Continued from node 9091

Defying the World Court

Two months after Syrian president Bashir Assad called for renewed peace talks with Israel, the Israeli government announced in December 2003 that it planned to bolster (illegal) Jewish settlement construction in the Golan Heights, taken from Syria in the 1967 war. The plan would add 900 families to existing settlements. Israeli Agriculture Minister Yisrael Katz said the announcement was a message to President Assad that "the Golan is an inseparable part of the state of Israel, and we have no intention to give up our hold." On Oct. 5, Israel had bombed what it claimed was a training camp for Palestinian militants in Syria, in retaliation for the bombing of a restaurant in Haifa that killed 21. (New York Times, Dec. 31; Jerusalem Post, Dec. 31, 2003 via World War 4 Report)

On Nov. 28, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan advised Israel to abandon its project of building the "separation fence" in the West Bank: "Israel has repeatedly stated that the barrier is a temporary measure. However, the scope of construction and the amount of occupied West Bank land that is either being requisitioned for its route or that will end up between the barrier and the Green Line are of serious concern and have implications for the future." Annan also clearly labeled the wall a barrier to making peace: "In the midst of the Road Map process, when each party should be making good-faith confidence-building gestures, the barrier's construction in the West Bank cannot, in this regard, be seen as anything but a deeply counter-productive act." (CNN, Nov. 28, 2003)

Pope John Paul II, frequently lauded for his attempts to make amends for the Catholic church's past treatment of Jews, also joined critics of the separation wall. The pontiff started by saying, "I...renew my firm condemnation for every terrorist action carried out in these recent times in the Holy Land." But he added: "At the same time, I must note that unfortunately...the dynamism of peace seems to have stopped. The construction of a wall between the Israeli and Palestinian people is seen by many as a new obstacle on the road toward peaceful cohabitation. In reality, the Holy Land doesn't need walls, but bridges." (AP, Nov. 18, 2003)

Nobel peace laureate and Holocaust survivor Elie Weisel took exception to the pontiff's displeasure with the wall. Opined Weisel: "From the spiritual leader of one of the largest and most important religions in the world, I expected something very different, namely a statement condemning terror and the killing of innocents, without mixing in political considerations and, above all, without comparing these things to a work of pure self-defense." (AP, Nov. 18, 2003)

Phase I of the separation barrier, through the northern West Bank (cutting through Jenin, Tulkarm and Qalqilya districts) was completed in 2003, and work commenced on Phase II, a 45-kilometer stretch extending all the way into the Jordan Valley. And a final Phase III was approved, encircling the Ariel settlement bloc—that which juts the deepest into the West Bank, sometimes called the "Ariel Finger." Qalqilya was completely surrounded by the wall, and several villages now isolated in pockets cut off from the rest of the West Bank. Eliezer Hasdai, a settler advocate and member of the Likud central committee, boasted: "We've moved the Green Line." (Dolphin, p. 44, 52, 170)

According to reports that emerged in the Israeli press, the separation wall was to be mounted with remote-control machine guns when it was completed. (Ha'aretz, Sept. 24, 2003)

On Dec. 26, an Israeli soldier shot and wounded a 22-year old Israeli kibbutznik at a non-violent protest against the wall in the West Bank. Gil Na'amati, himself recently demobilized from the Israeli army, participated in the protest with Palestinian activists, foreign volunteers, and an Israeli group called "Anarchists Against the Wall." (World War 4 Report, January 2004)

On March 22, 2004, tens of thousands of Palestinians took to the streets of Gaza City to mourn the death of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the wheelchair-bound 66-year-old leader of Hamas who was killed in an Israeli missile attack that day. Helicopter-launched missiles targeted Yassin and seven others leaving a Gaza mosque. The strike wounded 16, including two of Yassin's sons. Israeli authorities defended the assassination as a legitimate move against terrorism. Said a statement from the IDF: "Yassin, responsible for numerous murderous terror attacks, resulting in the deaths of many civilians, both Israeli and foreign, was killed in the attack." (CNN, March 22, 2004)

But two days after the attack, former Mossad director Ephraim HaLevy told Israel's "Politika" TV program that in 1997 Sheikh Yassin had offered a "30-year hudna [truce] ceasefire." HaLevy asserted that the offer had not even been discussed in Israeli government circles. When asked what he thought of the assassination, he replied, "Justice was done." But HaLevy admitted that it was he who arranged Yassin's release from an Israeli prison following the failed Mossad assassination attempt of Hamas "politburo leader" Khaled Meshal in Jordan in September 1997. HaLevy negotiated the deal with Jordan's King Hussein in order to "save the peace treaty with Jordan" and obtain the release of Mossad agents seized in the failed mission. While admitting he was assigned out of the country during the ceasefire proposal, HaLevy insisted he knew with certainty that the offer was made. (IsraelNN.com, March 24, 2004)

Following the assassination of Sheikh Yassin, the European Parliament issued a a formal article comparing Israeli military actions that resulted in Palestinian civilian casualties to "acts of terror," and called for a suspension of the Israel-EU Association Agreement if Israel persisted in its policy of assassinations. The agreement, launched in June 2000, elevated Israel's political and diplomatic status in its finance and trade dealings with the EU. The new Article 41 stated that the European Parliament "reiterates its condemnations of all terrorist acts against civilian populations committed by both sides." Article 43 called on the Palestinians "not to respond to this most recent provocation in order to stop the spiral of violence and terrorism." (Ha'aretz, April 2, 2004)

UNRWA announced at this time that it had stopped distributing emergency food aid to some 600,000 Palestinian refugees in the Gaza Strip, citing burdensome restrictions introduced by Israel on the sole commercial crossing into Gaza. (UNRWA press release, April 2. 2004)

On July 9, 2004, the International Court of Justice at the Hague issued an advisory opinion saying Israel was in violation of international law and conventions by building its "separation barrier" within the occupied West Bank. The UN General Assembly, by a vote of 150-6, with 10 abstentions, adopted the opinion. The US and Israel were among those voting against. The resolution, ES-10/15, called upon Israel to dismantle the barrier and compensate Palestinian farmers and property owners for the damage done to their crops by the barrier. Israel categorically rejected the resolution. (Islam Online, July 21, 2004; World War 4 Report, August 2004; Dolphin, 162-3; UN General Assembly website)

The International Committee of the Red Cross took the unusual step of issuing a statement on the separation wall's humanitarian impact, finding: "in as far as its route deviates from the 'Green Line' into occupied territory, [it] is contrary to International Humanitarian Law." (Dolphin, p. 160)

Israel formally rejected the World Court ruling. Sharon aide Ra'anan Gissin said "this resolution will find its place in the garbage can of history." (Dolphin, p. 161-2)

The US was virtually alone in strongly backing Israel's position in the matter. The House of Representatives passed a resolution—with broad bipartisan support—condemning the ruling, and commending President Bush for "his leadership in marshalling opposition to the misuse of the ICJ." (Dolphin, p. 205)

Addressing a long-outstanding issue, in July the Israeli cabinet resolved that the Israeli government will be able to sell or lease confiscated Palestinian property in annexed East Jerusalem under the Absentee Property Law. Decision No. 2297 stated that the government has decided "to remove all doubt that the Custodian has the authority vested in clause 19 of the Absentee Property Law, including to transfer, sell or lease real estate property in East Jerusalem to the Development Authority." The Development Authority is the quasi-governmental body with the power to sell land for construction or any other purpose. (Ha'aretz, Jan, 30, 2005)

In a "reprisal" campaign that lasted a month leading up to early August, Israeli forces destroyed more than 42,000 olive, citrus and date trees in the Palestinian town of Beit Hanoun, on the edge of the Gaza Strip. The Israelis' stated purpose was to stop Hamas militants from using the area to fire their crude rockets at the nearby Israeli town of Sderot. On June 28, the rockets killed two Israelis, including a three-year old, in Sderot, the first fatalities from such attacks. During the month-long incursion that followed in Beit Hanoun, Palestinian officials said 4,405 acres of agricultural land were flattened by the army, and 21 houses were demolished, with another 314 damaged. Before withdrawing from the town, the army passed out leaflets with a cartoon showing rockets bouncing back at Beit Hanoun from Sderot. The leaflet read: "Terror will kill you." (The Independent, Aug. 6, 2004 via World War 4 Report)

Israeli Agriculture Minister Yisrael Katz meanwhile announced a plan to plant 72,000 olive trees surrounding settlements in the occupied West Bank. He was explicit on the political ends behind the tree plantings: "This is seizing lands and preventing them from being turned over to Palestinians. This is how we will strengthen our hold on Judea and Samaria... We will cling to every dunum of available farmland by means of either planting olive trees or grazing." (Yedioth Ahronot, July 27, 2004 via World War 4 Report)

On Nov. 11, Yasser Arafat died in a Paris hospital at the age of 75. No successor had been named. There would, of course, be the inevitable rumors that he was poisoned by Israeli agents. (New York Times, Nov. 11, 2004; World War 4 Report, Jan. 31, 2006)

Mahmoud Abbas AKA Abu Mazen was named chairman of the PLO, and in January 2005 was voted Palestinian Authority president. (YNet profile)

On Feb. 8, 2005, Abbas and Sharon met at a summit hosted at Sharm el-Sheikh by Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak and agreed to a ceasefire. Hamas declared that they were not bound by the ceasefire, but in fact they would largely honor it; suicide bombings dramatically declined in the coming months. (The Guardian, Feb. 8, 2005; BBC News analysis, Jan. 29. 2007)

Later that month, the Israeli cabinet, following a High Court ruling, revised the route of the "separation barrier" so as to give greater emphasis to Palestinian needs—but it was still to be built mostly on occupied Palestinian territory, now incorporating 10% of the West Bank's territory, with 49,000 Palestinians (as opposed to an earlier 189,000) on the "Israeli" side (mainly in villages north of Tulkarm, south of Qalqilya and west of Bethlehem). This figure does not include the 200,000 Palestinians in East Jerusalem, who were also effectively walled in from the rest of the West Bank. (Dolphin, p. 18, 60, 169)

In July, the State of Israel finally admitted that its "separation barrier" was not placed where it was solely due to "security" considerations. The admission came in a case before the Israeli High Court brought on behalf of villages in the Qalqilya district, in which the state complained it would be "very expensive to move" the fence from its current location. Wrote Ha'aretz: "The state's position marks a fundamental change in its legal arguments. Initially, the state claimed security concerns were the sole motivation for erecting the fence, and there were no other considerations... The state's new stance also highlights a major policy change regarding the 'temporary' nature of the fence. Until now, the state has claimed that the fence was a short-term measure, and it was possible to move or dismantle the barrier." (Ha'aretz, July 4, 2005)

The Gaza "Withdrawal"

In the spring of 2005, Sharon's government began preparing for what it called a "unilateral disengagement" from the Gaza Strip—a pullout of military forces, and relocation of settlers from the territory, with the Palestinian Authority to assume full control. Hardline Gaza settlers pledged to resist relocation. Reports in the Israeli press said militant Jewish youths were converging on Gush Katif, the big settlement bloc in the southern part of the Strip, and arming to aid the settler resistance. (Yediot Aharonot, March 10, 2005)

Yet over the summer, the Gaza disengagement was completed, largely without resistance from settlers. In one apparent effort to derail the disengagement by sparking a general conflagration, a Jewish settler shot dead three Palestinians in the West Bank. The assailant was reportedly a driver who had taken Palestinian workers to jobs in the Jewish settlement of Shiloh. Once there, he snatched a security guard's gun and turned it on his passengers. He was arrested, and Sharon called the attack a "Jewish terror act." Palestinian President Abbas also called it "a terrorist incident." Both leaders agreed it was intended to disrupt the pullout from Gaza. (AP, Aug. 17, 2005)

With the settlers removed from Gaza, the Israeli army demolished their mainly suburban-style homes, and Palestinian and Egyptian contractors were brought in to help clear up the rubble. The Palestinian Authority said about 5% of the Gaza settlement land had been taken from private owners and would be returned to them. The remaining state land would be developed for housing, industry and agriculture with international aid. (BBC News, Aug. 17, 2005)

While the settlers were to be compensated for their abandoned Gaza homes, no compensation was planned for Palestinians whose Gaza properties had been demolished or confiscated over the years by the Israeli military and settlers. (Electronic Intifada, Aug. 15, 2005)

With the world media focusing on images of sobbing settlers and cheering Palestinians, there was little awareness that the Gaza disengagement was concomitant with a consolidation of Israel's de facto annexation of large areas of the West Bank—a far more valuable and fertile territory. Some of the relocated Gaza settlers were to go to settlements on the West Bank—with financial assistance from the Israeli government. (BBC News, Aug. 17, 2005)

And Israel was to stay in control of Gaza's borders—both with Israel and with Egypt, as well as the seacoast. Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahhar warned that Israel was poised to turn Gaza into a "big prison." (BBC News, Aug. 17, 2005)

The disengagement plan specifically stated that "Israel will guard and monitor the external land perimeter of the Gaza Strip, will continue to maintain exclusive authority in Gaza airspace, and will continue to exercise security activity in the sea off the coast of the Gaza Strip." Renad Qubbaj of the Palestinian NGO Network stated: "The Gaza Strip will still be occupied territory under international law." He warned that under the limited disengagement plan, "Palestinian society will be split into separate political, social and economic entities, and Jerusalem will be turned into an isolated island." (IPS, July 28, 2005)

Nor was the withdrawal from Gaza complete. Israel established a "security zone" extending some 150 meters into the Strip to prevent militants from infiltrating into the Jewish state. (AFP, Sept. 16, 2005)

The Gaza disengagement sparked a bitter split in Likud, and in November Sharon formally resigned from the party to form the new, more centrist Kadima ("Forward"). Kadima's platform embraced Palestinian statehood in guarded and equivocal terms, calling for "maximum security and assuring that Israel be a Jewish national home and that another state that shall arise be demilitarized, with terrorists disarmed." (Jewish Virtual Library)

The next month, Sharon suffered a stroke, and then another in January 2006, which left him permanently incapacitated. President Bush hailed Sharon as "a man of courage and peace." Prime ministerial duties were turned over to Ehud Olmert. (Ibid)

Also in January 2006, the Palestinian Authority held general elections in which Hamas took part for the first time. Hamas won by a landslide, taking hold of 76 of the Palestinian parliament's 132 seats. Following Hamas' victory, Israel, the United States, European Union, several Western government as well as the Arab nations suspended all foreign aid to the PA. President Abbas of Fatah now ruled in open hostility with his own prime minister, Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas. Numerous clashes between Hamas and Fatah militants would follow in the months to come, especially in Gaza. (YNet factsheet)

The Israeli government refused all contact with the new elected Palestinian government—and returned to its policy of assassination, targeting alleged Palestinian terrorists without trial or formal accusations. More than a dozen were killed in the weeks following the election in Israeli missile attacks. (Middle East Media Center, Feb. 10, 2006)

An Israeli missile strike on a car in Gaza City May 20 killed a top Islamic Jihad commander, Mohammed Dahdouh. A Palestinian woman, her 4-year-old son and a female relative were also killed in the attack, and three others wounded. (Al-Bawaba, May 20, 2006)

In June, Hamas called off its 16-month-old truce after Israeli air-strikes in Gaza killed 10 Palestinians, including three children playing on a beach. "The Israeli massacres represent a direct opening battle," Hamas said in a statement. The PA's Prime Minister Esmail Haniya, also a Hamas leader, called the deaths a "war crime" and urged Jordan and Egypt to intervene. (Reuters, June 10)

In another move protested by Israeli Arabs and drawing parallels to South African apartheid, Israel's High Court in May ruled that Israeli Arabs and their Palestinian spouses can be barred from living together. Commented Member of the Knesset Zehava Gal-On (Meretz): "In essence, we are talking about a means to halt the demographic threat. There are no real security issues." MK Ahmed Tibi (Ra'am Ta'al party), who was married to a Palestinian woman from Tul Karm, said, "the High Court of Justice and the Citizenship Law have erected a separation barrier in the midst of the Arab family on the basis of ethnic background and the separation of husband from wife and parents from children." He added: "The decision proves that a Jewish and democratic state is an error in logic and that these two values are inherently contradictory." (Ha'aretz, Jerusalem Post, May 14, 2006 via Ha'aretz)

"Summer Rains" and the Second Lebanon War

On June 25, 2006, a small group of Hamas militants conducted a raid near the Gaza Strip's Kerem Shalom border crossing, emerging from a tunnel under the border to ambush an Israeli tank. Two Israeli soldiers were killed and an IDF corporal named Gilad Shalit was captured. Two Hamas militants were also reportedly killed in the skirmish. After the raid, Hamas issued a statement demanding the release of all Palestinian women and individuals younger than 18 from Israeli jails in exchange for Shalit's release. The Israeli government responded on June 27 by launching a military offensive dubbed "Operation Summer Rains." (Global Security)

The two stated goals of "Summer Rains" were to secure the release of Cpl. Shalit and prevent the launching of Qassam rockets into Israel. While preliminary discussions of a prisoner exchange were proposed by Hamas and the Popular Resistance Committees, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert stated that there would be no negotiations. (Ibid)

On the first day of the campaign, the Israeli Air Force bombed three bridges and a power plant in central Gaza while IDF ground forces entered the southern Strip—the first major incursion into the territory since the previous year's "disengagement." Israeli forces also carried out a wave of arrests of Hamas leaders in the West Bank—including PA government ministers. Air raids and ground incursions would continue through the end of July. (Ibid)

At least 240 Palestinians were killed in the operation. According to the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), which investigated each case, 197 of the dead were civilians; 12 were women and 48 children. (The Guardian, Sept. 7, 2006)

Before Summer Rains had ended, Israel had launched a major offensive in Lebanon that sparked much global protest. The Lebanon offensive began after Hezbollah guerrillas on July 12 apparently infiltrated across the border and captured two Israeli soldiers. Prime Minister Olmert called the Hezbollah raid an "act of war" by Lebanon and threatened "very, very, very painful" retaliation. As Israeli ground forces entered Lebanon, Hezbollah sent rockets over the border into northern Israel. (AP, July 13, 2006)

There were reports that the Lebanon operation was launched just as an unprecedented peace dialogue had been launched between Hamas leaders and Orthodox Israeli rabbis, aimed at securing the release of Cpl. Shalit and Palestinian prisoners. The talks were apparently aborted by the Lebanon crisis. There were also widespread rumors that the abduction of two Israeli soldiers thsat sparked the crisis actually took place on the Lebanese side of the border. (American Muslim, July 29, 2006)

In June, Hamas' top elected official, Prime Minister Ismail Haniya, also said he now accepted that his government must forsake its call for Israel's destruction. "We have no problem with a sovereign Palestinian state over all our lands within the 1967 borders, living in calm," he told a journalist. "But we need the West as a partner to help us through." Haniya's government also agreed to a compromise with Fatah, forming a national coalition that implicitly accepted coexistence with Israel. Weeks later, Haniya's office was destroyed by an Israeli missile. (NYT, Aug. 17)

The IDF claimed to be attacking an "infrastructure of terror" in Lebanon, but in fact targeted bridges, roads, airports and ships. Hundreds of civilian casualties were reported, and thousands fled their homes. (Lebanese Civil Society statement, Indymedia Beirut, July 17, 2006) Fifty-four civilians, including 37 children, were killed in an Israeli Air Force strike on a three-story building in the southern city of Qan on July 30. (NYT, July 30, 2006) Human Rights Watch protested Israel's illegal use of cluster munitions in Lebanon. (Human Rights Watch, Feb. 17: 08)

With the world's attention focused on Lebanon, Israel also conducted a series of raids across the West Bank and Gaza. In an official report at the end of July, the Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that Israeli soldiers had taken some 600 Palestinian residents prisoner since the abduction of Gilad Shalit. (IMEC News, July 31, 2006) Hospitals in the Gaza Strip saw a significant increase in war casualties, and began running low on medical supplies. (Reuters, Aug. 8, 2006)

On Aug. 11, UN Security Council Resolution 1701 called for Israel to withdraw from Lebanon and for Hezbollah to withdraw from the border zone. Although Israeli goals of disarming Hezbollah were not met, both sides agreed to the terms. (Security Council press release, Aug. 11; Gilbert Achcar, "The 33-Day War and UNSC Resolution 1701," Aug. 16, 2006)

October saw the ascent of Avigdor Lieberman's far-right Yisrael Beiteinu (Israel is Our Home) party into the cabinet—to warnings of "fascism" from the Israeli left. (Arthur Neslen, "Ring the alarms," Comment Is Free, Oct. 25, 2006)

November saw the six-day Operation Autumn Clouds, in IDF re-occupation of the Gaza town of Beit Hanoun. The IDF interrogated thousands, detained dozens and killed 57 Palestinian residents. One IDF soldier was killed in the operation, aimed at halting Hamas rocket attacks. (YNet, Nov. 7, 2006)

On Nov. 20, Israel's air force cancelled a planned raid on the home of a Gaza militant after hundreds of Palestinians barricaded themselves inside the building. However, hours after the "human shield" protest, an Israeli aircraft attacked a car carrying Hamas militants on a crowded Gaza City street, killing an elderly passerby. (Reuters, Nov. 20, 2006)

With Israel controlling the Strip's borders and making incursions at will, John Ging, Gaza-based director of the UNRWA, said that the Palestinians there were "effectively living in one big prison." (Peacework, February 2006)

The Fatah-Hamas Civil War; Siege in Gaza; Enclosure on the West Bank

After several mediation attempts led by Saudi Arabia, Hamas and Fatah agreed to share power and on March 17, 2007, and the Palestinian unity government was sworn in. The calm did not last long; May saw renewed clashes between Hamas and Fatah militants. Leaders of both parties repeatedly tried to mediate ceasefires, but none lasted more than a few days. On June 12 Hamas forces stormed Fatah's Gaza headquarters and after a short siege took it over. There were now two separate Palestinian administrations—Fatah on the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza. (YNet, Dec. 8, 2007)

Hamas ended a five-month truce with Israel on April 24, firing a barrage of mortars and rockets into Israeli territory. The Izzadine al-Qassam Brigades said the attack was a response to Israeli raids that had killed several Palestinians in recent days. In the weeks to come, more border skirmishes between Israeli and Hamas forces broke out. (AlJazeera, April 24, 2007; BBC News, May 15, 2007)

War also returned to Lebanon at this time, as the Lebanese army moved against the Fatah al-Islam militant group, a new faction supposedly linked to the internaitonal al-Qaeda network which had established a presence in Nahr al-Bared refugee camp. Lebanese army shelling of the camp left several refugees and presumed militants dead. (AlJazeera, June 1, 2007)

Palestinian and Israeli protesters gathered in Hebron, Nablus and Ramallah on June 5 to mark the anniversary of the start of the Six-Day War, and to demand an immediate end to Israel's occupation of Palestinian land. At the Hebron rally marking what had become known in Palestinian parlance as the naksa (setback) of 1967, some 200 Israeli protesters demanded the removal of all Jewish settlers from the city. They faced off against 30 Israeli counter-protesters, who carried signs calling them "traitors." In East Jerusalem, Israeli police shut down a Palestinian conference marking 40 years since Israel occupied the eastern sector of the city. (AlJazeera, June 5, 2007)

Palestine formally had two governments after President Mahmood Abbas fired Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh as prime minister, replacing him with the officially non-affiliated Salam Fayyad, a US-educated economist, former Palestinian finance minister—and veteran World Bank and IMF bureaucrat. He would only have real authority in the West Bank, with Hamas in control of Gaza. Haniyeh called for calm, and expressed hopes for reconciliation talks with Fatah. (BBC News, June 17; IMEMC, June 16, 2006)

In Jerusalem, the Temple Mount was a source of growing controversy, with Israeli teams and the Waqf each carrying out archaeological digs that were protested by the other side. Orthodox Jewish groups assailed the Antiquities Authority for approving the Waqf's dig, while the UN cultural organization UNESCO protested that the Authority had approved Israeli excavations without consulting the Waqf. A self-proclaimed "New Sanhedrin Council"—conceived by ultra-orthodox Israelis as a revival of the ancient Hebrew supreme religious body—joined groups calling for the renewal of ancient sacrificial rituals at the Western Wall. Israel's real courts issued a ruling barring the ritual, finding that "the rights of the petitioners to practice their faith are outweighed by other considerations such as public order and safety." When the gorup tried to sacrifice sheep at the wall, they were halted by police. But Muslims fears were growing of Jewish designs to expropriate the Waqf and establish a Third Temple on the site. (Feb. 28, March 14, April 2, 2007; Jerusalem Post, July 15, 2007 via World War 4 Report, July 17, 2007)

In August, Amnesty International warned that the Israeli army had "increased efforts to force Palestinian villagers out of the Jordan Valley...by destroying villagers' homes and restricting their movement and access to water." Homes, animal pens and other infrastructure were destroyed by the IDF at the hamlets of Humsa and Hadidiya. (Amnesty International, Aug. 23, 2007)

In the fall, US-brokered Israel-Fatah talks convened at Annapolis, Maryland, the West Bank was again under siege—but this time by Palestinian security forces. One was killed and several wounded in PA repression of dissidents from Hamas, the PFLP and other factions that protested the Annapolis talks. On the Israeli side, right-wing protesters packed Jerusalem's Paris Square Nov. 26, shouting "no" to a divided Jerusalem and "yes" to more West Bank settlements. The rally followed a larger protest at the Western Wall, where some 15,000 prayed for the Annapolis talks to fail. (Washington Jewish Week, Nov. 29, YNet, Nov. 27, 2007)

Israeli raids also continued. IDF forces carried out a series of incursions on West Bank villages in December, searching homes and detaining some 20. (Ma'an News Agency, Dec. 5)

Construction on the "separation barrier" also continued. Despite the World Court ruling, Israel's High Court had issued only five decisions supporting changes in the wall's route. As a result, only a small percentage of Palestinian land had been "returned" to the eastern side of the barrier. The wall still enclosed nearly 12% of the West Bank's land. As of Oct 1 2007, the Israeli courts had heard over 120 Palestinian complaints against the wall, 89% of which was set to run through Palestinian territory inside the West Bank. (World War 4 Report, Oct. 1, 2007)

Even where lands were not seized outright, the failure to provide sufficient "agricultural gates" on the barrier meant that farmers in some villages now had to travel up to 15 kilometers to reach their fields, leading to a declaine in cultivation and productivity. In encircled Jayyous, Palestinian farmers faced what the B'Tselem human rights group called a "bureaucratic nightmare," having to apply for military permits to reach their own lands—which were often arbitrarily denied. Shepherds in at least three Bedouin communities were forced to sell their sheep due to grazing lands being enclosed by the barrier—leaving them little choice but to seek employment as "illegal" workers in Israel, or doing manual labor on West Bank settlements. A report by the Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign of the Palestinian Environmental NGOs Network (PENGON) warned, "The completion of the Wall and its ghettoization of Arab Ramadin are turning a community of shepherds into exploited workers for Israeli settlement industrial zones, as they are unable to sustain their lives." (World War 4 Report, Oct. 1, 2007; Dolphin, p. 83, 92-4)

In a widely publicized ruling, on Sept. 4, the town of Bil'in won a case at the High Court to have the barrier moved, saving 500 acres of its farmland which had been isolated from the rest of the village by the wall. But the very next day, in a separate ruling that received little media attention, the court ruled that Matityahu East, a new settlement outpost being built within the wall on part of Bil'in's land, could stay. So while the publicized decision returned lands to Bil'in, the quiet one upheld an illegal grab of other, more outlying village lands. (World War 4 Report, Oct. 1, 2007)

Protested the Israeli human rights group B'Tselem: "The state of Israel has the right and duty to protect its citizens and residents from terrorist attacks. However, if it wants to build a physical barrier between it and the West Bank, according to the courts, it must be built along the Green Line or inside its territory." (Ma'an News Agency, May 29, 2008)

And there were also continued expropriations of Arab lands within the Green Line. 2007 saw an ongoing protest movement in the Galilee over the bulldozing of olive trees by the Interior Ministry and Israel Lands Administration at the village of al-Mashhad. Authorities said the land had been confiscated in favor of the Jewish city of Nazareth Illit (Upper Nazareth). (Electronic Intifada, Feb. 14, 2008)

Thousands of people took to the streets of Gaza Dec. 21 for the funeral of eight people killed in the previous day's Israeli incursion into al-Maghazi refugee camp. During the procession, bullets were fired in the air, amid chants demanding the resistance respond to the Israeli aggression. Rocket attacks from Gaza—both by Hamas and the al-Quds Brigades, military wing of Islamic Jihad—would follow repeatedly in the weeks to come. These inevitably drew Israeli military raids into Gaza—which were nearly always more deadly than the rocket attacks. (Ma'an News Agency, Dec. 21, 2007; Muslim World News, Jan. 9, 2008; Daily Star, Lebanon, Jan. 16, 2008))

In January 2008, the far-right faction around Avigdor Lieberman of the Yisrael Beitenu party walked out of the Israeli government in protest of announced plans by Prime Minister Olmert to negotiate with the Palestinians on issued such as the status of Jerusalem. (London Times, Jan. 16, 2008)

Simultaneously, Israel announced it was completely sealing off Gaza Strip crossings, even to humanitarian aid, and launching a maritime blockade of Gaza's coast. The siege would at times be loosened in response to international protest, but to date it has never been entirely lifted. (YNet, Jan. 19, 2008)

Israel's High Court of Justice Jan. 30 ruled that the blocking of power and fuel to the Gaza Strip was legal, rejecting petitions submitted by human rights organizations. (Haaretz, Jan. 31, 2008)

Emulating US strategies on the Mexican border, Israel also approved construction of a reinforced fence along its border with Egypt to stop Palestinian militants reaching Israel via the Sinai desert, as well as to halt the flow of economic migrants from Africa. On Feb. 4, Israel was struck by its first suicide bombing for more than a year, killing a woman and two attackers at Dimona in the Negev. Hamas announced that the attackers had come from the West Bank, not Gaza. It was the first Hamas suicide attack in Israel since 2004. The following day, Israeli air-strikes hit a Gaza police station, killing seven, in response to a rocket attack that wounded two children at Kibbutz Beeri. (BBC News, Feb 6, 2008)

Shops and stores in downtown Gaza City closed their doors Feb. 23 as part of a general strike to protest Israel's siege of the Strip. Shop owners carried banners reading "closed because of the siege" in Arabic and English. (Xinhua, Feb. 23, 2008)

Israel launched nearly a dozen air-strikes on Gaza Feb. 28, killing 20 Palestinians, after rockets fell on the Israeli town of Ashkelon. The dead included purported members of rocket squads—as well as five children, ranging in age from 8 to 12, who relatives said were playing soccer when they were hit by an Israeli missile. (AP, Feb. 28, 2008)

February also saw fighting between the IDF and Fatah's al-Aqsa Brigades at Balata refugee camp, east of Nablus on the West Bank. (Ma'an News Agency, Feb. 28, 2008)

Early March saw an Israeli ground and air operation that killed 72 Palestinians following the death of one Israeli civilian in a rocket attack. The PA suspended all contacts with Israel over the assault. The European Union criticized Israel's "disproportionate use of force." (AFP, March 2, 2008)

On March 6, a gunman opened fire with a Kalashnikov rifle in a library at West Jerusalem's Mercaz Harav Jewish seminary, killing at least seven students and wounding nine before he himself was gunned down by an Israeli army officer. Israeli authorities said the previously unknown Galilee Freedom Battalion was behind the attack. (Ma'an News Agency, March 7, 2008)

The Israeli government March 9 approved construction of a 330-unit housing project in Givat Zeev, a West Bank settlement already home to about 10,000 settlers. The project began in 1999 but was suspended when the Second Intifada broke out the following year. Palestinian official Saeb Erekat called the project "another slap in the face of the peace process." Defending the decision, Prime Minister Olmert's press spokesman said: "We've said all along that there won't be a complete freeze in construction in the large settlement blocks. We've been very consistent and upfront." (Los Angeles Times, March 10, 2008)

Yet Olmert himself said in a January interview with the Jerusalem Post: "Every year all the settlements in all the territories [of the West Bank] continue to grow. There is a certain contradiction in this between what we're actually seeing and what we ourselves promised... We have obligations related to settlements and we will honor them." (Ibid)

In May, US Air Force Lt. Gen. William Fraser III, a Bush administration envoy, cuts short his visit to Hebron after meeting with angry protests by right-wing settlers—which escalated to a physical clash with Fraser's bodyguards. (Ha'aretz, May 2, 2008)

On May 6, 480 Palestinian Authority police entered the city of Jenin to crack down on criminal gangs and Islamic Jihad cells, under the rubric of the Israeli-approved and fashionably euphemistic "Operation Smile and Hope." Clashes with presumed Islamic militants broke out in the outlying town of Qabatiyah. The following day, Israeli forces occupied the city and refugee camp of Jenin—over the protests of the PA. (LAT, Ma'an News Agency, May 7, 2008)

Israeli troops attacked a peaceful march commemorating the 60th anniversary of the Nakba in the West Bank city of Tulkarm May 10, injuring ten, including a journalist who was hit with a bullet in his hand. Participants, including international activists, raised Palestinian flags and wrote graffiti on the face of the separation wall protesting the enclosure of village lands at Shofa. Soldiers opened fire and threw tear gas. (WAFA, May 10, 2008) Four were injured two days later in a similar scene at Na'lein village, west of Ramallah. (WAFA, May 12, 2008) Jordanian authorities meanwhile banned all events marking the Nakba. (Jerusalem Post, May 9, 2008)

Israel demanded that the UN strike the word "Nakba" from its lexicon after an official statement released by Secretary General Ban Ki-moon made specific reference to the word. A Ban spokesperson said the secretary general "phoned Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to stress his support for the Palestinian people on Nakba Day." Danny Carmon, Israel's deputy ambassador to the UN, said that the term "Nakba is a tool of Arab propaganda used to undermine the legitimacy of the establishment of the State of Israel, and it must not be part of the lexicon of the UN." (Arab News, May 17, 2008)

The legacy of the Nazi Holocaust continued to loom large in the propaganda war. Israel's deputy defense minister, Matan Vilnai, declared that continuing Palestinian rocket fire would risk a "greater shoah" of the Palestinian people. Israeli officials later insisted that Vilnai warned of disaster in a generic sense, but the term shoah (Hebrew for disaster) is used almost solely to refer to the extermination of the European Jews. (Muslim News, London, April 22, 2008)

Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said of Vilnai's comments: "We are facing new Nazis who want to kill and burn the Palestinian people." PA President Abbas said that what was happening to the Palestinians was worse than the Holocaust, and Hamas political leader Khaled Meshal summed everything up by saying: "The real holocaust [is] being committed by Israel against the Palestinian people." (Ha'aretz, London, March 31, 2008)

Israeli forces raided the village of Ni'lin, west of Ramallah, on May 29, storming houses and detaining four men. The village was a focus of local protests against the enclosure of agricultural lands by the wall. (Ma'an News Agency, May 29, 2008)

A new report by the Israeli group Peace Now said Israel has nearly doubled construction in its West Bank settlements in 2008—violating commitments under the US-backed "Road Map" peace plan even as it pursued revived talks with the Palestinians. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, meeting with Israeli and Palestinian officials in a bid to move negotiations forward, said that settlement activity was "not helpful." (Peace Now, August 2008)

The rights group B'Tselem described the ongoing campaign of violence by West Bank settlers:

For years, Israeli authorities have both barred Palestinian access to rings of land surrounding settlements, and have not acted to eliminate settlers' piratical closing of lands adjacent to settlements and blocking of Palestinian access to them...

Settlers pave patrol roads and place physical obstructions on Palestinian lands adjacent to settlements, at times with the authorities' approval, at others not. Settlers also forcibly remove Palestinians, primarily farmers, from their lands. B'Tselem has documented cases of gunfire, threats of gunfire and killing, beatings, stone throwing, use of attack dogs, attempts to run over Palestinians, destruction of farming equipment and crops, theft of crops, killing and theft of livestock and animals used in farming, unauthorized demands to see identification cards, and theft of documents. [B'Tselem, Sept. 10, 2008]

Jerusalem had not experienced a suicide bombing since 2004. But in July 2008, a Palestinian construction worker used a bulldozer to overturn a bus and plough into cars and pedestrians before being shot dead. Three people were killed and 45 wounded in the attack, (The Scotsman, July 3, 2008)

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert announced the dream of a "Greater Israel" was over on Sept. 21—a day after settlers raided the Palestinian village of Assira Qabaliya, in the northern West Bank, causing extensive damage and wounding several people. (IRIN, Sept. 21, 2008)

Jews and Arabs clashed in the Israeli city of Acre after an Arab man was assaulted for driving during the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur Oct. 9. The violence erupted around midnight, several hours after Jews began marking the Day of Atonement, when Israel comes to a virtual standstill. A group of Jewish youths assaulted an Arab man in his car, sparking rioting that resulted in extensive damage to dozens of cars and shops. About one third of Acre's population of 50,000 are Arab. Arab MPs had for years asked police to prevent Jews from stoning cars driven by Arabs on Yom Kippur. (Middle East Online, Oct. 9 2008)

Departing Prime Minister Olmert announced measures Nov. 2 in response to rising settler violence, including a halt to all government financing of "illegal" Jewish settlement outposts. The announcement amounted to an acknowledgment that public funds were still being spent on the outposts, contrary to government policy and a longstanding pledge to the US. However, the move applied only to some 100 outposts considered illegal under Israeli law—not to the more than 120 "official" settlements (which are equally illegal under international law). Nonetheless, the move was followed by clashes between the Israeli security forces and extremist settlers, with settler youth hurling stones at soldiers. (AlJazeera, Nov. 3, 2008)

Following more rocket attacks and retaliatory raids, Israel went back on a pledge to ease its blockade of the Gaza Strip Nov. 13, turning away critical UN deliveries of fuel and food at the borders for the seventh consecutive day. Gaza was plunged into darkness as the territory's only power plant shut down for lack of fuel. As night fell, sirens sounded across the Strip in protest of the closure. (Ma'an News Agency, Nov. 13, 2008)

Speaking before the General Assembly, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon called Israel's ongoing settlement construction an "illegal" breach of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which has lead to widespread human rights abuses against Palestinians. Ban's statement came as he announced the findings of a new report prepared for his office, "Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including Jerusalem, and the occupied Syrian Golan." The report found that one-third of the settlements' territory was actually on private Palestinian-owned land, much of which was expropriated by Israel on the grounds of military necessity. A second report, on human rights in the Occupied Territories, found the situation to be "worsening." (The Public Record, Nov. 14, 2008)

Israeli police evicted an elderly disabled Palestinian man and his wife from their East Jerusalem home of more than 50 years in a pre-dawn raid Nov. 9. The eviction followed a July Israeli High Court order that found the home, provided to the couple in 1956 by the Jordanian government and a UN refugee program, was built on land they did not own. A Jewish land association said it had Ottoman-era documents proving the land originally was owned by Jews who fled in 1948 when Jordanian troops took East Jerusalem. The wheelchair-bound Palestinian man, Mohammed al-Kurd, and his wife, Fawzieh, were removed from the building before dawn. The eviction came despite a plea by the US consulate to allow the couple to remain in their home. Now in their 60s, the al-Kurds became refugees when the newly established state of Israel took over their family holdings in West Jerusalem and in Jaffa. "I will never forgive the Israelis for what they have done to me and my sick husband, kicking us out of our own house in the early hours of the morning," said Fawzieh al-Kurd. "I may forgive other things they have done, but not this." (BBC News, Nov. 15; JTA, Nov. 11)

In another case concerning the rights of Arabs within the Green Line, on Nov. 23 Israel's High Court issued a decision to allow the state more time to implement its ruling of February 2006 concerning the "National Priority Areas" (NPAs). In its 2006 decision, the court ruled that the government's division of the country into NPAs that are awarded special educational benefits discriminated against Arab citizens. The court noted that the 535 towns and villages designated as within high-priority NPA "A" included only four small Arab villages. But the deadline to correct the decision kept getting pushed back. (Adalah press release, Nov. 24, 2008)

Settlers invaded Nablus Dec. 4, setting fire to fields and vehicles. Dozens were injured in Hebron as IDF troops evicted 13 settler families that were illegally occupying a house belonging to a Palestinian family, enforcing an order from Israel's High Court. The settlers also set fire to Palestinian homes in Hebron, and several were arrested by Israeli soldiers, who used tear gas to quell the riot. (Ma'an News Agency, Dec. 4, 2008)

Israel's HIgh Court ruled on Dec. 15 that the route of the West Bank "separation barrier" could not be based on plans to expand Jewish settlements. The court rejected a plan that would route the wall through Bil'in village, on the grounds that this route was not motivated by "security concerns." The ruling ordered a return of 250 acres to the village—but noted that the Israeli state had still failed to implement a 2007 High Court ruling to similarly return village lands. (Ma'an News Agency, Dec. 16, 2008)

Some 50 Palestinians—many decked out in Santa Claus costumes—hurled stones at Israeli security forces in Bil'in Dec. 26 in a protest against the enclosure of village lands by the wall. Soldiers tried to disperse the crowd with tear gas and rubber-coated bullets. In Na'alin, 200 Palestinians and Israeli supporters also held protests that day, some hurling stones and petrol bombs at Israeli soldiers. Army Radio reported that dozens of young Likud supporters led by MK Gilad Erdan also arrived in Na'alin to express their support for the soldiers. (Ha'artez, Dec. 26, 2008)

Operation Cast Lead

A Hamas ceasefire had been in effect since June, as good-will measure to get Israel to lift the Gaza siege. Israel did not substantially ease the siege, and Hamas did allow sporadic rocket fire—typically after Israel killed or detained Hamas followers on the West Bank, where the ceasefire did not apply. These rocket attacks left none or one dead, by disputed accounts. (George E. Bisharat in the Wall Street Journal, Jan. 10, 2009)

Then, on Nov. 4 the IDF made an incursion into the Strip to blow up a tunnel near al-Bureij refugee camp they said had been built to allow terrorist infiltration. Six Palestinians were killed and two Israeli soldiers lightly wounded in the ensuing gun battle. (YNet, Nov. 5, 2008)

Hamas immediately retaliated with rocket fire; Israel then killed five more Palestinians in counter-retaliatory raids on Jebaliya refugee camp. More rocket fire of course followed—but still no Israelis had been killed when Olmert ordered a major offensive in the Gaza Strip on Dec. 26. (Jerusalem Post, Nov. 5, 2008; Bisharat, op cit)

On Dec. 22, five days before Israel launched its air war on Gaza, Hamas declared a self-imposed one-day halt to its fire, to give negotiations a chance to restore calm. Israel rejected this. Speaking to Reuters on that same day, Israeli government spokesperson Mark Regev said, "A ceasefire cannot be unilateral." (Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 17, 2009)

Israel of course claimed to be acting in self-defense, and this was the widespread portrayal in the Western media. However, the Israeli peace group Gush Shalom said in a statement:

The escalation towards war could and should have been avoided. It was the State of Israel which broke the truce, in the "ticking tunnel" raid on the night of the US elections two months ago. Since then the army went on stoking the fires of escalation with calculated raids and killings, whenever the shooting of missiles on Israel decreased. [Ma'an News Agency, Dec. 27]

Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal called Dec. 27 for a "third intifada" after air-strikes on the Gaza Strip killed more than 200—including children on their way home from school. Speaking from Damascus, he urged a "military intifada against the Zionist enemy," as well as "a peaceful intifada internally"—an apparent reference to Hamas' struggle with President Abbas. (Reuters, Dec. 27; BBC World Service, Dec. 28, 2008)

Defense Minister Ehud Barak told the Knesset that Israel is engaged in an "all-out war with Hamas." UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called for an immediate ceasefire and condemned both Israel and Hamas. While recognizing Israel's right to defend itself from rocket attacks, he condemned its "excessive use of force." (Ma'an News Agency, Dec. 28, 2008) Some 150 rockets and mortars were fired from Gaza into Israel since the air-strikes began, killing one person. (BBC News, Dec. 28, 2008)

The Israeli cabinet rejected calls from France and other nations for an immediate 48-hour pause in the devastating air offensive against Gaza, continuing the assault into a fifth day Dec. 31 despite mounting international pressure. (Middle East Online, Dec. 31, 2008)

Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann of Nicaragua, president of the UN General Assembly, accused Israel of "wanton aggression" in the offensive, charging that it violated the Geneva Conventions. His statement listed three violations:

Collective punishment — The entire 1.5 million people who live in the crowded Gaza Strip are being punished for the actions of a few militants.

Targeting civilians — The air-strikes were aimed at civilian areas in one of the most crowded stretches of land in the world, certainly the most densely populated area of the Middle East.

Disproportionate military response — The airstrikes have not only destroyed every police and security office of Gaza's elected government, but have killed and injured hundreds of civilians; at least one strike reportedly hit groups of students attempting to find transportation home from a university. [Ma'an News Agency, Dec. 31, 2008]

On Jan. 1, Israel bombed the offices of Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, and a Gaza City mosque where Hamas activists were reportedly hiding. Israeli strikes also targeted the Legislative Assembly building and Justice Ministry of the Hamas administration in Gaza, and first reports were heard of damage to a hospital. Nearly every government building in Gaza was hit, including the Education Ministry. Israeli jets flew some 500 sorties, with helicopter gunships also used. (Ha'aretz, BBC News, Jan. 1, 2009)

Israel again rejected calls for a UN-backed ceasefire. A draft UN resolution put forward by Egypt and Libya failed after the US and UK protested that it called on Israel to ends its air-strikes but made no mention of Hamas rocket attacks against Israel, which they said started the hostilities. Rockets fired by Hamas militants again landed in Beersheba, although there were no further casualties. (BBC News, Jan. 1, 2009)

On Jan. 2, Hamas leader Nizar Rayan was killed in a targeted air-strike several of his wives and children. Air-strikes also destroyed a mosque in the northern town of Jabaliya that the IDF said was a "terror hub." (Middle East Online, The Guardian, LAT, BBC World Service, Jan. 2, 2009)

On Jan. 3, Israel ordered a ground invasion. The IDF barred journalists from the Strip, but Palestinian medical sources said hundreds of Gaza residents had been killed since the bombing began. Much of the Strip was by then without electricity. Ban Ki-Moon called for a halt to the invasion. But an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council ended without agreeing on a statement on the crisis—largely due to US intransigence. (AlJazeera, (BBC News, Jan. 2, 2009)

Some 10,000 protesters gathered outside the residence of Prime Minister Olmert and Defense Minister Ehud Barak to demand an immediate ceasefire, under the slogan "Children in Gaza and Sderot want to live"—a reference to the Israeli town hit by multiple Hamas rocket attacks. Some 500 Sderot residents signed a petition calling for Israel to halt the military campaign and renew the truce with Hamas. A march some 100,000 strong was held in Sakhnin, an Arab city within Israel's borders, led by an Arab Member of the Knesset Mohammad Barakeh. "This is the largest march in the history of Palestinians" within Israeli boundaries, Barakeh said. Protests against the Gaza offensive also mounted around the world. (Press TV, Iran, YNet, Israel, Gush Shalom, Israel, Palestine News Network, Jan. 3, 2009)

Casualties mounted as Israeli troops penetrated the outskirts of Gaza City and met resistance from Hamas gunmen. The city's hospitals were soon overwhelmed. Aid groups expressed urgent concern for the civil population, who had no electricity, no water and now faced dire food shortages. Hospitals were only running on back-up generators. (Middle East Online, CNN, BBC World Service, Jan. 5; Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 4, 2009)

Israeli tanks and troops surged into towns across the Gaza Strip on Jan. 6, battling Hamas fighters through the streets and alleys of Gaza City in the heaviest fighting of what the Israelis were now calling "Operation Cast Lead." Urgent international calls for a ceasefire mounted. The United Nations demanded an investigation into tank and air assaults that hit three UN-run schools—killing at least 45 people who had taken shelter in one at the Jabaliya refugee camp. (Middle East Online, Jan. 6, 2009)

Four rockets struck northern Israel from Lebanon early Jan. 8, wounding two people and threatening to open a new front in the campaign. (CNN, Jan. 8, 2009)

UNRWA spokesman Christopher Gunness told the press that Gaza remained occupied territory: "In international law, there's the concept of effective control: if you control the airspace, the land and the sea borders of a place, you occupy it. And from the UN's point of view, there is one occupied territory... Gaza has continued to be occupied." He added that most media outlets had failed to report this crucial fact when reporting on the conflict: "Until the underlying cause of this, the occupation, is addressed and the strangulation, which is part of that occupation, is addressed, I fear for the people of Sderot." (Middle East Online, Jan. 7, 2009)

Israel carried out new deadly air raids early Jan. 9, even as the UN Security Council finally passed Resolution 1860, calling for an "immediate, durable" ceasefire leading to the "full withdrawal" of Israeli forces from Gaza. The text, while stopping short of demanding that Israel call off the offensive before a ceasefire is implemented, did call for "the unimpeded provision and distribution throughout Gaza of humanitarian assistance, including of food, fuel and medical treatment." The US abstained but refrained from vetoing the resolution. Air raids continued unabated. "Israel is acting and will act only according to its interests and the security of its citizens and its right to self-defense," an official quoted Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni as saying. The resolution came hours after the UN suspended food deliveries to Gaza and the Red Cross accused Israel of blocking medical assistance after its forces fired on aid workers. UNRWA said a UN convoy was hit by two Israeli tank shells, killing a truck driver. (Middle East Online, Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 9, 2009)

The US Senate unanimously approved a bipartisan resolution Nov. 8 voicing strong support for Israel's Gaza offensive, while urging a ceasefire that would prevent Hamas from launching any more rockets into Israel. The House followed up the next day with a similar resolution, expressing "unwavering" support for Israel's right to "self-defense" against "unceasing aggression" by Hamas. (Reuters, Jan. 8, 2009)

Meanwhile, Mauritania, one of three Arab countries that maintained full diplomatic relations with Israel (with Egypt and Jordan), recalled its ambassador in protest of the Gaza aggression. (JTA, Jan. 7, 2009)

Israeli troops bombed Gaza into a third week Jan. 10. Bombs fell on al-Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza, where a mosque came under missile fire. Although Hamas and its allies claimed to have fired more than 600 rockets into Israel, the Israeli toll since the start of the offensive still stood at 10 soldiers and three civilians. "The vicious cycle of provocation and retribution must be brought to an end," said UN human rights chief Navi Pillay. But both Israel and Hamas dismissed the UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire. Hamas said it was not consulted on the ceasefire resolution and would not accept a truce that did not see the lifting of the blockade. (Middle East Online, Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 10; IRIN, Jan. 9, 2009)

Israeli troops pushed deeper into Gaza City as warplanes continued to carry out air-strikes—despite a so-called "lull" in the fighting for the delivery of humanitarian aid. Thousands of panicked Palestinian civilians fled their homes before the advancing troops. Palestinian doctors said burn wounds were caused by banned white phosphorous shells, with Israel denying the charge. (Ha'aretz, Jan. 12; Ma'an News Agency, AFP, Jan. 11, 2009)

Ten Israeli soldiers opted for 14-day prison terms rather than accept deployment to Gaza. In a statement, the soldiers said they were refusing deployment on "conscience grounds." No'em Levna, a first lieutenant in Israel's army, said: "We killed 900 Palestinians in 17 days, including hundreds of children... Nothing justifies this kind of killing. It's devilish... [T]he hatred and anger we are planting in Gaza will rebound on us." (Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 13, 2009)

As Israeli tanks rolled deeper into Gaza City from the northern outskirts, Ban Ki-moon said he was "very frustrated and concerned" that Security Council Resolution 1860 had not been respected. "The fighting must stop," he said. "To both sides, I say, 'Just stop now.'" (VOA, Jan. 12)

On Jan. 14, Jewish American activists in Los Angeles chained themselves to the entrance of the Israeli consulate and blocked the driveway, chanting "Not in Our Name! We will Not be Silent!" They held up signs reading "Israeli Consulate: Closed for War Crimes." (IJAN, Jan. 14, 2009)

Israeli strikes set UN and media buildings and a hospital ablaze Jan. 15 as tanks rolled deep into Gaza City. Shortly after Ban Ki-moon arrived in Israel to plead for a ceasefire, a raid hit the main UN compound in Gaza, wounding three employees, setting fire to a warehouse filled with tons of aid, and leading UNRWA to partly suspend operations. "I have conveyed my strong protest and outrage and demanded a full explanation," Ban told reporters. (Middle East Online, Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 15, 2009)

The UN General Assembly approved a non-binding resolution Jan. 16 for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza—rejecting a more far-reaching text proposed by a group of Muslim and Latin American states led by Venezuela. The Assembly's resolution followed closely the text of the Security Council resolution, calling for "an immediate, durable and fully respected cease-fire, leading to the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip." The resolution was voted up by 142 countries, with four opposed and eight abstaining. Voting against were Israel, the United States and the Pacific island of Nauru. (Reuters, Jan. 17)

Arab leaders opened an emergency summit Jan. 16 in Qatar's capital, Doha—although they failed to meet the two-thirds quorum of the 22-member Arab League, with regional powers Egypt and Saudi Arabia refusing to attend. A joint communique issued at the end of the summit called on all Arab states to cut ties with Israel in response to the Gaza offensive. "Israel must cease its assault on Gaza and leave unconditionally," it said, emphasizing that all the enclave's border crossings should be opened to facilitate the flow of humanitarian aids. (Xinhua, Jan. 17, 2009)

Qatar joined Mauritania, Venezuela and Bolivia in breaking diplomatic ties with Israel. Syria's Bashir Assad criticized Arab nations for not attending the summit: "Israel is a country built on massacres... [T]he enemy speaks in language of blood only. This is a call to resistance... Resistance is the only way to peace." (AP, Jan. 16, 2009)

Meanwhile in Washington, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni signed a US-Israeli "Memorandum of Understanding" on securing Gaza's borders. Details of the MOU were not revealed, but a State Department spokesman said "the essential element of this [document] is to inhibit the ability of Hamas to rearm." (Middle East Online, Jan. 16, 2009)

Israel declared a "unilateral cease-fire" the next day (despite having previously rejected Hamas' "unilateral cease-fire")—although sporadic gunfire continued in Gaza, and rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel. Olmert said some Israeli forces would remain in Gaza, and claimed that Israel's goals "were met in their entirety, and even beyond." Saying Hamas had deliberately been left out of the ceasefire arrangement because it is a "terrorist" organization, he added that Israel would consider withdrawing its forces from Gaza only if Hamas agreed to completely hold its fire. Hamas itself said that it would disregard the Israeli ceasefire declaration, fighting on until its own demands are met. (Ha'aretz, Jan. 18; Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 17, 2009)

Olmert expressed "regret for the pain and the suffering for the unbearable situation," but nonetheless blamed Hamas. "Israel used its forces with as much sensitivity to the civilian pollution as it could," he claimed. Defense Minister Ehud Barak said the assault on Gaza has been "a war of choice, but the right one." More than 1,300 Palestinians, a third of them children, were killed in the three-week Israeli onslaught, by the estimate of Gaza health officials. Some 4,100 homes were totally destroyed and 17,000 others damaged. (Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 17; Middle East Online, Jan. 20, 2009)

Human rights groups wold later put the total Palestinian death toll in Operation Cast Lead at some 1,400—including some 300 children, more than 115 women, and some 85 men aged over 50, amounting to hundreds of unarmed civilians. (Amnesty International, July 2, 2009)

Israel's military said 1,166 Palestinians were killed, of whom 709 are described as "terror operatives." In quotes published a day before the circulation of the official Israeli figures, Israel's Southern Command chief Maj Gen Yoav Galant hailed the civilians-to-combatants ratio as an "achievement unmatched in the history of this kind of combat." (BBC News, March 26, 2009)

The Israeli death toll in Operation Cast Lead was ten soldiers (four killed by "friendly fire"), and three civilians killed in rocket attacks. (Amnesty International, July 2, 2009)

Israeli air-strikes continued through Jan. 17, and again drew harsh international criticism. Two brothers, aged five and seven, were killed in a strike on a UN-run school in the northern town of Beit Lahiya where hundreds of civilians had taken refuge from fierce clashes between Israeli ground troops and Palestinian fighters. The boys' mother lost her legs in the attack. "Not even a UN installation is safe," said Christopher Gunness of UNRWA. "There is no place to flee." (Middle East Online, NYT, The National, UAE, Jan. 17, 2009)

On the 19th, Hamas and other Palestinian factions in the Gaza Strip agreed to honor Israel's declared ceasefire on the condition that Israeli troops quit the Gaza Strip within one week, and again demanded a lifting of the siege on Gaza's borders. Israeli forces began slowly withdrawing. Hamas and other Gaza factions denied that Israel had "imposed its conditions" on the resistance. Hamas also rejected Israeli claims that it had killed more than 700 militants, saying only some 50 were killed. (Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 18, Ha'aretz, Jan. 19, Middle East Online, Jan. 20, 2009)

At least one Israeli settler was killed in Palestinian reprisals on the West Bank in the aftermath of Operation Cast Lead. (Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 20, 2009)

The Reckoning

In his first call to a foreign leader, the new US President Barack Obama spoke to Palestinian Authority President Abbas on the phone Jan. 21, 2009, saying he wanted to work "as partners to establish a durable peace in the region." He shortly followed the call up with one to and Israeli Prime Minister Olmert. Israel was then withdrawing the last of its troops from the Gaza Strip, but prevented Abbas' administration from transferring $80 million to Gaza to pay Palestinian Authority workers there. Israel told the UN and other aid agencies they must apply for project-by-project Israeli approval and provide guarantees none of the work will benefit Hamas. (Bloomberg, Reuters, Jan. 21, 2009)

Thousands of Palestinians rallied in cities across the Gaza Strip Jan. 20, responding to a Hamas declaration that the people should "celebrate the resistance victory in the war against Israeli forces." Massive crowds gathered in front of the demolished Palestinian Legislative Council headquarters in Gaza City, shouting that they were with the resistance. (Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 20, 2009)

Olmert assembled a team to defend his government against charges of war crimes in the Gaza offensive. Justice Minister Daniel Friedman assembled an inter-ministerial team to prepare legal defenses for Israeli officials and military personnel. Richard Falk, UN special rapporteur on human rights in the occupied territories, called for an independent investigation to see if Israel committed war crimes. The Israeli military banned publication of the names of Israeli commanders who took part in the offensive for fear they could face prosecution when traveling overseas. (VOA, Jan. 23, 2009)

The Palestinian Authority pressed the International Criminal Court at The Hague to investigate accusations of Israeli war crimes in Gaza. The court's prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo initially said he lacked the legal basis to examine the case, since Israel does not recognize the court. But after the Palestinian Authority signed a commitment on Jan. 22 recognizing the court's authority, the prosecutor indicated he was open to studying the Palestinian claim. (NYT, Feb. 11, 2009)

January saw the publication in the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz of classified government data regarding the extent of construction in "officially" recognized West Bank settlements that was nonetheless illegal under Israel's own laws. Violations included building carried out without appropriate permits or outside of approved plans—as well as the construction of whole neighborhoods on private Palestinian lands. The Israeli human rights group Yesh Din announced it was launching a campaign to help Palestinians sue the state of Israel for use of their privately owned lands for Jewish settlements. Some 285,000 Israelis were now living in about 120 recognized settlements in the West Bank, not including East Jerusalem. (NYT, Jan. 30, 2009)

February's tight Israeli election saw Benjamin Netanyahu of Likud locked in a battle for power with Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni of Kadima, the supposedly "centrist" party founded by Sharon. Livni opened coalition talks with Avigdor Lieberman of the ultra-nationalist Yisrael Beitenu. Hamas official Fawzi Barhoum said Israeli voters elected a "troika of terrorism"—an obvious reference to Livni, Netanyahu and Lieberman. After a month of negotiations, Netanyahu would become prim minster, and Lieberman foreign minister. (JTA, Feb. 11, The Guardian, March 31, 2009)

Several Israeli military vehicles overran the Qalqiliya-area village of Jayyous the night of Feb. 11 and imposed a curfew—evidently in response to the campaign of weekly protests against the building of the separation wall across village lands. The troops blasted into the area amid gunfire and sound bombs, witnesses reported. As the soldiers entered the village, Palestinian youths showered the vehicles with stones and bottles, sparking brief clashes. (Ma'an News Agency, Feb. 11, 2009)

On March 13, ISM volunteer Tristan Anderson of California was shot in the head with a tear-gas canister at Nil'in village on the West Bank. He survived, but suffered severe traumatic brain injury and blindness in his right eye. Israeli authorities closed the case without bringing criminal charges, but Anderson's survivors have brought litigation in Israel, demanding the investigation be re-opened. While Anderson's case won some international attention, the ISM pointed out that many Nil'in residents had suffered similar fates. Ahmed Mousa, 10, had been shot in the head with live ammunition the previous July. The following day, Yousef Amira, 17, had been shot twice with rubber-coated steel bullets, leaving him brain dead. He died a week later. Arafat Rateb Khawaje, 22, was the third Nil'in resident to be killed by Israeli forces, shot in the back with live ammunition on Dec. 28. That same day, Mohammed Khawaje, 20, was shot in the head with live ammunition, dying three days in a Ramallah hospital. (ISM press release, March 13, 2009; Solidarity with Tristan Anderson website)

A Palestinian protester was killed in April after being hit in the chest by a tear gas canister during a protest against the separation wall in Bil'in. The killing prompted further protests in Tel Aviv. (YNet, April 17; Ha'aretz, April 18, 2009)

Israeli soldiers shut down a non-violent protest in Hebron in June, declaring the area a "Closed Military Zone" and harassing international peace activists and Palestinians. The protest was against the expansion of the Susya settlement of south of Hebron. (Ma'an News Agency, June 6, 2009)

The New York Times reported days earlier that unnamed "senior Israeli officials" had accused President Obama of failing to acknowledge what they called "understandings" with the Bush administration that allowed Israel to build West Bank settlement housing within certain guidelines while still publicly claiming to honor a settlement "freeze." (NYT, June 6, 2009)

Israeli Knesset member Dove Hannen (Democratic Front for Peace and Equality) was one of hundreds of international and Israeli peace activists who participated in the weekly anti-wall protest in Bil'in on Aug. 14—and was tear gassed, shot at with rubber-coated bullets, and subjected to sound bombs by soldiers from his own country's military. (Ma'an News Agency, Aug. 15, 2009)

Arab and Palestinian leaders reacted angrily after US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton seemingly departed from her administration's insistence that Israel halt settlement growth. Speaking alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem, Clinton said, "What the prime minister has offered in specifics of restraint on the policy of settlements...is unprecedented in the context of prior-to negotiations." (Ma'an News Agency, Oct. 31, 2009)

Israel officially declared a temporary freeze on West Bank settlement construction on Nov. 26. But an investigation weeks later by the daily Ha'aretz found that construction at settlements was "booming" despite the supposed freeze. In December, Defense Minister Ehud Barak decided to "ease" the construction freeze, granting local settlement municipalities the authority to hand out building permits to be implemented immediately after the freeze expires. (Ha'aretz, Jan. 1, 2010)

Despite the continuance of settlement construction, at year's end President Barack Obama signed a US aid pledge of $2.77 billion for Israel in 2010, and a total of $30 billion over the next decade. Israel was bound by the agreement to use 75% of the aid to buy military material made in the US. Washington also for the first time provided $500 million to the Palestinian Authority, including $100 million to train security forces. A strict proviso tied to this aid was that the Authority's leadership recognize Israel. (Sydney Morning Herald, Jan. 2, 2010)

CIA training of the Palestinian Authority's security and intelligence forces were viewed darkly by some. According to the Palestinian watchdog al-Haq, human rights on the West Bank and Gaza had "gravely deteriorated due to the spreading violations committed by Palestinian actors"—namely, the PA and Hamas each persecuting each other's followers in their respective domains. (The Guardian, Dec. 17, 2009)

Year's end also saw Israel's High Court order the military to allow Palestinians to travel on part of a major highway through the West Bank. The move, heralded by human rights activists, reopened to Palestinians a 20-kilometer section of Route 443, linking Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. The IDF cut off Palestinian access to the road after a series of attacks on Israeli motorists in 2002. That move turned what had been a 15-minute drive for tens of thousands of Palestinian residents into an hour of difficult travel on unpaved roads. Despite the court order, sections of the road that lie in Israeli territory were to remain closed to Palestinian vehicles, like all Israeli roads. About 160 kilometers of roads in the West Bank remained off limits to Palestinians. (AlJazeera, Dec. 30, 2009)

The struggle for Jerusalem was ongoing. An internal report by European Union diplomats that was leaked to Reuters charged that Israel accelerated its "illegal annexation" of East Jerusalem in 2008 through municipal and security policies that discriminated against Palestinian residents. The number of building permits issued for Jewish homes in East Jerusalem increased by a factor of 40 in 2008 over 2007, the report found, while Israeli authorities placed "severe restrictions" on construction permits for Palestinians, who were also denied municipal funding proportionate to their population. (Reuters, March 7, 2009)

The revelation came as Israel announced new plans to demolish scores of Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem. Hillary Clinton called the planned demolitions "unhelpful" (which was now a State Department byword of successive administrations, Republican and Democratic). Israeli officials denied there was a campaign to drive out Palestinians, who made up 34% of Jerusalem's population. (Ibid)

October saw repeated Palestinian protests in Jerusalem against Israeli-imposed restrictions on access to al-Aqsa Mosque. Some 75 Palestinians were arrested in clashes with police. The violence clouded the visit of White House envoy George Mitchell, who met separately with Netanyahu in Jerusalem and Abbas in Ramallah. (WSJ, Oct. 10, 2009)

Palestinian Minister of Foreign Affairs Riyad al-Maliki, speaking at UNESCO's 35th general conference in Paris, urged member states to establish a special fund to protect the heritage of Jerusalem—which he said was suffering under Israel's refusal to implement hundreds of international resolutions. Al-Maliki said the separation wall was causing untold damage to East Jerusalem, and that its construction reflected Israel's lack of respect for cultural heritage. (Ma'an News Agency, Oct. 10, 2009)

Violent clashes erupted between Palestinian residents and Israeli troops Nov. 18 as military forces razed two houses in East Jerusalem's Silwan district. Troops fired tear gas at the crowd that gathered to confront the bulldozer crews. Some 20 Arab residents were left homeless by the demolitions. (Ma'an news Agency, Nov. 18, 2009)

The unrest came as the Israeli government announced approval of 900 new homes in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Gilo, one of a dozen in the occupied eastern part of the city where new settlements are under consideration. In a reaction that sparked media outrage in Israel, President Obama told Fox News: "I think additional settlement building does not contribute to Israel's security. I think it makes it harder for them to make peace with their neighbors. I think it embitters the Palestinians in a way that could end up being very dangerous." (Fox News, Nov. 18; AFP, Nov. 17, 2009)

Ban Ki Moon "expressed his dismay at the continuation of demolitions, evictions and the installment of Israeli settlers in Palestinian neighborhoods in occupied East Jerusalem," the secretary general's office said in a statement. Speaking from outside the Jerusalem home of an evicted Palestinian family, which was occupied by Israeli settlers, Richard Miron, spokesperson for the UN special coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, said: "Provocative actions such as these create inevitable tensions, undermine trust, often have tragic human consequences and make resuming negotiations and achieving a two-state solution more difficult. We reiterate the Secretary General's call for these actions to cease immediately." (Ma'an News Agency, Dec. 2)

In a first for an Israeli politician, outgoing Prime Minister Olmert called in remarks broadcast March 7 for dividing Jerusalem: "Let us be under no illusion, there will never be peace with the Arabs and the Palestinians if part of Jerusalem does not ultimately become the capital of a Palestinian state." Olmert said Israel would have to make "courageous but painful" decisions if it hoped to reach a peace deal with the Palestinians, including an "almost total withdrawal" from the West Bank. (AFP, March 7; YNet, March 6, 2009)

Border tensions with Lebanon remained ongoing. Israel shelled southern Lebanon Feb. 21 after a rocket hit its territory, injuring three people near the town of Maalot in the western Galilee. (AFP, Feb. 21, 2009)

Hardly more comforting was Israel's growing border cooperation with Egypt, which contributed to the hemming of historic Palestine by security barriers on all sides. Egypt commenced construction of a huge metal wall along its border with the Gaza Strip, extending 18 meters underground in an attempt to cut smuggling tunnels. The US in 2009 provided Egypt with $32 million for electronic surveillance and other security devices to prevent the movement of food, merchandise and weapons into Gaza. Egypt's new wall would augment Israel's wall on its side of the Gaza-Egypt border strip, the so-called "Philadelphi axis." (BBC News, Dec. 9, Information Clearing House, Dec. 10, 2009; Jurist, Jan. 10, 2010) Israel also announced construction of a 60-kilometer barrier on its border with Egypt, the first segment of the planned border fence aimed at keeping out African asylum-seekers. The announcement came amid a wave of intolerance towards migrants, widely referred to in Israel as "illegal workers." (IRIN, Nov. 11, 2011)

The civil rights of Arab citizens within the Green Line were also under attack. In May, the legislative committee of the Israeli cabinet on May 31 rejected a bill that would make a so-called "loyalty oath"—officially, a declaration of allegiance to a "Jewish, Zionist and democratic" Israel—a prerequisite for issuance of a national identity card. The measure was proposed by the Israel Beitenu party of Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman. The party also proposed criminalizing "anti-Israel" statements and commemoration of the "Nakba." (Jurist, June 1, 2009)

Bowing to pressure from President Obama, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a speech at Jerusalem's Bar-Ilan University June 14 that he would accept a Palestinian state—as long as it was demilitarized and recognized Israel as a Jewish state. (Newsweek, June 16, 2009)

While Netanyahu's speech won global headlines as an historic first for the hardline prime minister, a reciprocal move by a senior Hamas leader received little media coverage. Meeting with ex-president Jimmy Carter in Gaza City over efforts to free Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier abducted in the Strip in 2006, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said his organization would be "prepared to accept a state in the territories occupied by Israel in 1967." He did not make clear whether this would just be part of a long-term truce, as Hamas had previously proposed, or if it meant Hamas was prepared to formally abandon its demand for Palestinian sovereignty from the Mediterranean to the Jordan River. (Haaretz, June 17, 2009)

Throughout the year, the world's eyes remained fixed on the carnage that had caused global outrage during Operation Cast Lead. "Israeli forces used white phosphorus and other weapons supplied by the USA to carry out serious violations of international humanitarian law, including war crimes," said Donatella Rovera, who headed Amnesty International's fact-finding mission to southern Israel and Gaza. (Amnesty International, Feb. 20, 2009)

Human Rights Watch also found that Israel "unlawfully and extensively" used white phosphorus munitions in the Gaza offensive. While white phosphorus is allowed to be used to obscure ground operations in open areas and against military targets, international law prohibits air-bursting the shells over populated areas due to the risk it poses to civilians. According to the HRW report, the IDF fired these munitions over homes, apartment buildings, a hospital, a school being used for shelter and other civilian-occupied buildings, causing deaths, injuries and property destruction. The report called for the US to cease transfers of white phosphorus to Israel and to conduct an investigation into whether or not such use violated international law. (Jurist, March 25, 2009)

Amnesty International also accused Israeli forces of such war crimes in Gaza as using children as human shields, and wanton attacks on civilians. The rights group also accused Hamas of war crimes, but found no evidence that Hamas fighters had similarly used civilians as shields. It reiterated its call for an international arms embargo against Israel. (AFP, July 1, 2009)

Human Rights Watch also issued a report calling on Israel to investigate the unlawful destruction of civilian property during the Gaza hostilities, and to lift the blockade that hindered residents from rebuilding their homes. (HRW, May 12, 2010)

Criticisms of human rights group's criticisms of Israel promoted HRW to respond in an official statement, denying any double standards and defending its monitoring of "open societies" such as Israel. (HRW, Oct. 20, 2009) It should be noted that HRW also continued to have hard criticisms for Hamas. One report accused Hamas authorities of "systematic detention, torture, and execution of political opponents and suspected Israeli collaborators." (HRW, APril 20, 2009)

In March, UN Special Rapportuer on human rights in the Palestinian territories Richard Falk issued a report to the UN Human Rights Council, in which he criticized Israel for failing to take adequate precautions to distinguish between civilians and combatants in its campaigns in the region. Israel dismissed the report as one-sided and politically motivated. Said IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi: "My impression is that IDF behaved ethically and morally. If there were incidents, they were limited." The US State Department echoed Israel's view that the report was biased. (Jurist, March 25; YNet, March 23, 2009)

Israel announced it would not comply with a UN Human Rights Council investigation into possible war crimes committed during Cast Lead, to be lead by South African jurist Richard Goldstone. Instead, Israel would conduct its own investigation into the claims. (Jurist, April 16, 2009)

Goldstone's report went ahead—to great controversy. There was an outpouring of Palestinian anger at Abbas when the PLO mission to the UN in Geneva dropped its endorsement of the Goldstone report. The PLO's move, reportedly under US pressure, led the Human Rights Council to delay action on Gaza. "Abu Mazen has lost a lot from this," said Shawan Jabarin of al-Haq human rights watchdog in Ramallah, using Abbas's popular name. "Even the average man in the street thinks Abu Mazen has given up the rights of the victims and given up on pursuing Israeli war criminals." (Ma'an News Agency, Reuters, Oct. 4, 2009)

Under heavy criticism from his own people, Abbas returned the motion to the Council, and even added a condemnation of Israeli policy in occupied East Jerusalem to the resolution. UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay also endorsed the Goldstone report, stating that steps to hold war criminals accountable "are not obstacles to peace, but rather the preconditions on which trust and, ultimately, a durable peace can be built." (Ma'an News Agency, Middle East Online, Oct. 15, 2009)

The report was approved by the Rights Council on Oct. 16, and by the General Assembly two weeks later. (NYT, Nov. 5, 2009) Goldstone's report called on Israeli and Palestinian authorities to conduct their own thorough, independent and credible investigations into the charges. If they failed to do so, the report called for international bodies—including the International Criminal Court—to follow up. (Ma'an News Agency, Middle East Online, Oct. 15, 2009)

In Deceber, Israel reacted angrily to the news that a warrant had been issued in Britain for the arrest of former foreign minister Tzipi Livni, with President Shimon Peres warning that it was "high time" the British government changed a law allowing courts to grant such warrants. Prime Minister Netanyahu called the move "an absurdity." The UK Foreign Office distanced itself from the legal action, saying that "Israel's leaders need to be able to come to the UK for talks with the British Government." The warrant was issued by a London court Dec. 12 at the behest of activists who charged that Livni was responsible for war crimes in Operation Cast Lead. Livni, who cancelled a planned visit to London to deliver a lecture, said the court had been "abused" by the plaintiffs. "This is a lawsuit against any democracy that fights terror," she told the BBC. (The Independent, BBC News, Dec. 16, 2009)

A study released at year's send by the Italy-based New Weapons Research Committee found that the Gaza bombing campaign left a high concentration of toxic metals in the soil, which can cause tumors, birth defects and fertility problems. The report particularly cited tungsten, mercury, molybdenum, cadmium and cobalt. (New Weapons Research Committee, Dec. 17, 2009)

In January 2010, the IDF announced that two high-ranking Israeli military officers had been disciplined for firing shells into a populated area during Operation Cast Lead. The information was contained in a report presented to the UN outlining Israel's own findings on the Gaza offensive. The report said the IDF fired several artillery shells near populated areas in the Tel el-Hawa neighborhood of Gaza City, destroying a UN compound and a Palestinian hospital. The UN maintained that the compound was hit with white phosphorus shells, while the report concluded that the "use of this weapon in the operation was consistent with Israel's obligations under international law." The two officers involved were disciplined for "exceeding their authority in a manner that jeopardized the lives of others," but the Military Advocate General said it would not pursue a criminal investigation. The officers would keep their rank and pay. (Jurist, Feb. 1, 2010)

The IDF said more disciplinary actions were pending, and that a criminal investigation had been opened into the bombing of a housing complex. (Jurist, July 6, 2010)

In March, the IDF charged two soldiers with endangering the life of a Palestinian boy during the Gaza offensive. The army said the soldiers, who had been searching a building, instructed the nine-year-old to open bags they suspected were booby-trapped—a "human shield" tactic that had been officially banned by the Israeli military. The Israeli military now said it had opened some 150 investigations into misconduct during the Gaza operation. Human rights group B'Tselem welcomed the indictments, but called for an independent investigation of the army's operation. (BBC News, March 12, 2010)

Increasing Isolation

A caravan of some 500 activists with a shipment of medical aid entered the Gaza Strip from Egypt the night of Jan. 6, 2010, after protests against the Egyptian government's refusal to allow 400 of the group to pass lead to clashes at the Rafah crossing. An Egyptian soldier was reportedly shot dead during the clashes, and at least 12 Palestinians were injured. The protest had been called by the Hamas administration of the Strip, against Egypt's perceived complicity in the Israeli blockade—and what they called attacks on the convoy organized by the international group Viva Palestina. (Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 6, 2010)

Israel unveiled a short-range missile-defense system to fend off rockets from the Gaza Strip, dubbed the "Iron Dome." (UPI, Jan. 8) The announcement in early January came as the IDF launched four air-strikes on Gaza, targeting a supposed weapons shop and two smuggling tunnels, killing at least three. (CNN, Jan. 8, 2010)

February saw more clashes between Palestinian protesters and Israeli police at al-Aqsa Mosque, with discord spreading throughout East Jerusalem's Old City. Police stormed the compound after Palestinian youths barricaded themselves inside and threw stones at visitors they believed to be radical Jewish settlers. The protesters staged the occupation in response to rumors that militant Jews planned to take over the compound during the Purim holiday. (Ma'an News Agency, Israel Today, March 1, 2010)

The Israeli government's decision in February to include two West Bank locations—the Cave of the Patriarchs near Hebron and Rachel's Tomb near Bethlehem—on a list of "national heritage sites" sparked protests from the Palestinian leadership, and an fracas within Israel's political class. Chaim Oron, chairman of the left-wing Meretz party, charged, "This is another attempt to blur the borders between the State of Israel and the occupied territories." Speaking of Prime Minister Netanyahu's speech at Bar-Ilan University the previous June, Oron said, "This decision puts Netanyahu's Bar-Ilan declaration of two states for two peoples in an absurd light." The right, of course, welcomed the addition of the sites to the heritage list. "This is another sign of the intractable link between the Jewish people and this area," said MK Uri Yehuda Ariel of the National Union party. Fatah said in a statement that the decision was an attempt by Netanyahu's government to "wreck international efforts aimed at returning to talks." (AlJazeera, Feb. 22, 2010)

Early March saw more street fighting in Jerusalem, with Palestinian protests at al-Aqsa Mosque broken by police who used tear gas and baton charges. The al-Aqsa protests prompted counter-protests by ultra-orthodox haredi Jews, who torched trash cans in Shabbat Square and nearby streets. (YNet, Ma'an News Agency, March 7, 2010)

Israel imposed a full closure of the occupied West Bank for 48 hours in response to the Jerusalem unrest. Hundreds of men under the age of 50 were prevented from entering al-Aqsa mosque for Friday prayers. Palestinian women clashed with Israeli troops at the Qalandiya crossing between the West Bank and the contested city. The women chanted "Jerusalem is Arab, our eternal capital," briefly planted a Palestinian flag on one of the crossing's metal gates, and attempted to push through it. Israeli troops finally dispersed the women with tear gas. (AlJazeera, Ma'an News Agency, March 12, (AP, March 13, 2010)

Just as US Vice President Joe Biden and envoy George Mitchell arrived in the region in a bid to reopen the talks days later, Israel announced plans to build 1,600 new housing units in East Jerusalem—a move of course protested by the Palestinian Authority as a "dangerous" threat to the peace process. (Ma'an News Agency, March 9, 2010)

Palestinians staged angry protests in Jerusalem March 16 as part of a "day of rage" declared by Hamas, clashing with police and setting fire to tires and garbage bins. The "day of rage" was called to protest the re-dedication the previous night of the ancient Hurva synagogue in the Old City's Jewish Quarter. Hamas and Fatah officials alike charged that restoration work at the synagogue endangered al-Aqsa Mosque, situated some 400 yards away. Israel denied the charge. The synagogue was partially destroyed by Jordanian forces in the 1948 war. Hamas' acting parliamentary speaker, Dr. Ahmed Bahar, called on Palestinians to launch attacks on Israel inside the 1967 borders in response to the "desecration of al-Aqsa." (JTA, Xinhua, The Guardian, NYT, March 16, 2010)

In speeches before the annual Washington policy conference of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) March 22, Netanyahu and Hillary Clinton took barely veiled stabs at each other. "The Jewish people were building Jerusalem 3,000 years ago and the Jewish people are building Jerusalem today," Netanyahu told 7,500 cheering delegates. "Jerusalem is not a settlement. It is our capital." His remarks received a standing ovation—but also denunciations from a few protesters whose shouts were quickly drowned out by the AIPAC delegates. (JTA, Channel New Asia, March 23, 2010)

Speaking to the confab earlier that evening, Clinton urged Israel to make "difficult but necessary choices" for peace, and said the planned construction of 1,600 new homes in East Jerusalem "undermines mutual trust and endangers the proximity talks that are the first step toward the full negotiations that both sides want and need." But she added that her statement was not "a judgment on the final status of Jerusalem, which is an issue to be settled at the negotiating table." And she of course added that US support for Israel is "rock solid, unwavering, enduring and forever." (Ibid)

In April, Israeli human rights groups protested two new military orders that made any resident of the occupied West Bank without an Israeli-issued permit liable for deportation or imprisonment. The new "Order Regarding Prevention of Infiltration" and "Order Regarding Security Provisions" had "severe ramifications," B'Tselem and other rights groups said in a statement. (The Guardian, HaMoked, April 11, 2010)

The Israeli military said in a statement that the purpose of the orders was "the extradition of those residing illegally in Judea and Samaria." Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said: "These military orders belong in an apartheid state. They are an assault on ordinary Palestinians and an affront to the most fundamental principles of human rights. Israel's endgame is not peace. It is the colonization of the West Bank." (Ibid)

Three journalists were among eight injured on June 20 in the West Bank town of Beit Jala as locals and internationals gathered to protest the continued construction of Israel's separation wall. Border guards at the site, near the Cremisan winery and monastery established by the Catholic Salesian order in the 18th century, beat protesters with batons, and fired sound bombs, tear-gas canisters and rubber-coated bullets. (Ma'an News Agency, June 21, 2010)

Meanwhile, Israel that week witnessed one of the largest protests in its history, as some 120,000 Ashkenazi ultra-Orthodox Jews rallied in Jerusalem and near Tel Aviv. They turned out to support parents who refused to let their girls share classrooms with Jewish pupils of Sephardic or Middle Eastern descent. The protests were triggered by a court ruling sentencing some 80 Ashkenazi parents to two weeks in jail for contempt of court. "The Supreme Court is fascist," one poster read. The Ashkenazi parents said they wanted segregated classrooms because Mizrahi and Sephardic families are not religious enough. "I don't want my daughter to be educated with a girl who has a TV at home," said Yakov Litzman, MP with the United Torah Judaism party. (BBC News, June 17, 2010)

Amnesty International in June called on the Israeli authorities to stop the demolition of Palestinian homes and other buildings in the West Bank, after a further 74 were destroyed in the Jordan Valley. The demolitions were carried out by the Israeli military in the villages of Hmayyir and 'Ein Ghazal, displacing 107 people, including 52 children. "These recent demolitions intensify concerns that this is part of a government strategy to remove the Palestinian population from the parts of the West Bank known as Area C, over which Israel has complete control in terms of planning and construction," said the rights group. (Amnesty International, June 21, 2010)

The Israeli Supreme Court on July 18 issued an injunction against the enforcement of a law barring the prosecution of 400 protesters arrested during the 2005 Gaza disengagement. The ruling came in response to a petition by a group of left-wing protesters arrested while opposing the eviction Palestinians from the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah. The petitioners claimed that the amnesty law discriminated against them because they faced prosecution while protesters of an opposing ideology did not. (Jurist, July 19, 2010)

An "illegal" Israeli settlement outpost erected near the larger Kiyrat Arba settlement in Hebron was evicted by Israeli forces on the morning of Aug. 5, sparking a violent confrontation with angry settlers. (Ma'an News Agency, Aug. 5, 2010)

The Gaza Flotilla Affair

It was again the Gaza situation that brought yet another wave of global outrage down on Israel. On May 31, nine people were killed as Israeli naval commandos boarded aid ships bound for the Strip. The six-ship aid convoy led by a Turkish vessel with 600 people on board set sail for Gaza from Cyprus the previous day, stating open defiance of Israel's blockade of the territory. Footage from the flotilla's lead vessel, the Mavi Marmara, showed armed Israeli troops boarding the ship and helicopters flying overhead. The incident took place in international waters. Israeli Army Radio said soldiers opened fire "after confronting those on board carrying sharp objects." However, the Free Gaza Movement, organizers of the flotilla, said the troops opened fire without provocation as soon as they boarded the ships. Thousands of Turkish protesters tried to storm the Israeli consulate in Istanbul as the news of the incident broke. (Australian Broadcasting Corporation, AlJazeera, May 31, 2010)

"Our soldiers had to defend themselves, defend their lives or they would have been killed," Netanyahu said. Each side released its own video of the incident, each portraying the other as the aggressor. While the Israeli-released video seemed to show metal pipes that the activists supposedly used as weapons, it did not show any firearms. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called for a "full investigation" into the bloodshed. "I condemn this violence," he said. (NY Daily News, May 31, 2010)

Huseyin Tokalak, captain of the Gazze, another vessel in the flotilla, said an Israeli warship threatened to sink him before commandos boarded and trained their guns on his crew. Using a loudspeaker, Tokalak told the approaching craft that his ship was in international waters and carried nothing illegal. He said the Israelis responded by threatening to open fire. (IOL, June 1, 2010)

The UN Security Council on June 1 called for a "prompt, impartial, credible and transparent investigation" into the incident. Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said Israel had committed a "grave breach of international law" by attacking a civilian vessel. Ban Ki-moon and UN Human Rights Commissioner Navi Pillay both condemned the Israeli action and called for an independent inquiry. Israel responded by defending the action, calling the maritime blockade a legitimate measure during armed conflict. (Jurist, June 1, 2010)

Right-wing activists led by the group Im Tirtzu ("If You Will It") held protests in support of the IDF and against Turkey. On June 3, about 1,000 people protested outside Turkey's embassy in Tel Aviv. The following day, a memorial for Turkish soldiers killed in the Land of Israel during World War I was spray-painted with a pro-IDF message. (YNet, June 5)

On June 5, Netanyahu announced the seizure without resistance of the Gaza-bound aid ship Rachel Corrie. The Israeli military said soldiers boarded the Rachel Corrie from the sea rather than from helicopter, in contrast to the deadly raid five days earlier. The ship was taken to the Israeli port of Ashdod, and those on board again held and questioned before being deported. The Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign, which dispatched the Rachel Corrie, protested against the "hijacking" of the ship and its passengers. (AFP, The Telegraph, BBC News, June 5, 2010)

Two days later, the Israeli Navy opened fire on what it said was an armed squad of five Palestinians wearing diving suits and presumed to be on their way to attack Israeli targets. Four were apparently killed. (Haaretz, June 7, 2010)

Under growing international pressure, Israeli authorities said June 20 they would allow limited deliveries of aid, merchandise and fuel into the besieged Gaza Strip through the southern Kerem Shalom crossing. However, Gaza's primary bulk goods crossing, the northern Karni terminal, was to remain closed. Aid groups protested that the so-called "liberalization" of the siege was largely illusory. (Ma'an News Agency, June 19, 2010)

The conditions Israeli officials set for the siege had still never been made clear, despite ongoing court challenges. Israeli authorities maintained no list of goods either banned or permitted could be released for security reasons. (Ma'an News Agency, June 20, 2010)

An Israeli military probe into the flotilla incident released its results in July, finding insufficient intelligence and planning in the raid—but concluding that no punishments were necessary. The Eiland Commission, composed of professionals outside of the chain of command for the raid, had been assigned to study the the incident and "establish lessons." (Jurist, July 12, 2010)

The Knesset on July 13 voted to revoke parliamentary privileges from Arab MK Hanin Zuabi (Balad) due to her participation in the aid flotilla that was attacked in May. Zuabi responded to the vote by saying, "It's not surprising that a country that strips the fundamental rights of its Arab citizens would revoke the privileges of a Knesset member who loyally represents her electorate." (Intifada Palestine, July 14, 2010)

In September, a UN panel of experts tasked with monitoring and assessing investigations into claims of war crimes during the Gaza offensive issued a report criticizing the investigations being carried out by both Israel and Hamas, but positively assessing the work of the Palestinian Authority. The report noted: "[T]here is no indication that Israel has opened investigations into the actions of those who designed, planned, ordered and oversaw 'Operation Cast Lead.'" (Jurist, Sept. 21, 2010)

As growing international voices accused Israel of war crimes, Netanyahu accused Hamas of "at least four war crimes: inciting to genocide; systematically and intentionally firing on civilians; using civilians as human shields; and preventing visits by the Red Cross to kidnapped IDF soldier, Gilad Shalit." (Jurist, Aug. 12, 2010)

Which Way Forward?

In two raids in August 2010, personnel of the Israel Lands Administration, backed up by a large police contingent, demolished the homes of some 300 residents in the "unrecognized" Bedouin village of al-Arakib in the Negev. Most of them—Israeli citizens, including many children—were left homeless. No assistance or compensation was offered by Israeli authorities. In the second police action Aug. 3, the entire village was bulldozed, with many of the residents' cattle, trees and belongings lost. Clashes with police erupted as the villagers and some 150 activist supporters tried to stop the demolitions, with several people wounded and a handful arrested. Among the injured was MK Talab al-Sana (United Arab List-Ta'al). Al-Arakib, which had about 40 homes, was one of 45 Bedouin villages in the Negev 2not recognized by Israeli authorities. (AlJazeera, July 27; Haaretz, Aug. 5; Haaretz, Aug. 8, 2010)

On Aug. 4, a border clash left two Lebanese troops, an Israeli soldier and a Lebanese journalist dead—apparently sparked by Israeli troops cutting trees along the frontier that they said blocked visibility. UNIFIL, the UN force stationed along the border area between Israel and Lebanon, released findings that the trees being cut by Israel were located south of the Blue Line, as asserted by Israeli officials. The trees, although on the Lebanon side of the border fence, appear to have in fact been on Israeli-controlled lands, with the fence and the border (still officially considered de facto since 1948) not aligning in several places. (Ma'an News Agency, Aug. 4, 2010)

The Israel Government Tourist Office (IGTO) lost an appeal Aug. 4 of a British ban on a vacation advertisement that described the Western Wall as part of Israel. The IGTO appealed after the UK's Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) upheld a complaint that the Temple Mount is actually in the Occupied Territories. An image on the advert for vacations in Israel showed a picture of the wall with the gold Dome of the Rock in the background, captioned "Jerusalem." (IRNA, Aug. 4, Jewish Chronicle, London, Aug. 5, 2010)

Roads leading to Jerusalem's Old City were heavily congested and checkpoints overcrowded in Aug. 13 as tens of thousands of Palestinians attempted to reach al-Aqsa Mosque to perform prayers on the first Friday of Ramadan. Israeli forces deployed at checkpoints prevented large numbers of young Palestinians from entering the Old City, as military patrols chased hundreds who tried to bypass the checkpoints. Young men and women were prohibited from entering the holy city for prayer, while those aged 30-45 could apply for a special permit to enter. (Ma'an News Agency, Aug. 13, 2010)

Meanwhile, another conflict surrounding the contested holy site pitted Jew against Jew. On July 13, feminist activist Anat Hoffman, founder of the Women of the Wall movement, was arrested for carrying a Torah scroll at the Western Wall—which Israeli courts have prohibited women from doing in deference to Orthodox sensibilities. (Haaretz, July 29, 2010)

The Palestinian Authority and the Hamas administration in Gaza exchanged prisoners on the occasion of Ramadan, but tensions—and consequent suffering in the Strip—remained. Rationing and rotating blackouts were imposed by authorities in Gaza as Israel again tightened the flow of goods and fuel at the crossings into the Strip. The sole power station in Gaza shut down totally for several days, again leaving hospitals reliant on emergency generators. This time, there was a Kakfaesque bureaucratic rationale. The Strip's power company said it was sending $4 million to Ramallah's Finance Ministry every month to pay for fuel to be supplied through Israel. The PA said the Gaza administration's payments were in arrears. Gaza officials cited near 50% unemployment figures in the Strip as making it impossible to collect sufficient payments to keep the plant in fuel. (Ma'an News Agency, Aug. 12, Ma'an News Agency, Aug. 14, 2010)

The UN in August issued an urgent call for the lifting of military restrictions on civilian access to lands within the Strip. Over the past 10 years, the Israeli military had expanded restrictions on access to farmland on the Gaza side of the Green Line—and to fishing areas along Gaza's coast—with the stated intention of preventing attacks by Palestinian militants. "This regime has had a devastating impact on the physical security and livelihoods of nearly 180,000 people, exacerbating the assault on human dignity triggered by the blockade imposed by Israel in June 2007," stated the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and the World Food Programme, which carried out a study on the impact of the restrictions. (UN News Centre, Palestine News Network, Haaretz, Aug. 19, 2010)

It had been a fundamental of all peace proposals since the Oslo process began that there be some kind of corridor linking the Gaza Strip to the West Bank. Yet Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman proposed to do just the opposite. He floated a plan to unilaterally order an official political separation of Gaza from the West Bank, allowing it to function as an independent entity—but behind "hermetically sealed" borders, making the enclave even more of a de facto open-air prison camp. (Ma'an News Agency, July 16, 2010)

Israel and Hamas continued to exchange armed attacks. An unexplained explosion at the Gaza Strip home of a senior Hamas commander on Aug. 2 came two days after Gaza-based militants fired a rocket at Sderot, causing damage to a building used by day as a rehabilitation center for disabled children. The attack came at night, so there were no casualties. The IDF responded, firing missiles at two tunnels in the southern strip which it said were used by militants and weapons smugglers. (CNS News, Aug. 2, 2010)

Use of force by Israeli soldiers to shut down weekly Friday anti-wall protests at Bil'in, Nil'in and other West Bank villages became practically routine. On Aug. 3, IDF troops tear gas and sound grenades against Palestinian protesters and international supporters. (Ma'an News Agency, Aug. 14, 2010)

The European Union's top diplomat Catherine Ashton criticized Israel on Aug. 25 over the conviction by a military court of a protest leader from Bil'in, 39-year-old schoolteacher Abdullah Abu Rahmeh, on charges of incitement. Ashton said the barrier's route was illegal and that the EU viewed Abu Rahmeh as a human rights defender committed to nonviolent protest. (Haartez, Aug. 25, 2010)

In a Sept. 21, statement, the diplomatic "Quartet" called upon Netanyahu to extend the 10-month settlement freeze due to expire at the end of the month. (AlJazeera, Sept. 22, 2010)

Human Rights Watch also called on Israel to extend the settlement freeze, saying "Israel's construction of settlements and their infrastructure violates its obligations as an occupying power and the rights of Palestinians in the West Bank, including unjustly limiting their ability to build homes and access their lands." (Human Rights Watch, Sept. 26, 2010)

On Sept. 24, member states of the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) narrowly rejected an Arab-sponsored resolution calling on Israel to join the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), providing a diplomatic victory for the United States. Washington had urged countries to vote down the non-binding resolution, saying it could derail broader efforts to ban nuclear weapons in the Middle East. Arab League chief Amr Moussa criticized the IAEA's rejection of the resolution. "There can't be a situation in which only one country possesses nuclear weapons," Moussa said. "Why does Israel need to be the only one? If Israel maintains its nuclear weapons, the Middle East will slide in the wrong direction and enter an arms race." Israel's President Shimon Peres welcomed the IAEA vote. "This was another attempt to exploit the international community to make an absurd anti-Israel decision," Peres said. Israel, like India and Pakistan, is not a signatory to the NPT, and officially does not acknowledge the existence of its nuclear arsenal. (Ha'aretz, Sept. 24)

Israel meanwhile vigorously protested Iran's nuclear ambitions—despite the fact that Iran, unlike Israel, is a party to the NPT, and therefore must open its nuclear facilities to international inspectors. Israel was also believed to have carried out air-strikes in September 2007 that destroyed a secret Syrian nuclear facility at Dair Alzour—although Israel would not acknowledge the raid, and Syria would not acknowledge existence of the facility. (South Africa Mail & Guardian, Sept. 17, 2007; Reuters, April 1, 20011)

Several thousand Israeli settlers and supporters celebrated to mark the end Sept. 26 to the 10-month moratorium on new construction in their West Bank enclaves. Netanyahu had urged Israeli settlers to show restraint as the limited building freeze expired at midnight. But at Revava settlement, outside Nablus, residents expressed their defiance at a groundbreaking ceremony where a mixer symbolically poured cement into a hole in the ground amid cheers and the blasting of car horns. The celebration was attended by thousands bused in for the occasion. (Reuters, Sept. 26, 2010)

The festivities came after days of clashes between Palestinian youths and Israeli security forces in annexed East Jerusalem, with Israeli police detaining many. On Sept. 24, several hundred people threw rocks at Israeli troops in the Arab neighborhood of Issawiya following reports that a Palestinian baby had died from inhaling tear gas from an Israeli grenade. News of the death was broadcast from loudspeakers on top of mosques in the neighborhood, with youths then setting tires on fire and pelting Israeli forces. Israeli authorities said they had not received any reports of casualties, and that police were using minimum force. (Ma'an News Agency, Sept. 24; AFP, Sept. 25, 2010)

Israeli commandos again intercepted a boat carrying Jewish activists who hoped to breach the blockade of the Gaza Strip on Sept. 28. The navy blocked the catamaran Irene—dubbed the "Jewish Boat to Gaza"—which was carrying 10 passengers and crew along with a cargo of medical equipment, and diverted it to Ashdod. Activists on board said they were shoved, manhandled—and in one case shocked with a Taser by the commandos. Yonatan Shapira—a former Israeli helicopter pilot well known for refusing to carry out his military duties—received Taser shocks while passively resisting arrest by sitting down and embracing another passenger, witnesses said. (AP, JTA, Sept. 30, 2010)

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman prompted the Palestinian mission to walk out of a UN General Assembly meeting Sept. 28 by calling for redrawing the borders of the West Bank. Citing the "utter lack of confidence between Israelis and Palestinians," Lieberman told the UN that any durable solution in the Middle East, as in the Balkans and East Timor, would require the separation of populations. "We should focus on coming up with a long term intermediate agreement, something that could take a few decades... To achieve final status agreement, we must understand that the primary obstacle is the friction between the two nations." Lieberman added that "the guiding principle for a final status agreement must not be land-for-peace but rather, exchange of populated territory. Let me be very clear: I am not speaking about moving populations, but rather about moving borders to better reflect demographic realities." This notion, he claimed, had been accepted as a "virtual truism" in the academic community, which had coined the term "re-sizing the state." The Israeli prime minister's office disavowed the comments. (Checkpoint Washington blog, The Telegraph, Checkpoint Washington, Sept. 28; Press TV, Sept. 29, 2010)

Earlier in the month, Lieberman raised the prospect of the transfer of large Arab towns in Israel into a Palestinian state, again saying talks needed to deal not with the issue of land for peace "but an exchange of land and people.... This is a subject that we've run away from until now but we can't go on like this. It's as if someone were selling you an apartment on the condition that his mother-in-law continue living there." (The Australian, Sept. 21, 2010)

The Israeli cabinet approved an amendment Oct. 10 to the country's citizenship law that would require those seeking citizenship to pledge allegiance to Israel as a "Jewish and democratic state" and pledge "to honor the laws of the state." The amendment would be entered into law if approved by the Knesset and Supreme Court. Netanyahu expressed his support, while Arab politicians and the Israeli left called the amendment a tool to undermine the rights of the country's Arab minority. "There is a whiff of fascism on the margins of Israeli society," said Isaac Herzog, the Labor Party social affairs minister. (Jurist, AlJazeera, Oct. 10, 2010)

Addressing the Knesset at a session to mark the 15th anniversary of the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, Netanyahu insisted that a Palestinian state must recognize Israel as a Jewish state. The prime minister quoted from Rabin's final speech to the Knesset, in which he said, "We are convinced that a binational state will not be able to fulfill the Jewish role of the State of Israel, which is the state of the Jews." (CSM, Oct. 12; AFP, Ma'an News Agency, Oct. 16)

Netanyahu added that the partial settlement freeze had been a temporary "gesture," and that construction in existing West Bank settlements "does not contradict the aspiration for peace and an agreement." He also said he would support a new settlement freeze if Palestinians would recognize Israel as a Jewish state. (Ibid)

With the settlement freeze lifted, Israel began building some 550 apartments. In a statement, UN special coordinator for the Middle East peace Robert Serry called the construction activity "alarming," and "illegal under international law," saying it "will only further undermine trust." (The Telegraph, Xinhua, Oct. 22, 2010)

As the year ended, the governments of Brazil and Argentina announced that they were recognizing Palestine as an independent state within the borders defined in 1967. This brought a total of 104 countries that had recognize Palestine since it declared itself a state in 1988. (Weekly News Update on the Americas, Dec. 12, 2010)

An Israeli court in the first days of January 2011 effectively granted a settler license to steal Palestinian land. The ruling overturned an Israeli Defense Forces decision to allow a Palestinian farmer to work a contested field near the West Bank settlement of Shiloh, as well as questioning the army's authority to make a decision on other such land disputes. Jerusalem Magistrate's Court Judge Shimon Fineberg rejected the land right claims of a farmer from the Palestinian village of Krayot. Shiloh resident Moshe Moskowitz said he has been farming the land since 1980. The court ordered the IDF to allow Moskowitz to work there.

According to the 1858 Ottoman law that remains in effect, anyone who spends more than a decade working land that does not have a clear previous title becomes the recognized owner of the property. The IDF said records showed the Krayot resident had paid property tax on the land, while Moskowitz did not present any documents showing ownership. The IDF found he should be granted access to the land after the Palestinian farmer brought a complaint to the IDF with the aid of Rabbis for Human Rights. Moskowitz—backed by the Regavim advocacy group, which says it is dedicated to preserving "state lands"—appealed to the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court. "We hope that the court's ruling in the Moskowitz case will [serve as] a clear warning" to the army, said Regavim director Yehuda Eliyahu. Countered the Palestinian farmer's lawyer: "The judge's decision regarding the Krayot village land provides a new opening for the theft of privately owned Palestinian property. Every settler will now be able to demand Palestinian land." (Haaretz, Jan. 5, 2011)

The Israeli cabinet was then considering a package of incentives the US had proposed if it renews a partial freeze on settlement construction. Washington reportedly said it would strengthen its commitment to oppose UN resolutions critical of Israel, and offer defense and security guarantees. In return, Israel would stop building for 90 days in the occupied West Bank. (BBC News, Nov. 14, 2010)

Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, responded to that if the US incentives fail, Palestinian leaders would ask the UN Security Council to recognize an independent Palestinian state. Erekat said that "if the United States won't force Israel to halt settlement construction this month, our next step will be to ask the Americans to recognize a Palestinian state within the 1967 border." (AFP, Nov. 12, 2010)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had offered to renew a partial settlement freeze if the Palestinians recognize Israel as "a Jewish state." Speaking at the opening of the winter session of the Knesset, Netanyahu said: "If the Palestinian leadership will unequivocally say to its people that it recognizes Israel as the national state of the Jewish people, I will be ready to convene my cabinet and ask for another moratorium on building." Palestinian leaders countered that recognizing Israel as a Jewish state would compromise the rights of the 20% of the Israeli population that is not Jewish, as well as betraying the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their lands. (BBC News, Oct. 11, 2010)

The Israeli military bombed several sites in Gaza in January, after rockets were fired by militants across the border. Prime Minister Netanyahu said Hamas would "make a terrible mistake to test our will to defend our people; I think they will make a terrible, terrible mistake." Local media reported a "massive presence" of Israeli warplanes above Gaza. (The Guardian, Jan. 12, 2011)

Defense Minister Ehud Barak, speaking at Tel Aviv University on Iran's supposed nuclear threat, was repeatedly interrupted by protesters who held pictures of Palestinian victims, and shouted "You murder children in Gaza!" (YNet, Jan. 4, 2011)

A 2008 diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks revealed an Israeli official's comment to US embassy personnel that Israel was seeking to keep Gaza's economy "functioning at the lowest level possible" while avoiding a humanitarian crisis. The cable indicated that the Israeli government kept the US embassy in Tel Aviv briefed on its blockade of the Gaza Strip. "As part of their overall embargo plan against Gaza, Israeli officials have confirmed to [US embassy officers] on multiple occasions that they intend to keep the Gazan economy on the brink of collapse without quite pushing it over the edge," one cable read. (JTA, Jan. 5, 2011)

Israeli activist Yonatan Pollack arrived Jan. 11 at the Hermon Prison in the Galilee to begin serving his three-month prison sentence—convicted of "illegal gathering" during a Tel Aviv protest against Operation Cast Lead, where he rode his bicycle slowly along the streets, causing traffic jams. Upon entering the prison, the activist said: "The prison sentence is part of a trend of restricting and putting obstacles in the path of protestors in Israeli society... The restriction of protest is expressed through Palestinians sentenced to longer prison terms than mine, with no evidence and no trial." (YNet, Jan. 11, 2011)

On the morning of Jan. 12, a convoy of military vehicles and bulldozers arrived at the Palestinian village of Dkaika in the Jordan Valley, demolishing 16 homes, an animal pen, a store and one of the village school's classrooms. The demolition orders were issued because the structures were built without official permission—almost impossible for Palestinians to get. Dkaika—a community of around 300 people, without electricity or running water—was in Area C, under full Israeli military and civil control, accounting for 60% of the West Bank. Residents said they believed the demolition orders were on hold while a plan to regularize the village was under consideration by the Israeli authorities. Some 60 people were made homeless by the demolitions. A total of 478—many of them children—were displaced in Area C in 2010, according to the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). The number for the previous year was 319. (The Guardian, Jan. 14, 2011)

January saw controversy over the so-called "Palestine Papers" released satellite network AlJazeera detailing concessions that Palestinian negotiators apparently offered Israel during years of negotiation. One concession was an apparent proposal by chief PLO negotiator Saeb Erakat that Israel keep all settlements in Jerusalem except one, offering what he said was "the biggest Yerushalayim [Jerusalem] in history."

According to other documents, Erakat also accepted an offer from Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to allow only 10,000 Palestinian refugees the right to return, and referred to refugees' rights as a "bargaining chip." The position sharply contradicted the PLO's public statements that right of return for Palestinian refugees was inalienable. President Abbas said the papers were forgeries: "We are on the right track to restore our people’s rights. Unchangeable Palestinian principles have never and will never change." (Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 25, 2011)

Israeli forces injured one Palestinian at the weekly anti-wall rally on Friday Jan. 28 in the West Bank village of Bil'in. Soldiers fired tear gas to disperse dozens of locals and international demonstrators protesting the separation wall, which enclosed large swathes of village land. The Israeli military said troops responded to protesters throwing rocks. Palestinian ambassador to Chile Mai al-Kaila attended the rally, with a delegation of Chilean lawmakers. Demonstrators marched to the wall raising Palestinian flags and photos of Jawahir Abu Rahma, who died on Jan. 1 after inhaling tear gas at a similar protest. In a statement, the Popular Committee Against the Wall in Bil'in praised Human Rights Watch and the Spanish parliament for taking a stand against Israel's extension of activist Abdullah Abu Rahma's detention. He was convicted of organizing protests in the village. Protesters also rallied against Israel's wall and settlements in the central West Bank village An-Nabi Salih—and were met by tear gas and rubber-coated bullets. (Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 30, 2011)

On Jan. 27, a young Palestinian was killed by presumed Jewish settlers in the Palestinian village of Iraq Burin in the northern West Bank. A 15-year-old Palestinian boy was gravely wounded on Jan. 28 when he shot by a gang of armed Jewish settlers near Hebron while on his way to work on his family's land between the villages of Beit Omar and Safa. (NYT, Jan. 28, 2011)

Periodic persecution continued against those advocating for Arab rights within Israel. Amnesty International issued an alert Jan. 30 when Ameer Makhoul—director of the Haifa-based Ittijah: the Union of Arab Community-Based Associations—was sentenced by an Israeli court to nine years in prison, and given an additional one-year suspended sentence. The prosecution claimed that a Jordanian civil society activist who Makhoul was in contact with was a Hezbollah agent, and that he gave the contact information on the locations of a military base and Shin Bet offices. Makhoul's "confession" was admitted as evidence, despite claims that his statement was made under torture following his arrest in a pre-dawn raid on his home. The information allegedly conveyed by Makhoul was actually publicly available; under Israeli law, people can be charged with "espionage" even if the information passed onto an "enemy agent" is publicly known—and even if there is no intent to do harm through passing on the information. Makhoul was held incommunicado for 12 days after his arrest the previous May, and a gag order prohibited media coverage on the case during this period. He was originally charged with an even more serious offense, "assisting an enemy in war," which could have carried a life sentence; that was dropped when he agreed to a plea bargain. (Amnesty International, Jan. 30, 2011)

A report from Israeli rights organization Yesh Din released in February indicating a pattern of impunity in settler violence against Palestinians on the West Bank. Yesh Din had filed such cases of behalf of West Bank Palestinians since 2005. The report showed that 488 of the 539 cases, or 91%, filed by Yesh Din were closed without indictments. In 315 cases, police cited "assailant unknown" as the reason for this and in 33 cases "no criminal culpableness" was found. Yesh Din legal advisor Michael Sfard called the failure to protect West Bank residents "a mark of Cain upon the brow of Israeli society." (YNet, Feb. 16, 2011)

Palestine in the Arab Spring

The year 2011 opened with a wave of protest movements across the Arab world, with demands for democracy spreading to the streets of nearly every Arab capital. Tunisia's long-ruling strongman Zine El Abidine Ben Ali was overthrown in January, and Egypt's Hosni Mubarak followed in February.

Palestinian security forces shut down a solidarity demonstration Jan. 30 in front of the Egyptian embassy in Ramallah, after calling in one of the organizers for questioning. Declaring a "security area," armed officers cleared the area, ordered journalists to turn off their cameras and microphones, and dragged one protester away when he shouted, "Long live Egypt!" The Palestinian Authority had banned a similar demonstration in solidarity with theTunisian uprising the week before. Palestinian activist and organizer Omar Barghouti said the "heavy-handed suppression" of the protest indicated where the PA's loyalty lies. "Autocratic, unelected regimes tend to identify with one another, it seems. The glaring difference here, in the occupied Palestinian territory, is that the PA is trying to 'rule' by decree while we are still under foreign occupation." (Ma'an News Agency, Jan. 31, 2011)

Palestinians demonstrating in support of the Egyptian protesters were again dispersed five days later when a few dozen men in plainclothes disrupted the rally in Ramallah. Several hundred protesters carrying the Egyptian and Tunisian flags, chanting "The people want to bring down the regime" were set upon by a gang of men chanting "The people want Mahmoud Abbas!" The two groups clashed before the protesters were dispersed. (CNN, Feb. 5)

Police in Gaza also broke up a rally in solidarity with the uprising in Egypt, although marchers succeeded in gathering again days later without interference. (Ma'an News Agency, Feb. 3, 2011)

The contradictions in Palestine, amid the the so-called "Arab Spring," continued. Fatah leader Tawfik Tirawi called Feb. 18 for a "day of rage" against the United States after the Obama administration used its veto power to block a UN Security Council resolution condemning Israeli settlements on the West Bank. In the previous day's vote, the US directed its UN ambassador to kill the draft resolution even though the 14 other members of the 15-nation Council voted in favor. (Ma'an News Agency, Feb. 19, 2011)

Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum said, "This is an arbitrary and outrageous decision against the Palestinian people. It should push the Palestinian Authority to adopt a strategy of unity...and take a national decision to end all forms of negotiations with the occupation." US ambassador to the UN Susan Rice said Washington was "regrettably" opposing the resolution. She said that should not be seen by Israel as support for continued settlement building on the West Bank. Ahead of the vote, the US pressured the Palestinians to drop their backing for the resolution, to no avail. PA President Mahmoud Abbas reportedly rejected a personal appeal from President Obama. Fatah leaders also said anonymously that US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton threatened to cut off financial aid if the PA did not withdraw its draft from the Security Council's agenda. (AFP, YNet, Feb. 19, 2011)

A Palestinian lawyer and specialist in settlements affairs meanwhile said that Israeli authorities sold some 1,400 homes in the Jewish settlements of the West Bank and East Jerusalem in the year 2010. Qais Nasser said that 668 homes were sold in the settlement of Modi'in, southwest of Ramallah, 319 homes in the settlement of Har Homa, ease of Jerusalem, 101 homes in Ma'aleh Adumim, also east of Jerusalem, 126 homes in Beitar Elit, west of Bethlehem, and 78 homes in Giv'at Ze'ev, located within East Jerusalem. Nasser warned that Israel was planning to build and sell 5,000 housing units in West Bank and East Jerusalem. (Arab News, Feb. 19, 2011)

Israeli forces fired rubber-coated bullets at protesters in Hebron Feb. 25, leaving at least nine injured. Four international activists and two Palestinians were detained. The demonstration, which called for the reopening of one of the city's main streets, came on the anniversary of the 1994 massacre of 29 Palestinians in Hebron by the Jewish extremist Baruch Goldstein. Hundreds of protesters, waving Palestinian flags and chanting "Down with the occupation!" and "Hebron is Palestinian," said they were trying to reopen central Shuhada (Martyrs) Street, once home to the city's main market. Israel largely closed off the street, citing security, after the 1994 massacre. Hebron governor Kamel Hamid participated in the march. The Israeli military called the march "a violent and illegal riot," putting the number of marchers at around 300. Organizers and the AFP news service put the figure at 1,000.

Hebron, the largest Palestinian city in the West Bank, was by then also home to around 600 religious Jewish settlers, mostly living in the area around Shuhada Street. In 2003, Israel's Supreme Court had ruled for Palestinian merchants, ordering that the settlers be evicted and the market reopened—but the orders were never implemented. Under a 1997 accord with the Palestinian Authority, Israeli troops evacuated 80% of the city, but continued to protect the settlers in the area. (Ma'an News Agency, Feb. 25, 2011)

The Israeli human rights group B'Tselem noted the apartheid-like restrictions on freedom of movement that remain in place in Hebron:

Shuhada Street in the center of Hebron. The street, one of Hebron's main thoroughfares, links the north and south of the city and passes by the major markets, the Old City , the Tomb of the Patriarchs and al-Haram al-Ibrahimi, and Israeli settlement compounds. Since October 2000, Israel has forbidden Palestinians to walk or drive on the street, although no valid military order for the closure has been presented. Along with other restrictions on Palestinian movement in the area, this has led to an economic collapse of the city center. Many residents have left, and the area has become a ghost town. Over the years, the army repeatedly claimed it was about to permit Palestinians to use the street again, but this has yet to occur. Israeli settlers, however, are allowed to move freely on the street. {B'Tselem, March 3, 2011]

The report noted the irony of the justification for the restrictions:

Israel began to restrict Palestinian movement along the street in 1994. After the massacre carried out by Baruch Goldstein in the Tomb of the Patriarchs that year, Israel chose to impose restrictions on the Palestinians, rather than on the Israeli settlers in the city, contending that these restrictions were necessary in order to protect the settlers' safety. [Ibid]

Israel's leaders were clearly viewing the unrest in the Arab world uneasily. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told a press conference: "Our concern is that when there are rapid changes, without all aspects of a modern democracy in place, what will happen—and it has happened already in Iran—will be the rise of an oppressive regime of radical Islam." Semingly without irony, he added: "Such a regime will crush human rights and will not allow democracy or freedom, and will constitute a threat to peace." (Ha'aretz, Feb. 1, 2011)

Israeli fears of the Arab revolutions was exemplified by a gruesome incident in West Jerusalem in late February, just as the Egyptian protests were reaching their cliimax. A group of nationalist Jewish youth screaming "death to Arabs" accosted a Palestinian man, and beat him to death—in what Israeli media reports called "drunken brawl turned bad." Some young settlers were later arrested in connection with the crime. (+972, Feb. 23, 2011)

In contrast, there was a vociferous outcry in Israel over a grisly attack on Jewish settlers on March 11. Protesters disrupted traffic in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and elsewhere across Israel in response to the attack in the West Bank settlement of Itamar, in which a family of five, including an infant and a young child, were stabbed to death. Protesters, accusing the government of a too lenient security policy on the West Bank, began amassing immediately after thousands turned out for the funeral at Jerusalem's Givat Shaul cemetery in Jerusalem. There were also scattered so-called "price tag" attacks on Palestinians by settlers on the West Bank, with five cars set on fire in Nablus. (Jerusalem Post reports.)

Speaking at the funeral, Minister of Strategic Affairs Moshe Yaalon invoked Israel's "right to the land"—by clear implication, the West Bank:

This murder reminds everyone that the struggle and conflict is not about Israel's borders or about independence of a repressed nation but a struggle for our existence. Therefore, we cannot continue speaking about security while the essence is neglected—the essence which is Israel's right to its land. Whoever gives up this right won't have security either. In this difficult hour we must rise from the rubble and do the most natural thing—continue building and developing Israel. [Ha'aretz, March 13, 2011]

The Itamar attack came days before Israel's ministerial committee on settlement affairs approved the construction of 500 new West Bank houses. (Ha'aretz, March 13, 2011)

Hamas' armed wing, the al-Qassam Brigades, said March 21 that it would commit to a truce if Israel stopped bombarding the Gaza Strip—but vowed to retaliate if Israel continued to attack the enclave. On March 20, Israeli tanks shelled several targets in the central Gaza Strip, leaving one man injured by shrapnel. Two 17-year-old Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire the night before. The armed wing of the Popular Resistance Committees, the an-Nasser Brigades, issued a statement declaring its campaign of fire into Israel Operation "Winds of Change." The group said the campaign was "in response to the offensive on Gaza." (Ma'an News Agency, March 21, 2011)

Israeli warplanes targeted sites across the Gaza Strip late March 21, injuring at least 17 people including seven children, witnesses and medics said. An Israeli military spokesman said that the attack targeted two "terror tunnels, two weapons manufacturing and storage facilities, and two additional terror activities sites." The official emphasized that the attack came in response to a barrage of projectiles fired toward Israeli territory over the past week, including 50 on March 19 for which Hamas claimed responsibility. (Maan News Agency, March 21, 2011)

The al-Qassam Brigades said the March 19 attacks had been in response to an Israeli strike last week which killed two of its members—but that it was ready to call an end to the tit-for-tat violence if Israel also did so. "If the enemy stops the escalation and aggression against our people we will implement the Palestinian national agreement," the statement said, referring to a truce reaffirmed by the main militant factions in January. The offer, however, came with a warning attached: "The enemy will pay a heavy price if it continues its aggression and crimes against our people in the Gaza Strip." (Ibid)

In a later statement, Hamas spokesman Taher al-Nunu said the movement's Gaza government was committed to preserving the informal truce, with the backing of other militant groups. "The government affirms that there is consensus among the factions regarding the security situation in the strip," he said. Israeli deputy foreign minister Danny Ayalon ignored the offer, but issued a death threat against Hamas leaders. "If Hamas decides to escalate, we will put an end to it... We have several actions before putting ground forces in Gaza, including direct threats against Hamas leaders," Ayalon told Israeli radio. (Ibid)

There were growing reports of Israeli vigilante "price tag" attacks spreading to the Galilee in response to the Itamar massacre. Two vehicles belonging to Arab students were set on fire in the northern city of Safed on March 16. Slurs reading "Death to Arabs", "Kahane was right," and "Revenge" were sprayed on the walls of the city's Zefat Academic College. Some 250 Jewish and Arab students held a demonstration outside the college later that day calling for co-existence. Students accused Safed's Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu of agitating local Jewish sentiment against Arabs. (YNet, March 16, 2011)

On March 19, a 22-year old Christian Arab from the Galilee town of Gush Halav, was hospitalized after being stabbed multiple times by a group of masked men he claimed were haredim (ultra-orthdox Jews). (YNet, March 20, 2011)

An Israeli woman was critically wounded when a bomb ripped through a bus near Jerusalem's central bus station on March 23 died of her injuries after being hospitalized. The attack was the first major bombing in Jerusalem since 2004. (Maan News Agency, JTA, March 23, 2011)

The explosion came hours after two Grad rockets hit the Israeli city of Beersheba, injuring one. Prime Minister Netanyahu warned: "It may be that it will take an exchange of blows...but we are very determined to strike at the terrorist elements' ability to harm our citizens." The al-Quds Brigades, Islamic Jihad's armed wing, claimed responsibility for the Beersheba attacks as well as for another Grad fired on the port city of Ashdod that night, and vowed to continue targeting cities deep inside Israel. (Middle East Online, March 23, 2011)

Israeli warplanes carried out a series of airstrikes on targets in Gaza City late March 24—and then again three days later. The strikes came a despite another truce offer on March 26. Gaza militants resolved at a meeting that they were committed to calming tensions if Israel reciprocated. Hamas official Ismail Radwan told reporters after a two-hour meeting with Islamic Jihad and other factions that "we are committed to calm as long as the occupation [Israel] commits to it." (Maan News Agency, March 23; Middle East Online, March 27, 2011)

For a third day in a row, Israeli forces appeared in large numbers around the southern West Bank town of Beit Ummar March 28, installing road gates and fence posts along entrances to the village. An Israeli military spokesman confirmed the work, saying in a statement, that "In response to incidents of rock throwing at Israeli cars driving from the village of Beit Omer [sic], a number of temporary blocks were placed at certain entrances to the village (though not including the main entrance) in an attempt to stymie such actions." A week earlier, a settler had opened fire on Beit Ummar residents at a funeral procession as they walked to the cemetery, injuring two, one critically. The incident followed growing tension between settlers and Beit Ummar residents, who had been holding regular Saturday protests against ongoing land confiscations by the nearby settlement of Karmi Zur. (Ma'an News Agency, March 28, 2011)

Israel's Knesset on March 28 passed a law enabling the judicial system to revoke the citizenship of anyone convicted of terrorism, espionage, treason or helping the enemy during times of war. The bill, which was passed by 37-11, was initiated by two Knesset members from the ultra-nationalist Yisrael Beitenu party of Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman. "Without loyalty, there can be no citizenship," Lieberman said just minutes after the bill was passed. "Any person who harms the country cannot enjoy the benefits of citizenship and its fruit." The law is part of Lieberman's "no loyalty, no citizenship" campaign—widely understood to target Israel's Arab minority. The Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) immediately protested the new law. ACRI spokeswoman Ronit Sela said: "The vote in support of this bill shows that the Knesset has lost sight of a very important principle: that citizenship is not a prize that is given or taken away, it is a person's protected right." (Middle East Online, March 30, 2011)

Although a similar procedure for revoking citizenship already existed under the 1952 Nationality Law, it could only be done through the Interior Ministry. Under the new law, it could be done directly by the courts upon conviction. Israel's Arab citizens by then numbered 1.3 million, some 20% of the population.
But the measure also applied to those with residency status, such as Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem. (Ibid)

Israel also emulated Arab dictatorships in a crackdown on the use of "social media" to organize protests. Attempts by Facebook to shut down a "Third Intifada" page backfired on March 29—with more than 7,000 Palestinians immediately signing up for three new copycat pages. The original "Third Intifada" page, which had acquired almost half a million "fans," was closed down earlier that day after Israel contacted Facebook to complain about comments which it said called for "the killing of Israelis and Jews." The original page, created on March 6, called for a third intifada to begin on May 15—Israeli independence day, when Palestinians recall the Nakba. (Middle East Online, March 30, 2011)

The National Resistance Brigades announced April 2 its disengagement from the Gaza ceasefire agreement, following an overnight Israeli air-strike that killed three leaders of Hamas' armed wing. The brigades, military wing of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, said they would retaliate to the killings and that Israel "would have to bear the repercussions of this crime." (Maan News Agency, April 2, 2011)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on April 3 called on the UN to retract the Goldstone Report following statements made by Richard Goldstone in a Washington Post op-ed. Netanyahu said the Goldstone Report, which found that Israel committed war crimes in Operation Cast Lead after a fact finding mission, is called into question by Goldstone's April 1 article, where he wrote: "If I had known then what I know now, the Goldstone Report would have been a different document." According to Goldstone, new evidence indicated that Israel didn't intentionally target civilians in the offensive, as originally alleged.

The allegations of intentionality by Israel were based on the deaths of and injuries to civilians in situations where our fact-finding mission had no evidence on which to draw any other reasonable conclusion. While the investigations published by the Israeli military and recognized in the UN committee’s report have established the validity of some incidents that we investigated in cases involving individual soldiers, they also indicate that civilians were not intentionally targeted as a matter of policy.

Goldstone's piece commended Israel and the Palestinian Authority for conducting investigations into the report's allegations, noting that Hamas had not done so. (Jurist, April 3, 2011)

The Goldstone Report's three other co-authors—the Pakistani human rights lawyer Hina Jilani; Christine Chinkin, professor of international law at the London School of Economics; and former Irish peace-keeper Desmond Travers—immediately rejected Goldstone's recantation, saying in a joint statement that "calls to reconsider or even retract the report, as well as attempts at misrepresenting its nature and purpose, disregard the rights of victims, Palestinians and Israeli, to truth and justice." (The Guardian, April 14, 2011)

Israeli artillery fire killed five Palestinians and injured some 40 after an anti-tank missile from the Gaza Strip hit a school bus in southern Israel, injuring two people, April 8. (One of those wounded in the bus attack would later die.) Hamas' armed wing claimed responsibility for the missile attack, saying it was an "initial response" to Israel killing three of the group's leaders days earlier, when an air-strike hit their car in southern Gaza. But the escalation came one day after the Hamas administration in Gaza said it had got most armed Palestinian factions in the Strip to sign on to a ceasefire in a bid to prevent further Israeli strikes. (Ma'an News Agency, April 8, 2011)

Israel also apparently carried out an air raid April 5 on Sudan's Red Sea coast, killing Abdul-Latif Ashkar, said to be the successor to Hamas weapons procurement operative Mahmoud Mabhouh, who was assassinated by presumed Israeli agents in a Dubai hotel room the previous year. (Ma'an News Agency, April 8, 2011)

In the following days, militant mortar fire from the Strip would be met with more Israeli air-strikes, leaving some 10 more Palestinians dead. ( (Maan News Agency, April 8, 2011)

There were disturbing signs of the emergence of a small but deadly Salafist presence among the Palestinians—extreme Islamic fundamentalists who felt Hamas was too soft. Israeli actor and political activist Juliano Mer-Khamis, who ran a theater project in the West Bank's Jenin refugee camp, was shot dead by apparent Salafist gunmen on April 4 outside the theater he founded there. Kadura Musa, governor of Jenin, said: "He was a Palestinian citizen of Israeli origin. An actor and an artist but most of all a true human being. We don't know why this happened, but all the people of the camp condemn the death of this son of ours whose mother also did so much for the people of Jenin." (Ha'aretz, April 8; The Guardian, Ha'aretz, April 4) Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad also issued a statement condemning the killing. "We cannot stand silent in the face of this ugly crime, it constitutes a grave violation that goes beyond all principles and human values and it contravenes with the customs and ethics of co-existence," he said. (Jerusalem Post, April 4, 2011)

Days later, Vittorio Arrigoni, an Italian journalist and human rights activist working in the Gaza Strip, was kidnapped by Salafists. His body was found hanged in an abandoned house in Gaza City. In a video released by the abducotrs before his death, Arrigoni was shown blindfolded with his face bloodied. The accompanying Arabic text said: "The Italian hostage entered our land only to spread corruption." It described Italy as "the infidel state." Hamas authorities arrested two men in connection with the killing. (BBC World Service, The Guardian, April 15, 2011)

Joseph's Tomb was the next holy site to serve as a flashpoint on the West Bank. On April 24, an Israeli settler was apparently shot dead and four others were injured by Palestinian police after a group of Jewish worshipers entered Nablus to visit the Tomb without coordinating with either Palestinian or Israeli security. Nablus and Joseph's Tomb were officially under full Palestinian control. Prime Minister Netanyahu condemned the shooting as a "terrorist attack" and called on the Palestinian Authority "to take harsh steps against the perpetrators who committed this heinous act against Jewish worshipers who were on their way to prayer." Three days later, Israeli army and Border Guard forces detained some 40 settlers from the extremist "Hilltop Youth" and "Hebrew Cities" movements who entered the Balata refugee camp in Nablus, in an apparent effort to make an unauthorized visit to Joseph's Tomb. The infiltrators, who clashed with the Israeli security forces, were accompanied by right-wing activist Baruch Marzel and MK Michael Ben-Ari. (YNet, Maan News Agency, JTA, April 28; YNet, April 24, 2011)

A surprise deal to end decades of rivalry between Fatah (which controlled the Palestinian Authority) and Hamas (with a de facto regime in Gaza) was welcomed by the Palestinian leadership, but denounced by Israel as crossing "a red line." Under the agreement, announced in Cairo April 27, the two factions are to form a transitional government, with new elections to be held within a year. Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad called the pact "an essential and important step to proceed to the immediate establishment of national unity." But in Gaza City, a spontaneous rally in support of the pact was violently dispersed by Hamas police April 28. (Middle East Online, Maan News Agency, Maan News Agency, April 28, 2011)

As Hamas chief Khaled Masha'al prepared to meet Palestinian president and Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas in Cairo to sign the unity deal, Israeli tank fire wounded several people near the central Gaza Strip's al-Bureij refugee camp April 28—allegedly in response to "terrorists" attempting to place explosive devices near the security barrier between the Strip and Israeli territory. (Middle East Online, Maan News Agency, April 29, 2011)

In May came revelations that Israel has used a covert procedure to cancel the residency status of 140,000 West Bank Palestinians between 1967 and 1994, according to a Justice Ministry document obtained by Haaretz newspaper. The document was written by the ministry's "Judea and Samaria" office after an Israeli rights group, the Center for the Defense of the Individual, filed a request under the Freedom of Information Law. The document stated that the procedure was used on Palestinian residents of the West Bank who traveled abroad between 1967 and 1994. From the start of the occupation until the signing of the Oslo Accords, Palestinians who wished to travel abroad via Jordan were ordered to leave their ID cards at the Allenby Bridge border crossing. Those Palestinian who did not return by the time of the card's expiration (generally three years) were registered as NLRs—no longer residents. The Justice Ministry document made no mention of any warning or information that the Palestinians received about the process. Palestinians who found themselves declared NLRs included students who graduated from foreign universitie and laborers who left for work in the Persian Gulf states. Over the years, many of them have started families, so the number of these Palestinians and their descendants is probably in the hundreds of thousands, even if some have died. According to Israel's Central Bureau of Statistics, the West Bank's Palestinian population amounted to 1.05 million in 1994, which means the territory's population would have been some 14% greater if not for the procedure. (Ha'aretz, May 11, 2011)

Violence erupted on Israel's borders with Syria, Lebanon and Gaza on May 15, leaving at least 12 dead and scores wounded, as Palestinians commemorated the Nakba. Israeli troops opened fire as dozens of Palestinian refugees tore through a border fence and crossed into the Israel-occupied Golan Heights from Syria, leaving at least four dead. Four were killed as Palestinian refugees attempted to cross into Israel from Lebanon. Some 60 were injured as troops fired on Palestinians approaching the Gaza Strip border fence. Israeli soldiers also fired tear gas and rubber bullets in a clash with protesters outside Ramallah on the West Bank. In Tel Aviv, a truck driven by an Arab Israeli slammed into vehicles and pedestrians, killing one man and injuring 17 people; police said they were trying to determine whether the incident was an accident or an attack. (Reuters, DPA, May 15, 2011)

Israeli authorities were quick to portray the protests as fomented by foreign powers. "We are seeing here an Iranian provocation, on both the Syrian and the Lebanese frontiers, to try to exploit the Nakba day commemorations," said the army's chief spokesman, Lt-Col. Yoav Mordechai. (Ibid)

Indeed, the Syrian regime seemed to have encouraged the protests to deflect popular rage away from itself. Days before the protest campaign, a cousin and adviser of President Bashar Assad warned in an interview with the New York Times that unless there was stability in Syria, "there's no way there will be stability in Israel." Rami Makhlouf, a leader of Syria's political elite and one of the country's richest men, warned, "nobody can guarantee what will happen after, God forbid, anything happens to this regime." (NYT, May 11, 2011)

The days leading up to the Nakba commemoration saw repeated street battles in Jerusalem. On May 14, some 2,000 mourners filled the streets for the funeral of Milad Said Ayyash, a Palestinian youth fatally wounded the previous day in the city's Silwan district. Police said it was unclear who had shot him and they are investigating. Carrying Palestinian flags, the mourners, some masked, chanted "Allah Akbar" (God is great) and "With our blood and our soul, we shall sacrifice for the martyr," as they marched to al-Aqsa Mosque. (AFP, May 14, 2011)

In Egypt, authorities on May 14 blocked access to the Sinai peninsula to prevent a march from Cairo to Gaza in solidarity with the Palestinians, as thousands protested at the Israeli embassy in Cairo. (AFP, May 13, 2011)

World reaction to President Barack Obama's May 19 speech on the Middle East overwhelmingly focused on his demand that a peace settlement must be based on Israel's 1967 borders—despite the fact that this had been, at least, the de facto US position since the Oslo Accords. And despite the fact that Obama actually hedged by invoking possible land swaps:

[W]hile the core issues of the conflict must be negotiated, the basis of those negotiations is clear: a viable Palestine, a secure Israel. The United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine. We believe the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states. The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves, and reach their full potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state. [transcript, May 19, 2011]

Five days later, Prime Minister Netanyahu's speech at the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC in Washington DC was interrupted May 24 by pro-Palestinian protesters. The five protesters—all American Jews— unfurled banners and chanted slogans before they were escorted out of the conference hall by security. "Do you think they have these protests in Gaza?" Netanyahu jokingly asked the audience. (Haaretz, May 24; Ynet May 25, 2011)

Later that same day, Netanyahu's speech before a joint session of Congress was disrupted by a protester identified as Rae Abileah, a Jewish-American of Israeli decent. Abileah stood up in the gallery as Netanyahu was congratulating the US for the killing of Osama bin Laden and shouted "Stop Israeli war crimes!" In a statement released shortly after the incident, Abileah said: "Prime Minister Netanyahu says that the 1967 borders are indefensible. But what is really indefensible is the occupation of land, the starvation of Gaza, the jailing of dissenters and the lack of equal rights in the alleged Israeli democracy. As a Jew and an American taxpayer, I can’t be silent when these crimes are being committed in my name and with my tax money." Abileah said she was manhandled by AIPAC activists after disrupting the speech, and was briefly hospitalized. (Ibid)

In his remarks before AIPAC, Netanyahu repeated his criticism of President Obama's call for a return to the 1967 borders. The prime minister said that while Israel is eager to negotiate a peace deal, "it must leave Israel with security. Therefore, it cannot return to the indefensible 1967 lines." (LAT, May 24, 2011)

In his address before Congress, Netanyahu received several standing ovations from the assembled lawmakers—as he overtly called for Israeli annexation of at least parts of the West Bank:

I will be prepared to make a far reaching compromise. This compromise must reflect the dramatic demographic changes that have occurred since 1967. The vast majority of the 650,000 Israelis who live beyond the 1967 lines, reside in neighborhoods and suburbs of Jerusalem and Greater Tel Aviv. These areas are densely populated but geographically quite small. Under any realistic peace agreement, these areas, as well as other places of critical strategic and national importance, will be incorporated into the final borders of Israel. [ Yeshiva World transcript, May 24, 2011]

Following a campaign by the Stop the JNF Campaign, British Prime Minister David Cameron's name was evidently dropped from the list of honorary patrons of the Jewish National Fund-UK in May. Stop the JNF Campaign repeatedly wrote to Cameron, requesting that he withdraw as patron of the charity. The campaign's Mortaza Sahibzada said: "His name has been taken off the list and that is significant. Someone has decided to take it off and I doubt whether it was JNF." Cameron became an honorary patron of the JNF five years earlier, and other patrons still included former prime ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. In its latest letter to Cameron, Stop the JNF complained that the JNF's "British Park"—a "reforested" area proclaimed by a sign at the site as "a gift of the Jewish National Fund of Great Britain"—was was in fact planted "in order to cover over the remains of the Palestinian villages of Ajjur and Zakariyya, destroyed in 1948, and to prevent the original population and their descendants from returning." (Jewish Chronicle, May 26; Stop the JNF Campaign, April 7, 2011; Electronic Intifada, Feb. 15, 2010)

The Jewish National Fund boasts on its website: "Since it was established in 1901, JNF has planted more than 240 million trees all over the State of Israel, providing luscious belts of green covering more than 250,000 acres." (JNF website) Palestinians charge these groves were often planted to cover the ruins of destroyed Arab villages.

Israeli military forces shut down Friday anti-wall protests in villages across the West Bank on May 27, saying the unarmed weekly demonstrations in Palestinian villages have been declared illegal. An army spokesman said the areas between Israel's separation wall and villages Ni'lin and Bil'in had been designated "closed military zones" every Friday between 8 AM and 8 PM. In Nil'in, where the wall cuts off around one third of the village, protesters had just marked the third anniversary of their peaceful protest campaign against the barrier—over the course of which Israeli forces had killed five Palestinians and injured hundreds more. On Friday May 27, for the first time the army installed a checkpoint at the entrance to Ni'lin, stopping residents from joining the protest. Troops fired tear-gas grenades into fields when protesters tried to evade the checkpoint, and residents said olive trees were set on fire. At a simultaneous rally in Nabi Saleh, soldiers also enforced a closed military zone and detained six protesters for entering the area and "hurling rocks" at troops, an army spokesperson said. A protest was similarly shut down in al-Ma'sara, south of Bethlehem. (Ma'an News Agency, Arab News, May 27, 2011)

Some 1,600 Jewish worshipers escorted by Israeli soldiers again visited Joseph's Tomb for late night prayers May 30—and some 50 then refused to leave when the allotted time for the visit was over, and had to be forcibly removed by the troops.Three were arrested. After the confrontation, villagers south of nearby Nablus reported seeing dozens of settlers set fire to agricultural lands. A settlement monitoring official with Fatah, Ghassan Doughlus, told Ma'an News Agency that residents of Madama village, whose lands were torched, believed the settlers were from the illegal residential community of Yitzhar, known for its militancy. Local Palestinian fire crews were able to put out fires before significant damage was done. (Ma'an News Agency, May 31; JTA, May 30, 2011)

On May 29, an Israel Defense Forces inquiry concluded that the previous month's shooting by Palestinian police on settler worshippers at Joseph's Tomb was not premeditated, but was carried out with the intent to hurt Israelis since their lives were not at risk. The Israeli military found the police fire, which left one settler dead, was "unwarranted." (Ibid)

A bill introduced in the Knesset in May would change Jerusalem neighborhoods with Arabic names to Hebrew ones—Mamilla, Talbiya or Holyland becoming the Hagoshrim, Komemiyut and Eretz HaTzvi. "The purpose is to strengthen the bond to Jerusalem by enforcing the use of Hebrew names for the capital's neighborhoods where Jews reside," said MK Tzipi Hotovely (Likud). The bill would apply to any neighborhood with Jewish residents. Old names would remain unchanged, but have a secondary status to the new Hebrew ones. The Jerusalem city government would have to complete the Hebraization of all city neighborhoods, replace the signposts and not use the previous names in any official matter. Several Arab-majority districts would be affected. The Palestinian town of Abu Dis (dissected by a security barrier with the western part under the Jerusalem government) will become Kidmat Zion. (YNet, May 30, 2011)

Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barakat said the municipality would continue to build Jewish-only housing in the occupied city. Barakat told Israel Radio that all construction plans would be completed regardless of "political issues." (Ma'an News Agency, May 31, 2011)

At least 5,000 people marched in central Tel Aviv on the night of June 4 in support of a Palestinian state based on 1967 borders. The march was sponsored by several parties and organizations, including Peace Now, Meretz, Hadash, Combatants for Peace and Gush Shalom, and Other Voice. Chants and slogans included "Netanyahu said no—We say yes to a Palestinian state," "Palestinian state—An Israeli interest," "Jews and Arabs refuse to be enemies," and "Bibi, recognize the Palestinians." A few dozen right-wing activists held a counter demonstration at the start of the march. (JTA, June 5, 2011)

The next day, Israeli troops opened fire as protesters from Syria stormed a ceasefire line in the occupied Golan Heights, with Damascus saying 20 demonstrators were killed—including a woman and child—and more than 220 wounded. Hundreds of protesters rushed towards the ceasefire line, cutting through barbed wire as they tried to enter the occupied Golan Heights in a repeat of the previous month's protests. In Majdal Shams, Israeli troops opened fire as protesters sought to push through the mined ceasefire line, which had been reinforced with several rows of barbed wire since the May demonstrations. The June 5 protests were held as a commemoration of the Naksa, or the "defeat" for the Palestinians in the 1967 Six-Day War. Protests were also held in the West Bank, where hundreds demonstrated at the Qalandiya checkpoint near Ramallah, and in the Gaza Strip, where several hundred more gathered. (AlJazeera, June 6; AFP, June 5, 2011)

The mosque in the West Bank village of Maghayer (also rendered al-Mughayyir) suffered damage and threatening graffiti in a vandal attack in the wee hours of June 7. Burning tires were rolled into the mosque near Ramallah, setting rugs in the building on fire, and the walls were scrawled with anti-Arab slogans. The words "Alei Ayin" were also spray-painted on the walls, which is the name of a nearby Jewish settlement outpost demolished by Israeli police last week, sparking clashes with the settlers. Other slogans spray painted on the wall included "This is only the beginning" and "Price Tag"—a reference to the strategy of exacting a price in attacks on Palestinians in retribution for moves against settlements or incidents such as the Itamar attack. Several West Bank mosques had been torched in the past year; most incidents were blamed on Jewish settlers. Israeli authorities said they were investigating the Maghayer attack. (Ma'an News Agency, JTA, June 7, 2011)

Dozens of armed Israeli settlers on June 10 attacked residents of Qusra village in the northern West Bank. PA settlement affairs official Ghassan Doughlas said the attackers beat several residents at the entrance of the village, south of Nablus, and smashed the windscreen of a truck belonging to a local. Doughlas said the settlers were from "illegal" outpost Alei Ayin, which the Israeli army had recently evacuated. Settlers from the same outpost were suspected in the recent mosque attack near Ramallah. Meanwhile, in the nearby village Iraq Burin, Israeli forces used tear gas and stun grenades to break up a weekly anti-settlement protest. (Maan News Agency, June 12, 2011)

In operations across the West Bank, Israeli forces arrested eight Palestinians that same day, including a former Hamas minister, Wasfi Kabaha. Um Osama, the 50-year-old Kabaha’s wife, said Israeli soldiers broke into their home at 2 AM and took her husband to an undisclosed location. The Hamas movement said in a press statement that Kabaha was among 17 of its ministers and lawmakers that Israel was holding as “bargaining chips” to use as leverage in the efforts to secure the release of Gilad Shalit. (Arab News, June 10, 2011)

Shutting Down the New Gaza Flotilla

As international activists prepared for a new flotilla campaign to break the Gaza blockade, the US State Department issued the following terse warning on June 22:

The security environment within Gaza, including its border with Egypt and its seacoast, is dangerous and volatile. U.S. citizens are advised against traveling to Gaza by any means, including via sea. Previous attempts to enter Gaza by sea have been stopped by Israeli naval vessels and resulted in the injury, death, arrest, and deportation of U.S. citizens. U.S. citizens participating in any effort to reach Gaza by sea should understand that they may face arrest, prosecution, and deportation by the Government of Israel... On May 31, 2010, nine people were killed, including one U.S. citizen, in such an attempt. {US State Department, June 22, 2011]

The new "Freedom Flotilla" was to be led by a US vessel, The Audacity of Hope,. Six members of Congress ed by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) wrote an open letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asking her to ensure the safety of US citizens onboard aid flotillas to Gaza. The letter stated that while Israel has the right to defend itself, the measures it takes must “conform to international humanitarian and human rights law,” and that the US must also work to protect its own citizens:

We write to express our concern for the safety of American passengers on the US ship The Audacity of Hope, which will set sail for Gaza in the next few days. We request that you do everything in your power to work with the Israeli government to ensure the safety of the U.S. citizens on board...

We wholeheartedly support Israel’s right, and indeed its duty, to protect its citizens from security threats. The measures it uses to do so, as in the case with any other nation, must conform to international humanitarian and human rights law. We are encouraged that The Audacity of Hope organizers have stated that their cargo “is open to international inspection” and that they “are fully committed to nonviolence and the the tenets of international law. [ Just Foreign Policy, June 27, 2011]

Other governments were taking a much harder line on protecting the activists aboard the flotilla. “Israel must exercise all possible restraint and avoid any use of military force if attempting to uphold their naval blockade,” said Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade Eamon Gilmore. “In particular, I would expect that any interception of ships is conducted in a peaceful manner and does not endanger the safety of our citizens or other participants.” (ThinkProgress, June 25, 2011)

Days later, activists preparing the new aid fllotilla charged that Israel sabotaged one of their boats at the Greek port of Piraeus. In a statement, Scandinavian organizers said "hostile divers" had cut the propeller shaft of the Juliano, a ship shared by Swedish, Norwegian and Greek activists. They said the damage can be repaired and that it will not affect plans to sail for the Palestinian territory toward the end of the week. The 10-ship flotilla has already been delayed by administrative problems with Greek port authorities that activists blame on Israeli diplomatic pressure. (CBS, Arutz Sheva, June 28, 2011)

Flotilla organizers also denied Israeli reports that they intend to kill soldiers, using chemical weapons. IDF spokesperson Lt. Col. Avital Leibovitz charged: "There are radical elements on board the American boat who have said they want to kill Israeli soldiers. We also know that one of the boats is carrying dangerous incendiary chemicals that these human rights militants want to use against Israeli soldiers.” Flotilla activist Dror Feiler told Israel's Army Radio that the charges of plots to kill were excuses for the IDF to justify violence. (Ibid)

The Audacity of Hope, US-registered lead ship in the flotilla, was stopped by the Greek Coast Guard just some 20 minutes outside the port of Perama on July 1. Athens warned that all ships bound for Gaza would be prohibited from leaving Greek ports. Cyprus likewise banned ships headed for Gaza from leaving its ports. (Jerusalem Post, CNN, July 1, 2011)

Greek authorities also detained two of the ships docked in the Athens area, after the right-wing Israeli advocacy group, Shurat HaDin-Israel Law Center, submitted a complaint to the Coast Guard suggesting that seven of the ships might be lacking insurance or were improperly registered. (NYT. June 28, 2011)

The captain of the US boat in the flotilla was jailed July 2 in Athens. John Klusmer was handcuffed and arrested after arriving at a police station that afternoon, while his four-member crew was detained on the boat, apparently charged with disobeying a police order not to leave the port and "disturbing sea traffic." While passengers were free to go, they remained on the Audacity of Hope as a show of solidarity with their captain and crew. Also in Athens, Palestinian lawmaker Mustafa Barghouti called on the Greek government to allow the flotilla to sail, saying the flotilla and other acts of non-violent resistance to the occupation resembled “the best traditions of Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, and Gandhi." (Maan News Agency, July 2, 2011)

The Tahrir, a Canadian ship in the flotilla, was forced to return to Aghios Nikolaos harbor in Crete after an attempt to reach international waters was thwarted by coast guards after just 15 minutes on July 4. But another flotilla vessel, the Dignite al Karama, managed to slip past the coast guard that night, and reached international waters. The vessel's passengers included Olivier Besancenot, head of the New Left Party in France, and French member of the European Parliament Nicole Kiil-Nilsen. Charges were meanwhile been dropped against the captain of the Audacity of Hope. (AlJazeera, AlJazeera, July 5, 2011)

The French-flagged Dignite, was detained by the Greek coast guard while refueling in Crete July 7. Leslie Cagan, coordinator of the US Boat to Gaza, announced that the team of activists from the United States was returning home. “The Greek government’s willingness to serve as the enforcer of Israeli’s naval blockade of Gaza made it impossible for this journey to happen,” Cagan wrote. (JTA, July 7, 2011)

Israel hailed Greek cooperation in shutting down the flotilla. "Greece is taking a responsible stance and dealing with a particular situation," said Foreign Ministry spokesman Grigoris Delavekouras. "And this situation says that there is an immediate danger to human life by participating in this attempt.... The region doesn't need this at the moment." (Jewish Policy Center, July 5, 2011)

In a message on the "US to Gaza" website, the group also said its flotilla participants, including St. Louis area activist and Holocaust survivor Hedy Epstein, were leaving Greece. (US to Gaza website, July 6, 2011)

To protest the shutting down of the Gaza flotilla, international activists staged an "air flotilla," flying into Israel's Lod Airport and declaring their intention to travel to Gaza and the West Bank. This was shut down by authorities as well. Dozens of activists were barred from leaving foreign airports for Israel, and some 60 who managed to fly in were promptly deported. (EJP, July 8, 2011)

This second, anti-climactic flotilla affair occasioned a fierce propaganda war in the media and on the Internet. Conveniently, it came just as a UN report on the previous year's deadly Israeli raid on the flotilla vessel Mavi Marmara, was leaked—providing further propaganda ammo to both sides. According to findings of the UN commission headed by former New Zealand prime minister Geoffrey Palmer, leaked in Turkey and Israel, the military operation was "premature" and the deaths "unacceptable." However, in what Israel hailed as a vindication, the Jewish state is only asked to express regret and not to apologise. Turkey is also criticised for not doing enough to stop the flotilla, and for its links with IHH, an Islamist group which helped organize it. The report also apparently concluded that the blockade of Gaza is not illegal, and that Israel is justified in stopping vessels even outside its territorial waters. (The Telegraph, July 7, 2011)

Adnan Abu Hasna, media representative for the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), provided a a different perspective, stating (emphasis added):

From a legal point of view, Gaza is occupied by Israel. Israel did not withdraw from Gaza. Maybe you cannot see troops in the streets but Israel is around Gaza, in the air and in the sea, the Israelis are everywhere. With the exception of fuel to run Gaza’s electricity and some building materials [that come through the tunnels] Gaza depends on Israel 100%.

Of course the blockade is illegal, and it is not helpful. We published a report just three or four days ago ["Labour Market Briefing, Second-Half 2010"] and we told them that the unemployment rate is nearly 45% - they have made the poorest people more poor—what will be the result? Give one example in history where imposing a blockade and siege has moderated anything, has created people looking for peace? We think it is counterproductive... Imposing such restrictions is weakening civil society and strengthening the Hamas government. What is Israel’s interest? [Snoop, June 22, 2011]

Palestine activists also pointed to a 2009 report by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), "Locked In: The Humanitarian Impact of Two Years of Blockade on the Gaza Strip," which found that the siege had triggered a "protracted human dignity crisis" with negative humanitarian consequences. "At the heart of this crisis is the degradation in the living conditions of the population, caused by the erosion of livelihoods and the gradual decline in the state of infrastructure, and the quality of vital services in the areas of health, water and sanitation, and education." (Palestine Telegraph, Aug. 18, 2009; UN News Centre, Aug. 17, 2009)

The reported also stated: "The denial of Palestinians' right to leave Gaza , or to move freely to the West Bank , particularly when their lives, physical integrity, or basic freedoms are under threat, is another key component of the current human dignity crisis. The blockade has 'locked in' 1.5 million people in what is one of the most densely populated areas on earth." (Ibid)

Also in 2009, the UN's Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Richard Falk, urged Israel’s European and North American allies to use the threat of economic sanctions to pressure the country into ending the Gaza blockade. "People of conscience everywhere, as well as governments worldwide and the United Nations, should take note of the dire situation in Gaza," said Falk. "The ordeal of the 1.5 million residents of Gaza affected by the Israeli blockade, over half of whom are children, has been allowed to continue without any formal objection by governments and at the UN." (UN News Centre, Dec. 23, 2009)

"The unlawful blockade imposed by Israel continues, and is in its third year," said Falk, noting that insufficient food and medicine is reaching Gazans, producing a further deterioration of the mental and physical health of the entire civilian population since Israel launched Operation Cast Lead against the territory in December 2008. Falk added that "so far, there is no evidence of meaningful international pressure being brought to bear to end the blockade or to ensure that Israeli and Hamas officials are held accountable for alleged war crimes perpetrated during the Gaza attacks... [T]his represents both a tragic failure of responsibility by the powerful governments of the world and of the UN." (Ibid)

Falk's statement came as Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, in his an annual report on human rights released to the General Assembly, also called on Israel to end the blockade of Gaza, as well as to cease evictions and demolitions of Palestinian homes, and ensure that the rights of children are respected. "In particular, the Government of Israel should allow unimpeded access to Gaza for humanitarian aid and the non-humanitarian goods needed for the reconstruction of properties and infrastructure," the Secretary-General wrote. (Ibid)

A year after the Israeli government announced its decision to "ease" the closure of the Gaza Strip, the IDF's Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) published a report, "Implementation of the Civil Policy Toward the Gaza Strip: One Year Since the Cabinet's Decision to Expand the Civil Policy." This document was analyzed by the Gisha Legal Center for Freedom of Movement, an Israeli human rights group that monitors the situation in the Strip, in a study humorously dubbed "Numbers, Meet Context"... .

The COGAT report stated:

Israel is working with the international community and the Palestinian Authority to advance and streamline procedures for the approval of internationally-funded projects. To this end a coordination and monitoring mechanism has been set up for the implementation of internationally funded projects in accordance with security considerations. So far 163 internationally funded projects were approved for implementation.

Gisha responded:

And in the broader context? The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), whose projects account for half of those approved by Israel last year, reports that this still only represents 27% of the projects they wish to implement in their recovery and reconstruction plan. For example, of 100 schools the agency seeks to build, only 42 were approved, and as getting clearance for materials still involves cumbersome bureaucratic procedures, actual construction has begun on only half of the schools. "Advancing and streamlining", indeed.

Gisha summed up:

Certain measures have indeed been taken over the past year to "ease" the closure, and we welcome those. But when seen in the broader context of the needs of Gaza residents and promises made to them, it's clear that overall, progress has come too little and too late.

Gisha in July appealed to Israel's Supreme Court a judgement upholding the policy that allowed Christians —but not Muslims—to exit the besieged Gaza Strip for worship at Jerusalem's holy sites. The ruling by the Beersheba District Court rejected a petition filed in February by seven Muslim women from the Gaza Strip. The petitioners sought to enter Israel in order to exercise their right to freedom of worship and pray at the al-Aqsa Mosque. Despite the declared sensitivity towards freedom of worship at Jerusalem's holy sites, Israel does not allow the entry of Muslim worshippers from Gaza, even subject to security screening, but does allow Christian worshippers to enter. The court rejected the petition and ordered the petitioners to pay legal fees in the unprecedented amount of 25,000 NIS (approx. $7,250). In the appeal, Gisha claims that the district court reached on erroneous legal conclusions that contravene the state’s obligation to maintain equality and freedom of worship with respect to access to sites that are holy to all religions. (Gisha, June 20, 2011)

The Arab Spring Comes to Israel?

The Israeli army in June began tearing down a section of its separation barrier in the West Bank near Bil’in village, where weekly protests had become a symbol of opposition to the wall's encroachment on Palestinian land. The rerouting of the barrier, after long delays, was a rare instance in which Israeli military officials were forced to change plans by a court order. It came four years after the Israeli Supreme Court ruled on a petition by villagers that the barrier's route did not serve security needs, but cut through village farmland for purposes of expanding the adjacent Israeli settlement of Modi'in Ilit, a fast-growing town of ultra-Orthodox Jews. The court ordered the barrier torn down and rebuilt closer to the settlement. (WP, June 26)

At Bil’in, the fence cut the village off from a hill covered with olive trees, where a new neighborhood of Modi'in Ilit was planned. The Supreme Court found in its 2007 ruling that the planned expansion of the settlement was not sufficient grounds for fencing off the land. Delays by the Defense Ministry in implementing the decision led to two contempt of court rulings in response to motions by villagers. The court rejected two alternative routes for the fence proposed by military officials, on the grounds that they enclosed too much land as a reserve for expansion of Modi'in Ilit. A third route was accepted in 2009, and the army built a new barrier, closer to to the settlement. On June 26, bulldozers began tearing down the old fence, a section two miles long. (Ibid)

Col. Sa'ar Tzur, the regional brigade commander, told reporters that the new route would restore some 140 acres to Bil’in, leaving about 50 acres of village farmland beyond the new barrier. Village residents said that the actual area of seized land was much larger than that. Michael Sfard, an Israeli human rights lawyer who represented the Bil’in villagers in the case, said that he had warned in a letter to the Israeli authorities several weeks earlier that if the barrier section was not removed by July 1, he would file another contempt of court motion. Sfard added that in delaying implementation, the Defense Ministry had "given preference to settlement expansion over fulfilling the court ruling to the letter." (Ibid)

Israeli forces in late June arrested some 25 Palestinian leaders in the cities of Qalqilyah, Hebron, Jenin, Ramallah and Nablus. PNC member Azmi Sl-Shiyoukhi, of the Fatah movement, was taken from his home in Hebron. Israeli sources said that the 23 were taken to undisclosed locations for questioning by Shin Bet. (Arab News, June 28, 2011)

On June 27, Hamas prisoners launched a one-day hunger strike to protest against the isolation of their leaders in Israeli prisons. Prime Minister Netanyahu ordered seven into solitary confinement after Hamas rejected the demand of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRS) to provide proof that Gilad Shalit is still alive. Hamas demanded Israel free up to 1,000 Palestinians in exchange for the release of Shalit. According to the recent Palestinian statistics, there were 6,700 Palestinians currently held in 23 prisons and detention camps in Israel and in the West Bank. Of these, 300 were under the age of 18. Israel also held 37 females and 17 members of the Palestine Legislative Council. (Ibid)

Hundreds of Palestinian detainees at Ashkelon prison, in Israel's south, also went on three-day hunger strike July 1 following attacks by prison security forces. Units of Israeli Prison Service raided the facility the day before, firing tear-gas and beating detainees with batons and hoses. Prisoners were later subject to abusive interrogations and strip searches. In a statement released to the media, Ashkelon prisoners described the attack as "barbaric and vicious." The statement added that "solitary confinements, tougher procedures and strip searches will never intimidate us." Netanyahu admitted that he had instructed the Israeli Prison Service to toughen conditions for Palestinian detainees to pressure Hamas on a prisoner swap. (KUNA, Palestine Telegraph, July 2)

Israeli police on July 1 limited access to Jerusalem's al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock for Friday prayers in a precautionary measure a day after clashes in the Old City. Muslim men under 45 years old were barred from the Haram al-Sharif. In the previous day's unrest, a Palestinian was wounded when an Israeli border guard opened fire to disperse protesters who were throwing stones at the entrance to Shuafat refugee camp in East Jerusalem. (AP, July 1, 2011)

However, new unrest in the city on July 3 actually began when haredi Jews protested the arrest of Rabbi Yaakov Yosef, gathering outside his house, where MKs Michael Ben Ari and Yaakov Katz both addressed the crowd. In two instances, the protesters surrounded a car full of Arabs, broke the windows and sprayed pepper spray into the vehicle. Police arrested several, and tried to disperse the crowds with water cannons. Haredi protesters retaliated with hurled rocks. (Jerusalem Post, July 3)

Police had arrested Rabbi Yosef that morning on his way home from morning prayer, to question him on suspicion of incitement to violence and racism over his alleged endorsement of the controversial book, Torat Hamelech (The King’s Torah). Police said they had repeatedly requested Yosef to turn up for questioning on his own volition, but the rabbi refused. Torat Hamelech, by the rabbi of the Yitzhar settlement on the West Bank, Yitzhak Shapira, gives Jews permission to preemptively kill gentiles under certain conditions in wartime. (Ibid)

"The prohibition 'Thou Shalt Not Murder'" applies only "to a Jew who kills a Jew," states the book, which poses itself as a compendium of halacha, or Jewish religious law. Non-Jews are "uncompassionate by nature" and attacks on them "curb their evil inclination," while babies and children of Israel's enemies may be killed since "it is clear that they will grow to harm us." (The Forward, Jan 20, 2010)

Also in July, a new report by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon into the violence along the Israeli-Lebanon border on Nakba Day harshly criticized the Israeli army for using unnecessary force in firing on protesters. The report, released to the Security Council, stated that Israeli troops "used direct live fire against unarmed demonstrators" and urged the army to avoid doing so in situations where there was no immediate threat to life. The report found that Israel's actions "constituted a violation of resolution 1701 [which ended the 2006 Lebanon conflict] and was not commensurate to the threat to Israeli soldiers." (Ha'aretz, Middle East Online, July 6, 2011)

In a resolution that passed 406-6, the US House of Representatives on July 7 threatened to cut off funding to the Palestinian Authority if it pursues recognition of statehood outside of negotiations with Israel. The text of the resolution "affirms that Palestinian efforts to circumvent direct negotiations and pursue recognition of statehood prior to agreement with Israel will harm United States-Palestinian relations and will have serious implications for the United States assistance programs for the Palestinians and the Palestinian Authority." It also called on the Obama administration to review assistance to the Palestinians, running about $500 million a year, in the light of negotiations with Hamas toward a unity government. The Senate passed a similar non-binding resolution. (JTA, July 8, 2011)

For the first time in three years, the Israeli state confiscated uncultivated land in the West Bank in July, to "legalize" a nearby settlement outpost. Acting on orders from the government, the Civil Administration declared 189 dunams of land belonging to the Palestinian village of Karyut to be state land, so as to retroactively "legalize" houses and a road in the Hayovel neighborhood of the settlement of Eli. The expropriation was carried out under an Ottoman land law dating from 1858 that allows uncultivated land to be declared state land. Hayovel was built on Karyut lands in 1998 as a temporary outpost, and later permanent houses and an access road were added. After the Peace Now and Yesh Din organizations petitioned the Supreme Court against the construction in 2005 and 2009, the Civil Administration reviewed the land's legal status. Since Jordan, which ruled the West Bank from 1948-67, had never officially entered the lands in its registry, the Civil Administration reclassified them as under review. This meant that any place that was still cultivated at the time of the review would remain in the hands of its original Palestinian owners, but the rest could be declared state land. (Ha'aretz, July 8, 2011)

In 2004, then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon had promised US President George W. Bush to stop this practice, and this promise was later reiterated by his successor, Ehud Olmert. In his speech at Bar-Ilan University in 2009, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, "We have no intention to build new settlements or set aside land for new settlements. But there is a need to have people live normal lives and let mothers and fathers raise their children like everyone in the world." (Ibid)

Hundreds of Palestinians and foreign activists gathered at the Qalandia checkpoint north of Jerusalem on July 10 to launch a campaign urging the international community to demand implementation of the World Court ruling to demolish the separation wall. The campaign was being supported by popular committees and local organizations across Palestine, as well as by a number of foreign activists who managed to enter Palestine recently as part of the "flytilla" campaign. (Ma'an News Agency, July 10, 2011)

The Knesset on July 11 passed a controversial law penalizing persons or organizations that advocate a boycott of Israel or the settlements, by a vote of 47 to 38. Under the law, those who advocate a boycott can be sued by the boycott's targets without having to prove that they sustained damage. The court will then decide how much compensation is to be paid. The second part of the law says a person or a company that declare a boycott of Israel or the settlements will not be able to bid in government tenders. MK Zeev Elkin (Likud), who proposed the law, said it was not meant to silence people, but "to protect the citizens of Israel." MK Nitzan Horowitz (Meretz) countered: "We are dealing with a legislation that is an embarrassment to Israeli democracy and makes people around the world wonder if there is actually a democracy here." (Ha'aretz, July 11, 2011)

A July report by the Israeli human rights group B'Tselem found that of more than 800 Palestinian youths under the age of 18 charged with throwing stones in the West Bank over a six-year period, only one was acquitted. From the beginning of 2005 to the end of 2010, at least 835 Palestinian minors were arrested and tried in military courts in the West Bank on charges of stone throwing. Thirty-four of them were aged 12-13, 255 were 14-15, 546 were 16-17. Only one of the 835 was acquitted; all the rest were found guilty. The report, entitled "No Minor Matter: Violation of the Rights of Palestinian Minors Arrested by Israel on Suspicion of Stone-Throwing," stated:

Palestinian minors charged with criminal offenses are tried under the military legislation applying in the West Bank, which grants them very few of the special rights relating to persons their age.. In November 2009, the Military Youth Court was established in the West Bank. The court was empowered to hear offenses committed by minors under age 16... The president of the Military Court of Appeals added that the military courts must operate in the spirit of the Israeli Youth Law, even though the Youth Law itself is not incorporated in the military legislation. Despite these declarations, institution of the Military Youth Court has brought limited change, and serious infringement of the rights of minors appearing before it continues. [B'Tselem, July 2011]

And the convicted youths are overwhelmingly sentenced to prison—despite the fact that imprisonment of minors is illegal in Israel:

Imprisonment, rather than an alternative punishment, is the principal penalty chosen by the military courts. In the period 2005-2010, 93 percent of the minors convicted of stone throwing were given a prison sentence, its length ranging from a few days to 20 months. Nineteen minors under age 14, who accounted for 60 percent of this age group who were convicted of stone throwing during this period, were given a prison sentence. Under the law in Israel, incarceration of minors under age 14 is prohibited. [Ibid]

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) released a statement July 15 confirming the occupied status of East Jerusalem. "UNESCO wishes to reiterate that, contrary to recent claims, there has been no change in UNESCO's position on Jerusalem," the statement read. "In line with overall UN policy, East Jerusalem remains part of the occupied Palestinian territory, and the status of Jerusalem must be resolved in permanent status negotiations." The statement noted that the Old City of Jerusalem is inscribed on UNESCO's World Heritage List and the List of World Heritage in Danger. UNESCO had been criticized recently after it emerged that the organization's website listed Jerusalem as Israel's capital, despite the international—and United Nations—consensus that the Eastern part of the city is under military occupation. (Ma'an News Agency, July 15, 2011)

The movement Sheikh Jarah Solidarity—named for the Jerusalem city being heavily colonized by Jewish-only housing—organized a high-profile march in the holy city July 15 to demand an independent Palestine in the 1967 borders. More than 3,000 people—Jews, Muslim, and Christians, Israelis and Palestinians—showed up and marched for three hours in the piercing sun, drumming and chanting: "Jews and Arabs refuse to be enemies," "Say no to fascism," and "From Bilin to Jerusalem, Palestine will be free." Tens of Palestinian flags were waved on the route which passed alongside the walls of the Old City. (New Jewish Resistance, July 16, 2011)

But an unprecedented protest movement was about to erupt in Israel. Some 150,000 protesters took to the streets in cities across Israel on the night of July 30—the biggest demonstrations the country has seen in decades—to demand action on rising rents, low salaries, and the high cost of living. The demonstrations—held in 12 cities including Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Haifa—shows that the popular protest movement that has emerged over the past two weeks is only gaining momentum. Activist Daphni Leef, who initiated the first "tent village" protest in Tel Aviv, told a crowd of some 100,000 outside the city's art museum that "we don't want to replace the government, but to do more than that. We want to change the rules of the game." Noam Shalit, the father of captured soldier Gilad Shalit, also spoke at the rally. (The Guardian, July 31, 2011)

A group of far-right West Bank settler activists who call themselves the "Hilltop Youth" did establish their own camp within the Tel Aviv tent town, and proposed aggressive West Bank settlement as a solution to the Tel Aviv housing crisis, as well as scapegoating African immigrants for the problem with such slogans as "Tel Aviv is Jewish!" But they were repudiated by most protesters, and their tents were eventually burned down by angry leftists. (Haaretz, Aug. 5, 2011; Ha'aretz, Aug. 3, 2011)

Israeli leftists also established their own tent, which they dubbed "Tent 1948," in an effort to get the protest movement to adopt justice for the Palestinians and an end to their displacement as a demand. (972Mag, Aug. 7, 2011)

An estimated 300,000 marched in cities and towns across Israel Aug. 6—the biggest mobilization yet in a growing movement for economic justice. More than 200,000 marched in Tel Aviv alone—one of the largest demonstrations in the history of the Jewish state. Even after the march ended, a hardcore of several hundred protesters blocked the intersection of Rehov Kaplan and Ibn Gvirol, two of the city's main arteries, singing Jewish songs late into the night and and chanting the movement's token slogan: "The people demand social justice!" One large banner from the rally showed the word "Go!" in Arabic—a key symbol of the protest movement that brought down Hosni Mubarak in Egypt, and a clear reference to Benjamin Netanyahu. Below, in Hebrew, are the words: "Egypt is here!" (972Mag, Jerusalem Post, Aug. 7, 2011)

As the rent protests shook Israel, the daily dispossession on the West Bank went on. Twelve settlers accused of setting fire to Palestinian mosques, property and vehicles were slapped with restraining orders limiting their movement in the West Bank, on recommendations from Shin Bet. A report by the Palestinian Authority found that settler violence increased "dramatically" in June 2011, documenting 139 attacks in the West Bank and the destruction of over 3,600 olive trees and vineyards. (Maan News Agency, Aug. 3, 2011)

Israeli soldiers again fired tear gas Aug. 5 to disperse the weekly anti-wall protest in Bil'in—marking the first Friday of the Ramadan holy month. (Ma'an News Agency, Aug. 5, 2011) Thousands gathered at Jerusalem's al-Aqsa mosque for prayers, despite Israeli restrictions that barred Palestinian men under the age of 50 from entering the city. (MSNBC, AFP, Aug. 5, 2011)

Israel's interior ministry meanwhile announced final approval for the construction of 900 new homes in the East Jerusalem settlement district of Har Homa—known as Abu Ghnaim to Palestinians and was a forested area in northern Bethlehem before the woods were razed to make way for the housing developments and the district redefined as part of Jerusalem. Hagit Ofran, who monitors settlement activity for the Israeli group Peace Now, described the final approval of the project as "a very dramatic development" because of the critical location of the new housing. "It adds a new ridge to Har Homa which blocks the territorial contiguity between east Jerusalem and Bethlehem and adds a further barrier to the possibility of east Jerusalem as the Palestinian capital in a two-state solution," she told AFP. (AFP, Aug. 4, 2011)

Israel's Supreme Court on Aug. 2 issued for the first time an order for the government to dismantle an illegal outpost in the West Bank. The order called for Migron, the largest "illegal" outpost in the West Bank, to be razed by the end of March 2012. The action came as the result of a petition filed by Peace Now in 2006. The government had decided to remove the settlement outpost (established by the Binyamin Regional Council) by August 2008, but later reached a compromise with settlers that delayed the razing until the state could build them a new neighborhood in a nearby settlement. However, the delay only allowed more houses to be built, and the Court noted that the intended two-year postponement had actually turned into an indefinite delay. (Jurist, Aug. 5, 2011)

Israel carried out new air-strikes in the Gaza Strip Aug. 5 following sporadic mortar and rocket fire from militants over the past week. Five were wounded in the Israeli air-strikes, and one—a Bedouin woman near Ashkelon—in the rocket fire. (BBC News, Ma'an, Aug. 5, 2011)

In mid-August, some 5,000 Palestinian refugees were forced to flee a camp in the Syrian port of Latakia as the Damascus regime shelled its own city from gunboats to put down a popular uprising. UNRWA said Aug. 15 more than half of the Ramel camp's 10,000 residents had fled, and at least four had died, among some 30 reportedly killed in repression in Latakia over the past days. The Palestinian authorities called on the Syrian government to safeguard the lives of refugees in its territory. Palestine Liberation Organization secretary general Yasser Abed Rabbo said the attack on the Ramel camp is "part of the crimes against humanity" targeting Palestinians and Syrians alike. (BBC News, AFP, Aug. 15, 2011)

On Aug. 18, coordinated militant attacks left seven Israelis dead—six civilians and one soldier—near the Red Sea tourist town of Eilat. Palestinian gunmen attacked two buses and two cars traveling near the southern resort city just after noon. When Israeli troops arrived, roadside bombs planted by the militants were detonated. Seven militants were killed in subsequent fire-fights with the soldiers. Israeli officials said they believed the militants crossed from the Gaza Strip into Egypt in order to infiltrate Israel's border near Eilat. Defense Minister Ehud Barak said the attacks "demonstrate the weakening of Egypt's control over the Sinai Peninsula and the expansion of terrorist activity there." (JTA, Maan News Agency, Aug. 18, 2011)

Israel responded to the Eilat attack with air-strikes across the Gaza Strip that killed at least seven—including Popular Resistance Committees official Khaled Shaath, but also his two-year-old son and a 13-year-old Palestinian boy. However, the Israeli media later raised doubts over claims that the militants had come from Gaza, suggesting they were actually Egyptians from the Sinai. (Ha'aretz, Aug. 25, 2011)

US and Egyptian officials meanwhile said a decision to postpone scheduled joint military exercises is due to the political transition underway in Egypt and should not be considered a sign of any rift. The Pentagon's Central Command traditionally leads the biennial Bright Star Exercises, the oldest in the Middle East region, which involve forces from the US, Egypt and European and Arab allies. (VOA, UPI, Aug. 18, 2011)

Tensions escalated Aug. 19 as Cairo registered a formal complaint with Israel over the killings of three of Egyptian officers at the Sinai border, and demanded an immediate investigation on Aug. 19. Egyptian officials said that the three officers were killed when an Israeli helicopter fired at suspected militants who had fled into a crowd of security personnel on the Egyptian side of the border. Dozens of Egyptians demonstrated outside the Israeli embassy in Cairo, burning the Israeli flag and chanting, "Close the embassy! Expel the ambassador!" (AlJazeera, NYT, Aug. 19, 2011)

Israeli shelling killed two people in the eastern and northern Gaza Strip on Aug. 19, bringing the death toll in the coastal enclave to nine in the 24 hours since the Eilat attacks. Earlier, Israeli warplanes struck an-Nuseirat refugee camp, destroying an electric generator and causing a local power outage. (Maan News Agency, Aug. 19) Militants in Gaza retaliated with more rocket attacks into Israel, seriously injuring one. (AFP, Aug. 19, 2011)

Eight people were wounded in Tel Aviv Aug. 29 when a Palestinian man from Nablus ran over police officers with a stolen taxi, exited the vehicle and stabbed more people. The perpetrator was also lightly wounded as police struggled to arrest him. Israeli authorities said the attack was "definitely an act of terror." It was quickly disavowed by the Palestinian Authority, which said in a statement: "We condemn all attacks against civilians, including the incident in Tel Aviv." (Haaretz, Aug. 29, 2011)

Egyptian authorities declared a state of emergency early Sept. 10 after a group of some 30 protesters broke into the Israeli embassy in Cairo overnight and dumped hundreds of documents out of the windows. The storming of the embassy came after a day of demonstrations outside, where crowds swinging sledgehammers and using their bare hands tore down the building's security wall. For hours, security forces made no attempt to intervene. The embassy's Israeli flag was torn down, and a giant Palestinian flag was draped from the building's upper stories. The Israeli ambassador, Yitzhak Levanon, together with his family and other embassy staff, left the country. (The Guardian, RT, Sept. 10; JP, Inagist, Sept. 9, 2011)

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