Human Rights

NOVANEWS by Shahd Abusalama In a nice restaurant overlooking Gaza’s beach, beneath a full moon with a beautiful halo surrounding it, I sat with my new friends who recently were released from Israeli prisons. Their freedom was restricted by Israel’s inhumane rules, including indefinite deportation from the West Bank, away from their families and friends. However, they all shared one thought: “The problem is not here.  Both the West Bank and Gaza are our homeland. The problem is that our freedom will not be complete until our land and people are totally free.” I listened carefully to their prison stories and memories of their families in other parts of Palestine. One of the most interesting things for me to hear was the warm, strong, and caring friendships they remembered from inside ...

From Elana   Here is an approximate English translation of Daphne Banai's Hebrew email note here below:   Since yesterday I remain extremely restless and bothered that a legal radio station has been shut down by the police; its director, former Meretz party Knesset member Mosi Raz, arrested and threatened that he shall remain in detention, being compelled to shut it down.  True, it's only one of the many signs of the times.   True that it wasn't the most popular station (Kol LaShalom).   Still, there has been no announcement, [let alone outcry - Elana] on the news and not a word from the news sources on the internet.  Total silence in the face of such an extreme muzzling of free speech.   Did I miss something?  Has Mosi joined Hamas and been captured at a checkpoint with three explosive ch...

NOVANEWS  Uncategorized  By Yael Katzwer http://thebrandeishoot.com “In the state of Israel, someone does not have sex with prostitutes but rapes sex slaves.” Rabbi Levi Lauer, the founding executive director of ATZUM-Justice Works, reiterated this point  repeatedly Tuesday at a lecture he gave at Brandeis University titled “When Hope Ends in Slavery: Human Trafficking in Israel.” The lecture was sponsored by the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies and the Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism. ATZUM is an Israeli nonprofit organization with four goals: helping Israeli survivors of terror attacks; assisting non-Jews who helped Jews during the Holocaust; educating and assimilating Ethiopian youth; and ending the sex-trafficking trade in Israel. ATZUM’s Task Force on Human ...

NOVANEWS Maureen Clare Murphy  The Electronic Intifada   Janan Abdu: “We need solidarity to keep us strong” Palestinian political prisoner Ameer Makhoul recently participated in a hunger strike that took place across the Israeli prison system in late September/early October. As The Electronic Intifada reported last month, Palestinian political prisoners were protesting Israel’s pervasive use of solitary confinement, arbitrary denial of family visits and a recent policy to deny political prisoners from receiving an education. Makhoul is serving a nine-year prison sentence upon accepting a plea deal after a sham trial based on a coerced confession. Following his arrest at his family’s home in Haifa in the middle of the night in May 2010, Makhoul was subjected to ill-t...

Bad news! A subcommittee of the Israeli cabinet voted to approve both bills targeting progressive NGOs that Daniel wrote to us about on Thursday. But the fight is not over. The decision is set to be reviewed by the cabinet again -- as soon as this Sunday -- and Prime Minister Netanyahu says that he wants to see significant changes made to the bills before they become law. Help defend Israeli democracy. Write Prime Minister Netanyahu today. You and I know that limiting the rights of Israel human rights groups is the wrong move for a democracy. And we’re not alone: Here’s what Knesset Speaker Ruby Rivlin -- a Likud stalwart -- had to say about yesterday’s cabinet vote: "The new Likud is not committed to the ethics of liberty, to the values of Jabotinsky and of Begin." Another leader in Likud...

NOVANEWS  by crescentandcross in Uncategorized   Jerusalem District Court convicts Zio-Nazi Shani Sevilya of abuse, intimidation, after she aims gun at Palestinian detainee, squeezes trigger while saying ‘death to Arabs’ ed note–CAN YOU JUST IMAGINE, FELLOW EARTHLINGS, that if a similar story appeared in Iran, with an Iranian border guard abusing a “Jewish youth”, pointing a gun at him/her and saying “Death to Jews”, pulling the trigger on an empty chamber and then only be sentenced to 3 months in the brig what the result would be????????????????? The 2nd coming of Jesus could take place and the world wouldn’t hear anything about it because of all the noise surrounding the HORRENDOUS CASE OF “ANTI-SEMITISM” and the “MISCARRAGE OF JUSTICE”. And let us be honest about something else here–...

NOVANEWS Just Vision, the folks I interned for last spring, are out with, “Home Front is a new series of four video portraits chronicling the resolve of a neighborhood, and the support it receives from the most unexpected of places.” It documents different Israelis and Palestinians involved in the Sheikh Jarrah movement, including a Palestinian teenager whose family who was evicted. TOD’s own Amir Terkel worked on the film. It is a wonderful primer on the movement, well worth the half hour or so to watch all four.    The mother of Sara Benninga, who has been featured on this site, appears in the second video.     You can read more interviews on the Home Front site.  More Recent Articles Villages Group: South Hebron Hills Update Video: Democracy Now! footag...

NOVANEWS by crescentandcross in Uncategorized  JERUSALEM – Israeli police say they are investigating anti-Arab graffiti found on Muslim tombs in central Jerusalem. Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld says vandals scrawled “price tag,” the signature of radical Jewish activists. He says police found the graffiti Thursday, but it is believed to be several weeks old. Vandals have desecrated some Muslim and Christian holy sites in both the West Bank and Israel. In October, vandals torched a mosque in northern Israel. Rosenfeld says the police have dedicated a task force to eradicating extremist attacks. Police arrested an Israeli man Wednesday on suspicion of spraying graffiti and calling in a bomb threat to the Jerusalem offices of Peace Now, an Israeli movement that opposes Israeli settlement...

NOVANEWS Dear friends, In days, the US could push through a new law to allow the use of cluster bombs -- a banned lethal weapon that kills children in playgrounds years after wars have ended. But if we build a massive campaign now, we can persuade other governments to stop the US and stop these weapons being used. Sign the urgent petition to save our children now! Ahmad picked up a bright metal object in a park in Lebanon where he was celebrating his 5th birthday. It was an unexploded cluster bomblet, which blew up in his face, killing him slowly in front of his family. Three years ago, public pressure pushed through a ban of these cruel bombs. But now the US is lobbying nations to quietly sign a new law that allows their use -- signing the death warrant for thousands of other c...

NOVANEWS by crescentandcross in Uncategorized    ed note–what else would a sane world expect? Judaism (as illucidated by the Old Testament) is cover-to-cover religiously-mandated violence against Arabs. Some 15 Muslim gravestones were found desecrated in Jerusalem with the slogan “Death to Arabs” on Thursday, in what is suspected to be the latest “price tag” attack by right-wing extremists. “Death to Arabs” and “Givat Asaf” – the name of a West Bank settlement outpost that is slated for demolition – were spray painted on the gravestones in the Bamamila Cemetery, next to the Jerusalem Museum of Tolerance. It is still not known who is responsible for the desecration of the gravestones, or even exactly when it took place. A month ago, on Yom Kippur, graves were desecrated with anti...