Author: HolyLandJustice.org

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The end of Palestinian “exclusivity”

Students for Justice in Palestine and the African Students’ Association at John Jay College in collaboration with Students for Justice in Palestine at Hunter and City Colleges and CUNY RSCC hold a Die-In/Vigil to protest injustice against people of color. (photo: John Jay / SJP)

Israel has been distancing itself from democracy, a credit to the awareness brought about by BDS, which is asking for nothing more “radical” than human rights.

By Nadia Elia | Mondoweiss | Apr 30, 2018

It is worthwhile to recall the objectives of BDS, so as to grasp how basic they are:

  1. Equal rights for all citizens, something Israel does not currently grant;
  2. Ending the occupation, and dismantling the wall, both of which are illegal according to international law;
  3. Granting Palestinian refugees the Right of Return, guaranteed by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

If BDS is indeed a “threat” to Israel, if it “delegitimizes” it in in any way, it is because Israel is in violation of international law. Justice is only a threat to injustice.

When a majority of Palestinian civil society organizations picked BDS as the strategy for their liberation struggle, modeling it upon the South African anti-apartheid struggle, they were sending a clear message to the world that our circumstances are not unique, they are comparable to those experienced by the indigenous black Africans under the official segregation rules of the white South African government. Apartheid is officially designated a “crime against humanity,” and the comparison with apartheid, indeed the mere use of that term to describe the country that had long claimed to be a democracy, set into motion a series of seismic shocks that forever changed the discourse around Israel.

Many Palestinians and their allies had long maintained that the Palestine predicament was absolutely unique. Some will still passionately argue that no other people has suffered so long, been so vilified, so dispossessed, so misrepresented. And even though nobody truly wins at Oppression Olympics, they would claim first prize.

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Despite outrage, Jerusalem museum vows to keep censoring evolution exhibit

An exhibit on evolution at the Natural History Museum in Jerusalem, blocked from view with a pink sheet, in April 2018. (photo: Michael Bachner / Times of Israel)

Natural History Museum justifies covering up displays during visits by ultra-Orthodox groups, as many in Israel and abroad slam institution as betraying science.

By Michael Bachner | The Times of Israel | May 2, 2018

“Science and knowledge are not a joke. The museum should decide whether it is a scientific museum presenting the truth or an institution with self-censorship that seeks to tell its visitors half-truths and complete lies.”
— Uri Keidar, Executive Director of Be Free Israel, a non-profit which promotes religious pluralism

The Natural History Museum in Jerusalem has vowed to continue its policy of hiding an evolution exhibit from view, along with other displays on dinosaurs and the human body, during visits by ultra-Orthodox groups in order to avoid offending their religious beliefs. The announcement came despite an outrage caused in Israel and abroad by its decision to self-censor displays on evolution, dinosaurs and the human body.

“Of course,” the museum’s educational director, Dr. Evgeny Reznitsky, told The Times of Israel on Tuesday when asked whether he will carry on with the practice, citing the institution’s dire financial situation and saying it was better to have ultra-Orthodox schoolkids visit on their terms than have them not come at all.

As people protested outside the building with a megaphone and demanded that the museum reject the demands set by Haredi schools, Reznitsky said he would only reconsider his position if ordered to stop by municipal authorities.

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Christians in Jerusalem’s Old City “under threat” from settlers

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The Greek Orthodox patriarch of Jerusalem, Theophilos III, speaks in front of the closed doors of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem’s Old City. (photo: Amir Cohen / Reuters)

Church leaders claim priests are being verbally abused and spat at while property is being vandalized in ancient walled city.

By Harriet Sherwood | The Guardian | May 1, 2018

“Today the church faces a most severe threat at the hands of certain settler groups. The settlers are persistent in their attempts to erode the presence of the Christian community in Jerusalem. These radical settler groups are highly organized. Over the last years we have witnessed the desecration and vandalism of an unprecedented number of churches and holy sites and receive growing numbers of reports from priests and local worshippers who have been assaulted and attacked. Where the authorities are concerned, this behavior goes largely unchecked and unpunished.”
— Theophilos III, the Greek Orthodox patriarch of Jerusalem

Christians in Jerusalem’s Old City say their presence at the geographical heart of their faith is under threat from intimidation and aggressive property acquisition by hardline Jewish settlers.

According to church leaders, priests are being verbally abused and spat at, and property vandalized.

Tensions have risen this year in the Christian and Armenian quarters of the one square kilometer ancient walled city, which includes the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the holiest place in Christianity where Jesus was believed to be crucified and resurrected. The Old City is also home to places of critical religious importance to Jews and Muslims.

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Philadelphia Orchestra support threatened over planned Israel tour

Activists in downtown Philadelphia protesting the Philadelphia Orchestra’s upcoming Israel tour. (photo: Adalah-NY / Twitter)

Opposition to the tour has spawned the “Philly, Don’t Orchestrate Apartheid” campaign, whose protests are now in their fifth week.

By Susan Landau | Mondoweiss | May 1, 2018

“We are longtime subscribers and donors to The Philadelphia Orchestra. We are human rights advocates, and we support a just peace in Israel-Palestine. We urge the Philadelphia Orchestra to cancel their tour in Israel, scheduled for June 2018, and to refuse to entertain Israeli apartheid. We strongly oppose this trip, knowing it is used to mask egregious Israeli policies of occupation, apartheid, and the dispossession of the Palestinian people.”
— Letter to the Philadelphia Orchestra from supporters and patrons

The Philadelphia Orchestra’s announcement of a Israel trip in June 2018 sparked a tsunami of letters and protests by human rights advocates demanding the cancellation of the trip. Touted as a cultural mission, the trip was immediately clear as a “Brand Israel” propaganda tour — celebrating Israel’s 70th anniversary, while whitewashing the Israel’s expulsion of over 750,000 Palestinians from their homes between 1947 and 1949.

Culture is inseparable from politics. Artists performing in Israel obscure the reality of the lived Palestinian experience of occupation and apartheid. The itinerary, prominently featuring the orchestra’s name and logo, lists visits to notables responsible for the implementation of Israeli policies which violate Palestinian human rights on a daily basis. For example, the Orchestra will have a “VIP visit” to an Israeli army base, plus a June 4 performance with Israeli army musicians. The orchestra also feted the tour at a gala event, led by Israeli Consul Dani Dayan, a longtime leader of Israel’s right-wing settlement movement.

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Columbia University law professor denied entry into Israel

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Katherine Franke,  Sulzbacher Professor of Law, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Columbia University. (photo: Columbia Law School)

Professor Franke and another human rights worker were detained and interrogated for 14 hours before being deported.

By Press Release | Center for Constitutional Rights | May 1, 2018

“My interrogation in Tel Aviv made it clear that I was banned from entering Israel because of my work in the U.S. on behalf of Palestinian rights. No government is immune from criticism for its human rights record. The abusive treatment Vince Warren and I received at Ben Gurion airport ironically illustrates how the state of Israel refuses to respect the political and civil rights of its own citizens, of Palestinians, and of human rights defenders globally.”
— Professor Franke

Vincent Warren, executive director of the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), and Katherine Franke, chair of CCR’s board and Sulzbacher Professor of Law, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Columbia University, were detained Sunday, April 29, for 14 hours and interrogated at Ben Gurion International Airport, then denied entry into Israel and deported, arriving back in New York early Monday morning. Warren and Franke were questioned about their political association with human rights groups that have been critical of Israel’s human rights record.

“The Israeli government denied us entry, apparently because it feared letting in people who might challenge its policies. This is something that we should neither accept nor condone from a country that calls itself a democracy,” Warren said. “Our trip sought to explore the intersection of Black and Brown people’s experiences in the U.S. with the situation of Palestinians, and Israel could not have made that connection clearer.”

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New South Carolina law outlaws referring to “occupation” of Palestine

South Carolina State Representative Alan Clemmons delivers an address from the steps of the South Carolina Statehouse in 2011. (photo: Mint Press News)

According to its author, discussing the military occupation of the West Bank, a reality recognized even by israel’s Supreme Court, would be considered anti-Semitic under the new law.

By Whitney Webb | Mint Press News | May 1, 2018

In 2015, South Carolina became the first of at least 22 states to prohibit state agencies or institutions from contracting with any vendor participating in a boycott of Israel.

The state of South Carolina will become the first state in the nation to legislate a definition of anti-Semitism that considers certain criticisms of the Israeli government to be hate speech. The language, which was inserted into the state’s recently passed $8 billion budget, offers a much more vague definition of anti-Semitism that some suggest specifically targets the presence of the global boycott, divestment and sanctions, or BDS, movement on state college campuses. The law requires that all state institutions, including state universities, apply the revised definition when deciding whether an act violates anti-discrimination policies.

Once it is reconciled with an appropriations bill previously passed by the state House, the measure will become law and take effect this July. However, the law will last only until the next budget is passed, meaning that the new legal definition of anti-Semitism must be renewed on a yearly basis unless new legislation making the language permanent is passed in the future.

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Israel scraps deportation of all African asylum seekers

Asylum seekers protesting at the Holot detention center in the southern Negev Desert of Israel, Feb 17, 2014. (photo: Ilia Yefimovich / Getty Images)

In a dramatic turnaround, Israel tells the High Court there is “no possibility” to expel migrants at this time.

By Tamar Pileggi | The Times of Israel | Apr 24, 2018

Israel has struggled with what to do with those already in the country, alternating between plans to jail and deport them and allowing them to work in menial jobs.

The Israeli government informed the High Court of Justice Tuesday it had scrapped its controversial plan to deport tens of thousands of African migrants from the country, after Israeli authorities failed to cement an emigration deal with a third country.

“At this stage there is no possibility of implementing involuntary deportations to a third country. Therefore, as of April 17, 2018, [the state] has ceased to hold hearings as part of the deportation policy, and no more deportation decisions will be made at this time,” the state said.

The admission marked a dramatic setback for the government in its years-long attempts to expel the asylum-seekers, most of them from Eritrea or Sudan, and a triumph for activists who appealed to the court against the government plans.

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How Natalie Portman became the latest Israel-Palestine flashpoint

Natalie Portman. (photo: Emma McIntyre / Getty Images)

She turned down Israel’s Nobel Prize — and kicked off a major firestorm.

By Zach Beauchamp | Vox | Apr 23, 2018

This is not a marginal controversy, some kind of celebrity sideshow. It is a leading indicator of the rising tensions between liberal American Jewry and the increasingly right-wing Israeli government. Portman is the canary in the coal mine, warning Israel that its policies on the Palestinians and African migrants are putting it increasingly at odds with its most natural friends abroad.

Natalie Portman, one of the most famous Jewish celebrities on the planet, just announced she was boycotting a major Israeli event.

Portman was scheduled to travel to Jerusalem to receive the Genesis Prize, a prominent award sometimes referred to as the “Jewish Nobel.” On Friday [Apr 20], she abruptly canceled her visit, writing that she “did not want to appear as endorsing [Israeli Prime Minister] Benjamin Netanyahu” in an Instagram post explaining her decision. It’s not yet clear what’s happening to the $2 million in prize money that comes with the award.

Celebrities deciding to avoid Israel on political grounds is not all that uncommon. Hollywood is left-leaning, and many celebrities are outspokenly pro-Palestinian. Netanyahu’s government is one of the furthest right in Israeli history, particularly when it comes to the conflict with the Palestinians. Tensions are to be expected.

But Portman is an altogether different case. Continue reading “How Natalie Portman became the latest Israel-Palestine flashpoint”

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America’s “most Jewish” secular college votes to divest from Israel

A display erected by students at Barnard College and Columbia University in protest of Israeli apartheid. (photo: Godland / Mint Press News)

One-third of Barnard College’s students are Jewish, the highest proportion among secular colleges in the United States.

By Whitney Webb | Mint Press News | Apr 24, 2018

While the school administration will not move forward with the call to divest, it has nonetheless caused concern among pro-Israel activists that the results will embolden BDS activists, as the vote has been hailed as a major victory for the movement.

Students at Barnard College just voted overwhelmingly to ask the school’s administration to divest from and boycott eight companies that do business with Israel and profit from the Israeli government’s treatment of Palestinians. Barnard, a women’s college that is part of Columbia University, passed the referendum by a 64 to 36 percent margin, with about half of the school’s students participating in the vote — a turnout much higher than in previous votes on the subject, perhaps reflecting Israel’s recent shooting of more than 2,000 unarmed Gazan protesters.

The result of the vote is being hailed as a major victory for Palestinian-rights movement BDS, the campaign to boycott, divest and sanction Israel for its violations of international law in Palestine.

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Second Palestinian journalist dies from sniper fire

Palestinian journalist Ahmed Abu Hussein is seen receiving medical treatment after being shot by an Israeli sniper during a protest on the Gaza border, Apr 13, 2018.

Ahmed Abu Hussein was shot by Israeli snipers during a protest near the Gaza-Israel border two weeks ago. He was standing at a distance from the fence and was wearing a PRESS jacket.

By Haggai Matar | +972 Magazine | Apr 25, 2018

“Ahmed had always expected this could happen to him. The situation in Gaza is difficult. There is no work. But Ahmed always had ambition and he wanted to progress. His friends offered him this job, and he would write and photograph for the agency and send materials for publication.”
— Abu Hussein’s mother

Ahmed Abu Hussein, a Palestinian journalist based in Gaza who was shot by Israeli soldiers two weeks ago, died of his wounds on Wednesday at Tel Hashomer Hospital in central Israel. Abu Hussein is the second Gazan journalist to be killed by IDF snipers over the past month, and one of 40 Palestinians killed during the Great Return March protests.

On Friday April 13, Abu Hussein, a 24-year-old from Jabaliya refugee camp, went to take photographs of the protest next to the Gaza-Israel border fence. His mother told +972 that he had been working with a small photo agency named Bisan, and according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, Abu Hussein had worked for a radio station linked to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (it is yet unclear whether he worked for both places at the same or separately).

Abu Hussein was wearing a PRESS jacket — and was standing with a group of photographers near a press tent at the Great Return March encampment — when an Israeli sniper’s bullet pierced his abdomen, disrupting the blood flow to his brain . . . . His mother says he was struck by a hollow-point bullet, which expands as it hits its target in order to cause maximum damage. This is the same kind of bullet that has been used against dozens of those who have been killed and maimed during demonstrations in Gaza over the past month.

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