Human Rights

NOVANEWS   - Please distribute widely - Dear Friends,  CO Ajuad Zidan was sentenced to 20 more days of imprisonment on 21 Mar. for his refusal to enlist. This is now his seventh term in prison. In our previous update on his case there was apparently an inaccuracy, as it appears his sixth term was shorter. He was released on March 18th. However, upon release he was again ordered to report at the military induction base, where he was sentenced again and returned to prison. This cycle is likely to continue after this term in prison too. Ajuad Zidan is due to be released from prison on 7 April, and is likely to be imprisoned again afterwards. His address in prison is: Ajuad ZidanMilitary ID 5810026Military Prison No. 6Military Postal Code 01860, IDFIsraelFax: ++972-4-9540580 ...

NOVANEWS Growing Crackdowns Against Protests Demonstrators Across the Middle East Met With Bullets, Teargas Syria After nearly a week of protests in Daraa, security forces using live bullets and teargas forced their way into the al-Omari mosque, where protesters had gathered. Our researcher, on the phone with them, could hear gunshots. Read more » Yemen In the deadliest attack since Yemen’s protests began, unidentified gunmen opened fire on largely peaceful demonstrators while security forces stood by without intervening. Doctors said 45 protesters, including one young boy, were dead and more than 350 wounded. The US should halt Yemen’s military funding » Bahrain Nighttime raids on demonstrator’s homes have become disturbingly familiar. Last weekend, security forces – of...

NOVANEWS Palestinian man stabbed by settler in Tuwani days after settler riot disrupts replanting of damaged olive trees March 22, 2011 AtTuwani, West Bank Contact: Christian Peacemaker Teams On the morning of March 21st shortly after 7 am a Palestinian father of two from Tuba village was attacked and stabbed near the the illegal outpost of Havat Ma'on in the South Hebron Hills. Mahmoud Ibrahim Ali Awad, 32, was traveling by donkey from his home in Tuba to a medical appointment in the city of Yatta when a masked settler ran out of the illegal outpost of Havat Ma'on and attacked him with a knife. The assault was witnessed by a resident of Tuwani, who quickly called villagers and internationals and interrupted the attack. The assailant ran back into the illegal outpost of Havat Ma'on. Villa...

NOVANEWS On the 8th Anniversary of Rachel Corrie’s Stand in Gaza–A Message from Craig and Cindy Corrie   www.Rachelcorriefoundation   On Wednesday, March 16th, we mark the eighth anniversary of our daughter Rachel’s stand in Rafah, Gaza, to protect the right of a Gazan family to be safe and secure in their home and the rights of all Palestinians to self-determination, freedom, equality, and security in the same measure as their Israeli neighbors. Here in Olympia, Washington – our hometown and Rachel’s – our family, the Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice, and our community will mark this anniversary with an event that emphasizes three components: community-building, education, and action. Strengthening community connections was important to Rachel when she lived an...

NOVANEWS IDF IN AWARTA GILAD ATZMON   FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Today the village of Awarta, near Nablus, is facing the second day of a severe curfew imposed by the Israeli military, following Friday morning’s murder of a settler family in the settlement Itamar . Three ISM activists–Cinda, 23, Chad, 25, from Sweden, and Cissy, 53, from Norway–are currently trapped in the village. Anyone caught stepping outside of their house is arrested. Soldiers have said that they’ll maintain the curfew until they’ve apprehended the settler family’s murderer. The army hasn’t presented any evidence that the murderer was from Awarta, and villagers have said to the ISM that they strongly doubt the murderer was even Palestinian as the settlement is so heavily guarded it would be impossible t...

NOVANEWS March 16th, the 8th Anniversary of Rachel Corrie's Stand in Gaza Wednesday, March 16th, we mark the eighth anniversary of Rachel Corrie's stand in Rafah to protect the home of a Gazan family and for the right of all Palestinians to be free of occupation. Here in Rachel's hometown, we will mark the day with an event emphasizing community-building, education, and action - all key to Rachel's organizing here and beyond. We will continue a tradition of sharing a potluck meal, music, and spoken word and will hear from Cindy and Craig Corrie about the continuing civil trial in IsraHell in Rachel's case.  We will  focus on our friends in Gaza who, according to the The UN Office of Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) continue to suffer death, injury, and severe restrict...

NOVANEWS   By Sherwood Ross     The United States of America is in the process of slowly and deliberately destroying a human being before the eyes of the world. All of President Obama’s posturing about the conduct of dictator Colonel Muammar el-Qaddafi of Libya will not expunge his own calculated cruelty in allowing his Pentagon to continue the degrading and dehumanizing punishments being inflicted on PFC Bradley Manning, the 23-year-old Army intelligence specialist accused of leaking hundreds of thousands of files to WikiLeaks. AP reports Manning has now been charged with “aiding the enemy,” a crime that can bring the death penalty or life in prison. Whatever Manning has done, if anything, the Pentagon has no right to reduce him to a vegetative state. Yet that is what it i...

NOVANEWS Please report any unattended human rights More Recent Articles Search The Only Democracy?     I read Neve Gordon’s piece a few months back about human rights websites being banned at Ben Gurion airport, and thought what a perfect microcosm of the front Israel is trying to put up to the world. While they wouldn’t think of banning such websites to their own population, I hope, international travelers are key to the PR efforts that they shouldn’t be allowed to read any such depressing news. Including, presumably, reports on the Palestinians or Israeli activists being denied entry or the foreign journalists being strip-searched. Well, Joseph Dana of Popular Struggle was watching Palestinian citizens being harassed at security on his wa...

NOVANEWS modernityblog Tags: Alkarama, Blogger, Blogging, Censor, Detained, Global Voices, Human rights, Internet Censorship, Khalaifi, Locked up, Qatar, Sultan, Sultan al-Khalaifi, US ally | Categories: Uncategorized | URL: http://wp.me/p4XPG-2Xu   News is coming out that a blogger, Sultan al-Khalaifi, has been detained in Qatar by the State security services: "Blogger and human rights activist, Sultan al-Khalaifi, has been detained by security forces after criticising the country’s censorship rules on his blog. Khalaifi, who is founder of a rights group campaigning on cases of detention in Qatar, has been in detention since March 2 after being contacted by state security. According to his lawyer he has been detained on numerous occasions in the past. " Global ...

NOVANEWS Israeli solidarity activist interrogated by police for “incitement” Israeli solidarity activist interrogated by police for “incitement” More Recent Articles Search The Only Democracy?   Sara Benninga, whose speech I reposted here on the blog, was interrogated by the police after speaking at the JStreet conference I attended. She provided one of the voices for a new direction for Jewish and Israeli activists working alongside Palest- inians for justice. For this she rewarded with an interrogation. From Didi Remez’s facebook page: Sara was interrogated for “incitement” because she made a call for solidaritywith the #Jan25 protesters at Tahrir sq. She was also que- stioned on “subversion” because she dared chant “settlers, thieves”. I ki...