Monthly Archives: March 2019

With Elections Weeks Away, Israel Pounds Gaza

Israel began strikes on the Gaza Strip, hitting targets across the already-besieged enclave.

The strikes began at around 18:00 local time (16:00 GMT), after Israel spent the day preparing for the assault. After claiming that a rocket was fired from Gaza on a town north of Tel Aviv, the Israeli army sent two army brigades – amounting to over 1,000 soldiers – to the Gaza fence and called up reservists from aerial units in preparation for air strikes.

Israel also locked down the Gaza Strip, closing the Kerem Shalom (Karm Abu Salem) and Erez (Beit Hanoun) crossings which allow goods and medical supplies into the enclave. It also reduced the fishing zone it imposes off Gaza’s Mediterranean coast, further blockading the territory. (more…)

The history of Palestine presented in Tapestry

Thirthy six palestinians living in the Middle East have made a tapestry with 80 panels representing each a different period of the history of Palestine now in the British Museum.

From the walls of Jericho – thought to be the earliest walled city – to the founding of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) stitches and vibrant colours. Tonight’s event was opened by Shelagh Weir, former Middle East curator at the British Museum, who described how Palestinian embroidery has formed an integral part of Palestinian culture for centuries. (more…)

UN says Israel’s killings at Gaza protests may amount to war crimes

The independent Commission of Inquiry, set up last year by the UN’s human rights council, said Israeli forces killed 189 people and shot more than 6,100 others with live ammunition near the fence that divides the two territories. The panel said in a statement that it had found “reasonable grounds to believe that Israeli snipers shot at journalists, health workers, children and persons with disabilities, knowing they were clearly recognisable as such”.

The Guardian view on the Gaza protests: a new challenge to Israel’s blockade

Thirty-five of those killed were children, three were clearly identifiable paramedics and two were clearly marked journalists, the report said. Israel dismissed the report as “hostile, mendacious and slanted”. (more…)

Israel releases Palestinian MP after 20 months in detention

Khalida Jarrar was arrested in July 2017 at her home in Ramallah, occupied by the Israeli army. Member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) –  a party placed on the list of terrorist organizations by Israel, the United States and the European Union –  this Palestinian MP spent nearly two years in administrative detention, without trial, before finally being released on Thursday, February 28^th, 2019.

This well-known figure of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine had already been incarcerated by Israel in 2015. And one year after her release, the Palestinian MP had once again been placed in administrative detention, that is, without charge or trial. (more…)