts until the current ruling rightwing coalition leaves office and a new, more moderate government takes office.

“The problem is that if these people resign now, Bibi will replace them with radical rightwing ass-kissers,” the former senior official told SpyTalk, using Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s nickname. The former official asked to remain anonymous to discuss sensitive matters.

Israel’s next elections are in 2026, but many expect Netanyahu’s government will fall before then, forcing a new vote.

Eavesdropping Unit Purge

Earlier this month, the commander of Israel’s vaunted Unit 8200, the IDF’s powerful electronic and cyber surveillance agency, comparable to the U.S. National Security Agency, was forced to step down.

The resignation of Brig. Gen. Yossi Sariel, whose identity had been a closely guarded secret, followed an April 5 report in Britain’s Guardian newspaper, which revealed that a book about the military uses of artificial intelligence that Sariel published on Amazon in 2021, using only the author’s initials “Y.S.”, had left a digital trail that led to a private Google account created in his name. The paper said the trail also revealed Sariel’s “unique ID and links to the account's maps and calendar profiles.”

An IDF spokesman confirmed the unmasking of Sariel, describing the book’s exposure of the spy chief’s identity as “a mistake.” But even before this security lapse, Unit 8200 under Sariel’s command had come under fire for its failure to foresee and prevent the Oct. 7 Hamas attack.

Also on Monday, Maj. Gen. Yehuda Fox, the commander of Israel’s central command, which includes the occupied West Bank, notified his superiors that he would step down at the end of his three-year term in August. According to Israeli press reports, Fox said he told close associates that he saw himself as part of the IDF General Staff’s failures on Oct. 7 and was therefore honor-bound to step down.

Fox’s command has come under scrutiny by IDF investigators probing the events surrounding the Hamas attack. These included several instances in which IDF soldiers under Fox stood by or participated in violent attacks on West Bank Palestinian civilians.

Such human rights violations by Israeli forces in the West Bank, as well as others in Gaza, where Israel’s war against Hamas has killed some 34,000 Palestinians, according to the enclave’s Hamas-run Health Ministry, were included in the State Department’s annual human rights report, which was released on Monday.

In what would be an unprecedented move, the Biden administration is expected to slap sanctions on a special IDF unit for human rights violations in the West Bank, Axios reported last week. The sanctions would prohibit the unit from receiving any kind of U.S. military assistance or training under a 1997 law that prohibits U.S. foreign and military aid to foreign military, security and police units that have committed human rights violations.

The unit, called Netzah Yehuda, is a battalion made up of ultra-orthodox men and radical right wing settlers who were deemed unacceptable by all other IDF combat units.

The State Department began its investigation of Netzah Yehuda in 2022 after its soldiers were involved in numerous violent incidents against Palestinian civilians in the West Bank. In one incident, Netzah Yehuda soldiers arrested Omar Assad, an 80-year-old Palestinian American, at a checkpoint near his village, claiming he refused to be searched. In response, the soldiers handcuffed and gagged him, then left him on the ground in the cold. He was found dead a few hours later.

Months ago, a State Department team investigating alleged foreign human rights violations based on the 1997 law recommended that Secretary of State Antony Blinken sanction several Israel military and police units that operate in the West Bank. Asked about the team's recommendations at a news conference in Italy last Friday, Blinken said he had reached determinations based on the team’s investigation and that they would be made public “in the days ahead.”


SpyTalk is a reader-supported publication.

UN raises 'war crime' alert as 300+ bodies are found in Gaza mass graves

Discovery of hundreds of bodies of Palestinians at Nasser and Shifa hospitals, with some victims stripped naked and their hands tied, sparks renewed concerns from UN, with rights chief calling the situation in Israel-besieged Gaza "beyond warfare".


Reports continue to emerge about mass graves in Gaza, prompting renewed concerns about possible war crimes amid ongoing Israeli airstrikes, the UN human rights office, OHCHR said. / Photo : AA

Reports of mass graves found in Gaza over the weekend at Nasser Hospital and Al Shifa Hospital in Gaza City in which Palestinian victims were found stripped naked with their hands tied, according to the UN, have prompted renewed concerns about possible war crimes by Israel amid its ongoing invasion of the besieged enclave.

"The intentional killing of civilians, detainees, and others who are hors de combat [someone who cannot fight back] is a war crime," UN rights chief Volker Turk said on Tuesday.

"Among the deceased were allegedly older people, women and wounded, while others were found tied with their hands…tied and stripped of their clothes," Ravina Shamdasani, spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, added.

The US has now sought information from Israel on "incredibly troubling" reports of mass graves in the Palestinian enclave where Israel's invasion from land, air and sea continued on day 200.

The UN outcry came after the recovery of hundreds of bodies "buried deep in the ground and covered with waste" at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, central Gaza, and at Al Shifa Hospital in Gaza City in the north.

UN rights chief noted that he was "horrified" by the destruction of Nasser and Al Shifa medical facilities in Gaza and reports of mass graves containing hundreds of bodies there, according to a spokesperson.

At least 30 bodies of Palestinians were recovered from two mass graves at Al Shifa Hospital last week following a 14-day Israeli siege on the hospital, the largest in Gaza, in March. The hospital was largely reduced to ruins after Israel withdrew April 1.

At least 283 corpses were found in a mass grave at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis after the Israeli army withdrew from the city April 7 following a four-month ground invasion, according to Gaza's civil defence agency.

Shamdasani, the spokesperson for the UN's human rights agency, said the rights organisation was raising the alarm because multiple bodies had been discovered.

"Some of them had their hands tied, which of course indicates serious violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law, and these need to be subjected to further investigations," Shamdasani said.

She added that the UN human rights office was working on corroborating Palestinian officials' reports, including one that 30 bodies were found at Al Shifa.

Reuters news agency reporters verified emergency workers digging corpses out of the ground in the ruins of Nasser hospital.

'Unspeakable suffering'

Gaza's Civil Emergency Service said on Tuesday a total of 310 bodies had been found at one mass grave at Nasser so far and that two other graves had been identified, but not yet excavated.

Turk, who was represented by Shamdasani at a UN press briefing, also decried Israeli strikes on Gaza in recent days, which he said had killed mostly women and children.

Shamdasani said the UN human rights office had received reports that some of the victims in another Gaza area Nur Shams had been killed in apparent extrajudicial executions.

"The latest images of a premature child taken from the womb of her dying mother, of the adjacent two houses where 15 children and five women were killed, this is beyond warfare," UN rights chief said in a statement.

The High Commissioner decried the "unspeakable suffering" caused by months of warfare and appealed once again for "the resulting misery and destruction, starvation and disease and the risk of wider conflict" to end.

UN has reiterated the call for an immediate ceasefire, the release of all remaining hostages taken from Israel and those held in arbitrary detention, and the unfettered flow of humanitarian aid.

Israel has waged a brutal military invasion on the Palestinian territory since an October last year following cross-fence raid by Hamas resistance fighters. The hours-long raid and Israeli military's haphazard reaction resulted in the killings of more than 1,130 people, Israeli officials and local media say.

Palestinian fighters took more than 250 hostages and presently 130 remain in Gaza, including 34 who the Israeli army says are dead, some of them killed in indiscriminate Israeli strikes.

Hamas says its October 7 blitz on Israel that surprised its arch-enemy was orchestrated in response to Israeli attacks on Al Aqsa Mosque, illegal settler violence in occupied West Bank and to put Palestine question "back on the table."

Israel has since then killed at least 34,200 Palestinians — 70 percent of them babies, women and children — and wounded more than 77,000 others, while thousands are feared buried under debris of homes annihilated in Israeli bombardment.

The Israeli war, now in its 200th day, has pushed 85 percent of Gaza's population into internal displacement amid acute shortages of food, clean water and medicine, while 60 percent of the enclave's infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.

Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, whichhas ordered Tel Aviv to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.

Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the rights situation in the Palestinian territories, said recently there were reasonable grounds to believe Israel was committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

France imposing restrictions on expressions of solidarity with Gaza: Amnesty

Limitations recently imposed on public displays of solidarity as well as cancellation or prohibition of events, says rights group

Esra Taskin |24.04.2024 -


PARIS

France has been imposing restrictions on expressions of solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza, human rights group Amnesty International said Tuesday.

The statement by Amnesty’s local branch said recent weeks have witnessed a series of limitations imposed on public displays of solidarity coupled with the cancellation or prohibition of events, while individuals face accusations of disseminating "terrorist propaganda."

One such instance cited by Amnesty was the banning of a scheduled conference on Palestine organized by the Free Palestine Association in the city of Lille earlier this month.

French authorities justified the ban, citing concerns over "terrorist propaganda," a move condemned by rights advocates as an attempt to stifle legitimate discourse on the Palestinian cause.

Amid these developments, Mathilde Panot, a senior Member of Parliament for France's La France Insoumise (LFI) party known for her vocal support for Palestine, revealed that she had been summoned for questioning on charges of "terrorist propaganda."

Panot, undeterred by the intimidation tactics, reaffirmed her commitment to standing against the genocide faced by the Palestinian people.

Israel has waged a sweeping offensive on the Gaza Strip since a cross-border attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7 which killed around 1,200 people.

At least 34,151 Palestinians have since been killed, mostly women and children, and 77,000 have been injured amid mass destruction and severe shortages of necessities.

The Israeli war has pushed 85% of Gaza’s population into internal displacement as acute shortages of food plunge Gaza into famine.

Israel is accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice. An interim ruling in January ordered Tel Aviv to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.

Over 3,660 Palestinians being held in Israel under administrative detention: Rights groups

Detainees include 22 women and more than 40 children

Awad Rajoob |24.04.2024 - 



RAMALLAH, Palestine

More than 3,660 Palestinians are being held under administrative detention in Israeli prisons, the highest number since 1967, prisoners' rights groups said Tuesday.

"As of the beginning of April, more than 3,660 Palestinians were being held under administrative detention in Israeli occupation prisons, marking 200 days since the continuous aggression in Gaza,'' the Commission of Detainees' Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoners Society said in a joint statement.

The statement pointed out that "the number of detainees was around 1,320 before the Hamas Oct. 7 attack.''

Administrative detention is imprisonment under Israeli military order without charges being filed, lasting for six months and renewable.

The current number of Palestinians who are under administrative detention is "the highest since 1967 and since human rights institutions began documenting data on administrative detainees during the years of the Stone (First) Intifada in 1987,'' Amani Sarahneh, the media coordinator for the Prisoners Club, told Anadolu.

"Among the current detainees are 22 women and more than 40 children,” the statement added.

The statement also noted that "the number of new or renewed administrative detention orders issued after Oct. 7 reached 5,210."

At least 9,500 Palestinians, including 80 women and more than 200 children, are behind bars at Israeli prisons, according to Palestinian figures.

Tensions have been high across the occupied West Bank since Israel launched a deadly military offensive against the Gaza Strip which has killed nearly 34,200 people following an attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7 last year.

At least 487 Palestinians have since been killed and over 4,800 others injured by Israeli army fire in the occupied West Bank.

Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, which in an interim ruling in January ordered it to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.

*Writing by Mohammad Sio in Istanbul

Student protests for Palestine spread on US college campuses as crackdowns backfire

Last week’s decision by Columbia University President Minouche Shafik to ask police to arrest dozens of protesters has largely served as a flashpoint for wider protest movement

Michael Hernandez |24.04.2024 - 


WASHINGTON

Student antiwar protests spread and intensified at US universities on Tuesday as demonstrators demanded that their institutions of higher learning condemn Israel’s war on the besieged Gaza Strip and divest from Israeli firms in response.

Last week’s decision by Columbia University President Minouche Shafik to ask the New York Police Department to arrest dozens of protesters has largely served as a flashpoint for the wider protest movement.

Thursday’s arrests of over 100 people incensed students who have been stridently seeking an immediate cease-fire to end the bloodshed in Gaza and emboldened a new wave of protesters.

At Columbia, protesters defiantly changed tactics and quickly moved to a lawn adjacent from the original "Gaza Solidarity Encampment" cleared by police. They were joined on Tuesday by Palestinian photographer Motaz Azaiza, whose work chronicled the grim realities of the war in Gaza, and Najla Said, the daughter of late Palestinian intellectual Edward Said.

As protests have continued on that campus, they have also been spreading rapidly on campuses near and far, including at New York University and the New School in Manhattan, Harvard University near Boston and Yale in Connecticut.

Protesters at the New School have now occupied the lobby of the University Center for the better part of three days. A picket line has formed outside the facility, bucking threats of suspensions and expulsions from administrators.

Over 130 people, including students and professors, were arrested overnight Monday at New York University. They were released with court summonses requiring them to appear before a judge at a later date.

Protesters at Yale University in Connecticut have opted to sleep under the stars in order to skirt threats from administrators that they would be arrested if they attempted to set up tents again after an initial tent encampment was cleared Monday alongside dozens of arrests.

Harvard Yard remains closed Tuesday, and campus authorities are checking for student IDs before allowing people on campus.

The unrest has not been limited to the Northeast, however.

Some 3,000 miles (4,828 kilometers) away from Columbia, demonstrators at California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt occupied Siemens Hall on Monday and clashed with police who tried to clear them from the facility. Officers ultimately withdrew from the site without bringing about an end to the demonstration, though arrests were reported.

Another encampment erected by students at the Twin Cities campus of the University of Minnesota on Tuesday morning quickly resulted in the arrests of nine individuals. Students responded by gathering en masse for a demonstration that was sharply critical of Interim President Jeff Ettinger.

About 1,000 people participated, and students rapidly moved to establish a new camp consisting of several yurts in front of the Coffman Memorial Student Union.

Other encampments erected in the wake of last week's events were established at Swarthmore College and the University of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania, the University of Rochester in New York, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Tufts University and Emerson College in Massachusetts, and the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.

The size of each sit-in varies greatly, but photos of the site at the University of Michigan showed dozens of tents.

While last week's events greatly accelerated the antiwar movement, several pro-Palestine encampments preceded the crackdown, including one at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, which has endured for nearly a month.

Efforts to restrict the protests have done little to quell criticism from those who say university leaders are not doing enough to provide campus security, particularly for Jewish students.

Israel's offensive on the Gaza Strip has displaced more than 75% of the coastal enclave's estimated 2.3 million residents and resulted in over 34,000 deaths, according to Gaza health officials. The vast majority of the dead have been women and children.

Israel has also targeted Gaza's places of higher education, with all of its 12 major universities being destroyed.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees, or UNRWA, has separately reported mass destruction at the sprawling network of schools it operates in the coastal enclave. ​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

How Columbia University is becoming a flashpoint for pro-Palestine protests in the US

The varsity was thrust into the limelight over the suspension and arrest of over 100 students protesting against university involvement with companies linked to Israel.

Images Staff

DAWN
24 Apr, 2024

New York’s Columbia University — an Ivy League school that prides itself on being the “finest liberal arts college in the US” — has become a hotbed of pro-Palestine protests after being thrust into the limelight due to the suspension and subsequent arrest of over a 100 protesting Columbia University and Barnard College students.

On April 17, students against Israel’s aggressive military offensive in Gaza established a “Gaza Solidarity Encampment” on school grounds. The demonstrating students, part of the Columbia University Apartheid Divest — a coalition of over 100 student groups from various institutions — attempted to raise calls for the varsity to financially divest from companies and institutions that “profit from Israeli apartheid, genocide and occupation in Palestine.”
What happened

On Thursday, around 108 demonstrating students, including Jewish students, and Minnesota Congresswoman and Democratic Party member Ilhan Omar’s daughter Isra Hirsi, who is a student at Barnard student, were suspended and eventually arrested on grounds of “trespassing”.

Columbia University President Dr Nemat Talaat “Minouche” Shafik requested the New York Police Department to “remove” student protesters in a letter. “More than 100 individuals are currently occupying the South Lawn of Columbia University’s Morningside Heights campus. This group has been informed numerous times and in writing that they are not permitted to occupy this space, are in violation of the University’s rules and policies and must disperse. All University students participating in the encampment have been informed they are suspended. At this time, the participants in the encampment are not authorised to be on University property and are trespassing,” the letter read.

The protests, disciplinary action, and arrests came a day after Shafik’s testimony at a Congress hearing about growing antisemitism on campus. According to a CNN report, “confrontations on campus” sparked condemnation from the White House and New York officials.

“The students that were arrested were peaceful, offered no resistance whatsoever and were saying what they wanted to say in a peaceful manner,” the outlet quoted NYPD Chief of Patrol John Chell as saying.

However, fourth year Columbia student Maryam Alwan, who helped organise the protest, in a televised MSNBC interview, said, “We were arrested on the grounds of trespass, meaning that we would’ve had to have been suspended in order to be trespassing onto our own campus but the suspension letter said that you are suspended for violation of law because you were arrested for trespassing so it doesn’t even make sense and feels like it’s part of repressive campaign against Palestine advocacy that has been ongoing for months now.”

Accompanying Alwan for the interview, Hirsi noted, “This was expected, we knew the risks and we knew what we were engaging in. However, I wasn’t really expecting to be locked out of my dorm and of campus as quickly as I was.”

The protests have now spread to other campuses, including Yale and MIT. Police arrested dozens of people at the demonstrations at Yale in Connecticut and New York University in Manhattan, according to Reuters.

From Yale, 60 people, including at least 47 student protesters, were arrested for trespassing after they blocked traffic around campus, according to a statement by Yale University President Peter Salovey issued on Monday. Several protesters were also arrested from NYU.

Hundreds of faculty members at Columbia also held a mass walkout on Monday to protest Shafik’s decision to have police arrest students on campus.
Exposing double standards

The university protests have become a flashpoint in the Palestinian liberation movement in the US and the response to the protests has exposed a troubling double standard in both the media coverage and the way the protests have been handled.

Much of the media coverage has highlighted the impact on Jewish students and communities as opposed to focusing on the protesters’ demands or the reasons for demonstrations.

A CNN report on the crisis at the varsity ahead of Jewish holiday Passover on Monday detailed a rabbi’s call to Jewish students on campus, urging them to stay home amid “tense confrontations,” but failed to give a single instance of antisemitism, harassment, or violence perpetrated against any Jewish student by another student at Columbia.

It makes a case for university officials’ testimonies about antisemitism on campus being a direct consequence of the pro-Palestinian protests on and near campus but makes no mention of the suspended Jewish students who were part of the encampment protests.

These students described the “discriminatory, repressive and unsafe conditions” they faced for protesting at the liberated zone at Columbia University in an open letter shared by Jewish Voice for Peace. The letter highlights how the suspension obstructed their religious observances during Shabbat and left them homeless on the religious holiday.

Threats from ‘outside’ the campus

In a sea of reports about various condemnations of the protests, one New York Times article highlighted how Jewish students feeling “targeted” at Columbia cited threats from outside the campus, not inside it.

“After reports of harassment by demonstrators, some Jewish students said they felt unsafe. Others rejected that view, while condemning antisemitism,” the report read. It pointed to an incident that occurred over the weekend after student-led demonstrations on campus allegedly attracted more agitated protests by demonstrators seemingly unaffiliated with the university “outside Columbia’s gated campus.”

Columbia University Apartheid Divest addressed these “unassociated incidents” in an Instagram story, assuring that their “priority is the safety of all,” which “includes not antagonising counter protesters or escalating situations unnecessarily.”
Students versus Shafik

The Columbia University president’s testimony before Congress about antisemitism has also been rebuked by protesting students, who in a sharp editorial published in The Columbia Daily Spectator, called on her to do more to protect protesters who had been doxxed.

The Barnard and Columbia chapter of the American Association of University Professors released a “Resolution of Censure of President Shafik, her administration, and the co-chairs of the Board of Trustees,” that they plan to submit to the University Senate.

The resolution was drafted after Shafik’s decision to authorise the NYPD to sweep the Gaza Solidarity Encampment.

“President Shafik’s violation of the fundamental requirements of academic freedom and shared governance, and her unprecedented assault on students’ rights, warrants unequivocal and emphatic condemnation,” the resolution read.

The editorial stated that Shafik had “demonstrated a complete lack of consistency in enforcing her principles, failing to differentiate between speech she personally opposes and speech warranting suppression.”

Shafik had said in a letter on Thursday announcing her decision to summon the police that the encampment had “disrupted campus life and had created an atmosphere of intimidation.”

Conflating pro-Palestine sentiments with antisemitism

But Shafik isn’t the only one blaming peaceful student protests for rising antisemitism in and around campuses. US President Joe Biden is one of several other politicians conflating pro-Palestine sentiments with antisemitism and blaming students and the pro-Palestine movement for propagating hatred towards Jewish people.

Andrew Bates, a spokesperson for the White House, said in a statement, “While every American has the right to peaceful protest, calls for violence and physical intimidation targeting Jewish students and the Jewish community are blatantly antisemitic, unconscionable and dangerous.” Bates’ statement failed to separate protests outside campus from demonstrations inside the campus while conflating calls for peace to antisemitic vitriol.

Similarly, in a statement to commemorate Passover, President Biden said it was necessary to speak out against “the alarming surge of antisemitism in our schools, communities, and online”.

“Silence is complicity. Even in recent days, we’ve seen harassment and calls for violence against Jews. Footage shared on social media appeared to show activists telling students to ‘go back to Poland’ and that October 7 is ‘going to be every day for you’ — referring to Hamas’s attacks on Israel in which 1,139 people were killed.”

Israel’s Foreign Minister, Israel Katz wrote on X of the Columbia protests, “I urge NYC Mayor, US officials and leaders to take immediate, unequivocal action to combat this scourge. Jewish students deserve safety, respect, and action, not just words.”

But Jewish students supporting the pro-Palestinian demonstrations on campus said they felt solidarity, not a sense of danger, even as they denounced the acts of antisemitism.

In a statement on Sunday, a group of student activists representing the protesters distanced themselves from “inflammatory individuals” and said they reject any form of hate or bigotry. “We are frustrated by media distractions focusing on inflammatory individuals who do not represent us. At universities across the nation, our movement is united in valuing every human life,” the statement read.

“Our members have been misidentified by a politically-motivated mob. We have been doxxed in the press, arrested by the NYPD [New York Police Department], and locked out of our homes by the university. We have knowingly put ourselves in danger because we can no longer be complicit in Columbia funnelling our tuition dollars and grant funding into companies that profit from death,” the statement added.

In the MSNBC interview, when asked if the encampment made other students feel uncomfortable or was threatening to anyone, Congresswoman Omar’s daughter Hisri detailed, “We would be singing songs, we had meals together, people prayed together. They held Chabat yesterday. It’s really just been a very community-centred space. And because it was being held outside, it didn’t disrupt any classes and the zone that we were protesting in, is the demonstration zone that you are allowed to be able to protest in. The school had already placed this spot to be meant for these kind of actions.”

IT'S PASSOVER

Pro-Palestine seders planned in New York, elsewhere as US campuses simmer

Organisers say they are willing to risk arrests as they demand Biden administration stop arming Israel against besieged Palestinians of Gaza.


Palestinian flags are seen around the encampment on the campus of Columbia University in New York City / Photo: AFP

Pro-Palestinian demonstrators plan to risk mass arrest by closing down the Brooklyn street where US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer resides, a coalition of Jewish groups opposing Israel's carnage in besieged Gaza have said.

The protest, planned on the second night of the week-long Jewish feast of Passover, is one of a dozen to be held in cities around the country, including Portland, Oregon, and Seattle.

There has been a spate of major demonstrations on college campuses from California to Massachusetts over the past week.

On many of the campuses, protesters have set up tent encampments to press their demands.

In Brooklyn on Tuesday, protesters will hold a Passover Sedar, a ritual holiday meal and service, while urging Schumer, the highest elected Jewish American, to support an end to providing US weapons for Israel's war in Gaza, organisers said in a statement.

"Hundreds will risk arrest while demanding Senator Schumer, who has recently spoken sharply against Netanyahu, take the next step and stop arming Israel," the statement said, referring to far-right Israeli Prime Minister.

Since Friday, hundreds of students and others were arrested at Columbia, Yale and New York University.

Protests in 'uncommitted' Minnesota

At the University of Minnesota, pro-Palestine protesters demonstrated on campus to demand an end to the Israeli carnage in Gaza and press the university to cut ties with companies and institutions that support Israel.

In a case that is not the first in which police responded with aggression against students, it was reported that nine of the students were arrested.

Dozens were previously arrested at Columbia and Yale universities.

Later, an emergency protest mobilised over a thousand students and staff members, and a community organiser said the Solidarity Encampment was being re-established.

Muslims in Minnesota announced months ago they would be voting uncommitted over President Joe Biden's support for Israel. Jewish activists also joined Minnesota's Muslims in the protest vote.



Tensions across campuses

At Columbia in New York City, the university cancelled in-person classes on Monday in a bid to defuse tensions on campus and out of concern that Jewish students faced possible harassment.

On Tuesday, the school said classes for the rest of the year were hybrid — with students able to attend either online or in person.

New York City police arrested more than 120 protesters on New York University's campus late on Monday, a police spokesperson said. Police said university authorities reached out for help, and protesters failed to clear by the deadline given by the university.

Israel has waged a brutal military invasion on the Palestinian territories since October last year following cross-fence raid by Hamas resistance fighters. The hours-long raid and the Israeli military's haphazard reaction resulted in the killings of more than 1,130 people, Israeli officials and local media have revised down from 1400.

Palestinian fighters took more than 250 hostages and presently 130 remain in Gaza, including 34 who the Israeli army says are dead, many of them killed in indiscriminate Israeli strikes and targeting by Israeli soldiers.

Hamas says its October 7 blitz on Israel that surprised its arch-enemy was orchestrated in response to Israeli attacks on Al Aqsa Mosque, illegal settler violence in occupied West Bank and to put Palestine question "back on the table."

Israel has since then killed at least 34,200 Palestinians — 70 percent of them babies, women and children — and wounded more than 77,000 others, while thousands are feared buried under debris of homes annihilated in Israeli bombardment.

The Israeli war, now in its 200th day, has pushed 85 percent of Gaza's population into internal displacement amid acute shortages of food, clean water and medicine, while 60 percent of the enclave's infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.

Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, whichhas ordered Tel Aviv to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.

Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the rights situation in the Palestinian territories, said recently there were reasonable grounds to believe Israel was committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

Gaza demonstrators at New School in US threatened with suspension as protests grow

Protesters warned of multitude of potential penalties ranging from warnings to suspension and expulsion

Michael Hernandez |24.04.2024 - 



WASHINGTON

Students taking part in a sit-in protest at a school in the US against "the ongoing genocide of Palestinians in Gaza" have been threatened with suspension, activists and the school's student-run newspaper said Tuesday.

Demonstrators set up what they are calling the Gaza Solidarity Encampment in the University Center lobby at the New School, a private university in New York City, on Sunday. They have remained there since.

New School administrators ended negotiations with demonstrators without a resolution, the school's chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine said on social media Monday. They implored community members to join at the University Center to prevent arrests and suspensions from moving forward.

The New School Free Press student-run newspaper reported that Monday's negotiations with Mark Diaz, the executive vice president for Business Operations at the university, were intended to discuss divestment from "corporations benefiting from and complicit in the ongoing genocide and apartheid against Palestinian people."

Full financial transparency from the university was also to be addressed. But the meeting was called off after protesters refused demands from the administration to immediately disband.

The newspaper reported that the New School's Student Conduct and Community Standards Office issued a statement in which they warned students taking part in the demonstration that they face a range of disciplinary actions to include expulsion, "interim suspension" and unspecified warnings.

Officers with the New York Police Department have been photographed outside the building's entrance.

It is unclear when the photos were taken, but videos posted to social media Tuesday appeared to show a picket line of students on the street outside the University Center.

Protests against Israel's war against Gaza have intensified on college campuses after Columbia University, also in New York City, asked the NYPD last week to arrest demonstrators staging a sit-in on a college lawn. More than 100 people were arrested on Thursday.

The action has largely invigorated antiwar demonstrators as protests have spread to other campuses including the New School, Yale and New York University and has done little to quell criticism from those who say university leaders are not doing enough to provide campus security, particularly for Jewish students.

All 10 New York Republicans in the US House of Representatives urged Columbia President Minouche Shafik to step down Monday. The conservative lawmakers said in a letter to Shafik that "anarchy has engulfed" the school's Manhattan campus and accused Shafik of failing to provide students with "a safe learning environment."

Israel's offensive on the Gaza Strip has displaced more than 75% of the coastal enclave's estimated 2.3 million residents and resulted in over 34,000 deaths, according to Gaza health officials. Israel has also targeted Gaza's places of higher education with all of its 12 major universities being destroyed.

The UN's Palestine Refugee Agency (UNRWA) has separately reported mass destruction at the sprawling network of schools it operates in the coastal enclave.

Demonstrators are demanding that universities divest from Israel-linked firms and condemn Israel's assault on Gaza. Counter-protesters in support of Israel have said the protests veer into antisemitism and make Jewish students feel unsafe.​​​​​​​

 

Opinion: Civil society should actively support Armenia-Azerbaijan border demarcation

24 APRIL 2024

Onnik James Krikorian

The announcement of the return of the four non-enclave villages of Baghanis Ayrim, Ashagi Askipara, Kheyrimli, and Gizilhajili comes as a welcome development. Situated in that part of Azerbaijan’s Gazakh region under Armenian control since the early 1990s, they were initially mentioned in an early version of the November trilateral ceasefire statement before being removed from the final version. In January, President Ilham Aliyev raised them again and after the issue became central to the work of the border commissions, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan last month acknowledged that they were indeed not de jure part of the Republic of Armenia.

Whatever his reasons, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan made a bold,  courageous, and some would argue, necessary move by doing so, despite the ire it would inevitably attract. A sea of disinformation and existential narratives re-emerged but rather than backtrack he instead visited local settlements adjacent to the provisional border to assure residents that their concerns, real or perceived, would be addressed by the government. This focus on those Armenian settlements also highlighted how they had hitherto been ignored by almost everyone.

Even prior to the 44-day War, Tavush had been a frontline in the conflict between the two countries, quite unlike that part of the Armenian border adjacent to the then occupied Azerbaijani regions of Kelbajar, Lachin, Qubadli, and Zangilan. With the exception of the non-enclaves discussed today, Gazakh was not otherwise taken and remained populated by Azerbaijan. With a distinct lack of adequate road communication to other parts of Tavush, the area around Noyemberyan and Voskepar often felt isolated in the administrative region. Poverty and out-migration was high and some arable land was unreachable because of landmines planted along the border. The potential dividends from the new deal for this small part of Armenia are therefore not insignificant, if development follows.

That is not to say that there won’t be problems as the physical process of delimitation/demarcation takes place, and military forces are replaced by border guards, and nor does it ignore the distinct lack of trust between Yerevan and Baku, but it does highlight the need for more focused work in order to build confidence between the sides. Pashinyan has already hinted at the idea of trade between the two communities at some point in an albeit distant future but this is also a region that has experienced significant cross-border incidents for over 30 years.

The task won’t be simple, but civil society in both countries could and should play an important role alongside the work of the two governments. To date, only one such project is known to have included residents of Gazakh and Tavush – Georgi Vanyan’s “Tekali Process” in Georgia close to Armenia and Azerbaijan. Sadly, it was a project implemented before its time but now it would be essential. His eventual aim was to establish a cross-border market to encourage more people-to-people contact in the same way that the old nearby cross-border Bagratashen-Sadakhlo market once did.

Resurrecting these ideas again seems only natural in this new reality, and long overdue. While the two communities remain in close proximity there will soon be no armies deployed in-between. Instead, border guards will replace them while the area also falls under the responsibility of monitors from the European Union Mission in Armenia (EUMA) operating from Ijevan. An Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism (IPRM) as the European Union Monitoring Mission (EUMM) operates in Georgia is unlikely to emerge as things stand, though something similar could be implemented by the authorities in cooperation with local residents.

Projects directly benefitting the communities would also go a long way in alleviating any sense of isolation, deprivation, and insecurity. This could also include those organisations willing and able to take on the coordinated task of landmine awareness on both sides of the border as some could still remain. There will also be the always-present issue of shared water resources and accidental crossings of the border too.

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That there are now protests in the area surrounding Voskepar and Kirants shows that the communities will need to be engaged in the long-term. Pashinyan has already referred to the return of the villages and demarcation as a pilot project. Indeed, as Azerbaijanis return to their homes in other border regions, the same issues will emerge there and perhaps even more so.

But there is reason for hope. One of the main concerns of those protesting is that one of two main routes from Armenia to Georgia passes through a small part of territory soon to be returned, though a bypass will likely be constructed. Ironically, its final destination is the ethnic Azerbaijani border village of Sadakhlo in Georgia, itself part of the majority ethnic Azerbaijani Marneuli municipality. Not only does all of Armenia’s passenger traffic via those two roads pass through that region with no problem, but so too does a sizeable amount of freight. Inter-ethnic trade already exists, albeit in that third country, while the issue of crossing the border by accident is addressed even for ethnic Armenians in Georgia that inadvertently get lost.

It could be that this is where things will inevitably lead anyway. There is much pressure on local communities to rebuff the new agreement, and while the involvement of local administration heads in a working group newly announced under the Commission on the Delimitation of the State Border is positive, some have reportedly already pulled out. But as always in the South Caucasus, time will be of the essence lest another window of opportunity be lost. Civil society could help here, but sooner rather than later.

source: Onnik James Krikorian is a journalist, photojournalist, and consultant from the U.K. who has covered the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict since 1994.

photo: On April 23, 2024, the first border post was installed on the border between the Republic of Azerbaijan and the Republic of Armenia within the framework of the process of specifying the coordinates based on geodetic measurements on the ground.

The views expressed in opinion pieces and commentaries do not necessarily reflect the position of commonspace.eu or its partners

 

 

Rafah showdown

Dina Ezzat , Tuesday 23 Apr 2024

The countdown to an Israeli ground offensive on Rafah has started, writes Dina Ezzat

“We are bracing ourselves for the worst and we know it is coming very soon.”

Speaking earlier this week, the staff member of a humanitarian relief organisation working on the Egyptian side of the Rafah border with Gaza said agencies were stepping up their level of readiness “to manage a huge humanitarian crisis” as “the countdown” for the Israeli ground offensive on Rafah began.

“The word is that it is coming before the end of this month. We are talking about days.”

Agency workers say that everyone has given up hope on the US administration’s ability to convince Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to forego a ground attack on the southern Gaza city where most of the Strip’s population has sought refuge. In the words of one UN source: “The US managed to get Netanyahu to contain his response to the Iranian attack of 14 April and the cautious Israeli strike five days later appeared to confirm diplomatic assessments that in return the US will accommodate Netanyahu’s Rafah offensive.”

For two weeks, Netanyahu has been insisting that the date for a ground offensive on Rafah has been set. Humanitarian agency and diplomatic sources have long expected the operation to begin sometime in the second half of April or early May. They warn that it will dramatically increase the 35,000 Palestinian civilians who have already been killed, and close to 100,000 injured, since the start of Israel’s war on Gaza.

This week, Egypt and a host of other countries, including the US and France, warned once again of the humanitarian toll any ground offensive on Rafah will exact. According to an Egyptian diplomatic source, appeals for Netanyahu to reconsider his plans, and demands that an efficient humanitarian evacuation scheme be put in place, are ongoing and continue to be ignored by Netanyahu.

Ahmed Morsy, senior associate researcher at the Stockholm Peace Research Institute’s Middle East Programme, argues that the state of looming anticipation may continue for much longer than early next month “because it is in Netanyahu’s interests to keep the situation loose and avoid being pressed to provide answers to questions for which he has none.”

The questions, says Morsy, include the future of Israeli security along the border with Gaza “in an assumed post-Hamas phase” and “the fate of the hostages which might not be resolved by an Israeli ground offensive”. Delaying the offensive could also allow Netanyahu to continue to extract political gains from his Western allies and continue to undermine “any possibility of a Palestinian state being established within politically acceptable parameters”.

In the event of an attack, the diplomatic and humanitarian sources who spoke to Al-Ahram Weekly say a different set of questions — for Israel and its closest regional allies and its enemies — remains unanswered.

How will the “humanitarian tragedy” that is expected to unfold with the ground offensive be managed? Egyptian officials say Cairo has stepped up security measures to avert any “unlawful entry into Egyptian territories” in parallel with increased humanitarian readiness along the borders and in nearby hospitals.

And what plans exist for the day after the ground offensive on Rafah? How will Gaza be managed?

Egypt, together with Jordan and some European countries, has been examining the possibility of hybrid security and humanitarian scenarios being set up that leave space for the involvement of Hamas and other militant resistance factions.

And what will be the role of UNRWA? Despite an independent inquiry announcing this week that Israel has failed to provide any evidence to back its claim that 12 UNRWA local staff were complicit in the 7 October attack on Israel, the organisation is still being targeted by the Israeli government.

Other questions relate to the future of the Palestinian Authority (PA) that is based — or “constrained”, as one former PA source put it — in the West Bank. What is the future for even a semblance of Palestinian political cohesion given the PA’s hands-off approach to the war on Gaza?

What of normalisation, especially between Israel and Saudi Arabia, which Arab diplomatic sources say the Biden administration is continuing to push hard to secure ahead of US elections in the autumn? What if the Iranian-Israeli tit-for-tat confrontation, which began with an Israeli attack on an Iranian diplomatic compound, spins further out of control?

According to Morsy, with or without an Israeli ground offensive on Rafah, the PA has been severely weakened by its failure to show any leadership vis-à-vis the war on Gaza and by repeated Israeli attacks in the West Bank. On normalisation, Morsy believes the process will continue along parallel tracks, with the Saudi track the least likely to produce a deal any time soon “given that with or after the war on Gaza the Saudis are in a stronger negotiating position.”

The Iran-Israel front, meanwhile, will continue to have a life of its own, says Morsy. Iran has demonstrated that it will only attack Israel directly in response to direct Israeli attacks on Iran, as was the case in the Israeli operation against the Iranian Consulate in Damascus earlier this month.

“Iran demarcated its red lines very clearly this month, and in a way that is independent of developments in Gaza,” he says.

Nor, in the short term, is Iran in a position to increase financial support or arms supplies to Hamas or other militant groups backed by Tehran given the impact of the Israeli war on Gaza and US-led military operations in the Red Sea in response to Houthi attacks on Israel and Israeli-destined shipping.  

Among so many questions that still require answers, whatever the timing of the Israeli offensive against Rafah, there is also the issue of Hamas. Will the damage sustained by the group force it to go further underground, resulting in less coordinated operations? And Netanyahu himself? What is his political future, and what is the fate of his long-held goal of liquidating the Palestinian cause once and for all?

“But the biggest question of all today, which goes beyond this war and the horrific bloodshed it has brought, concerns the prospects for Palestinian statehood as it has been pursued since the Oslo Accords,” says Morsy.

“Should we be anticipating a new political process, one that has to start from scratch?”

 

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* A version of this article appears in print in the 25 April, 2024 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly

China takes the lead in green technology

NOT OVERSUPPLY

China completely dominates the production and supply of solar panels

 / bne IntelliNews

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By bne IntelliNews April 24, 2024

China has taken the lead in green technology. President Xi Jinping, highlighting the country's dominance in key segments of this burgeoning industry, has drawn sharp criticiam from the US for non-market practises.

Transitioning from its traditional reliance on the housing market, green energy has become the primary economic driver in China, supporting Xi's push to promote the "green agenda" globally.

The figures from 2023, highlight China’s aggressive expansion in the sector, with the deployment of solar photovoltaic systems growing 2.5 times to reach a capacity of 261 gigawatts (GW). In stark contrast, the United States and the European Union have deployed only 32 GW and 53 GW, respectively.

China has also made substantial progress in regulating carbon emissions. Launched in 2021, its national carbon emission trading system initially targeted the power sector and is set to expand to include high-emission industries such as oil refining, petrochemicals, chemical production, and aviation.

With a current carbon price of around €8 per ton, the system is designed to progressively encompass all major carbon emitters and is expected to see a gradual increase in permit costs.

China takes the lead of green technology supply chains