Gaza: Silence is not an option

From the BBC:

The UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories has said Israel's policies there amount to a crime against humanity.

Richard Falk's statement came as UN human rights delegates urged Israel to take nearly 100 measures including ending its blockade of the Gaza Strip.

He said the UN must act to protect the Palestinian population suffering what he called "collective punishment".

Israel says the blockade is a necessary security measure to stem rocket salvos.

In his statement, Mr Falk called on the United Nations to make an "urgent effort" to "implement the agreed norm of a responsibility to protect a civilian population being collectively punished by policies that amount to a Crime Against Humanity".

He said the International Criminal Court should also investigate whether the Israeli civilian leaders and military commanders for the Gaza siege should be indicted and prosecuted for violations of international criminal law.

The last time there had been "such a flurry of denunciations by normally cautious UN officials" it was during the heyday of the apartheid government in South Africa, Mr Falk said.

"And still Israel maintains its Gaza siege in its full fury, allowing only barely enough food and fuel to enter to stave off mass famine and disease," Mr Falk said.

Israel allowed dozens of trucks filled with humanitarian supplies into Gaza on Tuesday, the fifth such shipment permitted to enter the Hamas-ruled Palestinian territory in the past month.

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Read Richard Falk's entire statement here >

In Gaza, Few Festivities, Mostly Sacrifice on the Festival of Sacrifice

From the Israeli NGO Gisha: Legal Center for Freedom of Movement -

More than half a million people in Gaza will remain without money during the Muslim Festival of Sacrifice which begins tonight. As part of an overall closure policy, Israel is preventing the transfer of cash to banks in Gaza, primarily harming 77,000 employees of the Palestinian Authority and the 460,000 family members they support, who have not received their November salary. Thousands of additional workers and recipients of international assistance are also left without money after Gaza's banks ran out of money and closed their doors last week.

B.M., 27, Gaza resident and employee of the Palestinian Authority: "I feel terrible. I have a salary, I have money in the bank, and I can't buy my daughter sweets or new clothing for the holiday. I went to the ATM, but there is nothing, it doesn't work. On the Festival of Sacrifice, Muslim men are supposed to give money gifts to their female relatives. I can't visit my family this year, because I have nothing to give them."

Depriving Gaza of cash reserves is part of the nearly hermetic Israeli closure of the Gaza Strip, in place since June 2007, a policy that constitutes collective punishment of 1.5 million people. Israel is also preventing the passage of industrial diesel to Gaza's power plant, responsible for producing 33% of Gaza's electricity supply, causing power outages of up to 16 hours per day. Israel again closed Gaza's fuel pipelines today, and as a result, Gaza's power plant will shut down tonight for lack of industrial diesel.

According to Sari Bashi, Director of Gisha: "Blocking the flow of cash to Gaza's banks threatens to completely topple Gaza's already battered economy, depriving 1.5 million people of basic needs and their right to a dignified livelihood. It is not clear what the Government of Israel wishes to achieve by destroying the economic and humanitarian foundations of Palestinian society".

Read the entire statement here>

Recent articles on Gaza

Here are some useful recent articles:

IRIN: How Gaza gets power - analysis

Washington Post: In Gaza, No Cash for Holiday - Israeli Blockade Prompts Warning From World Bank

AP: Israel again bans international media from Gaza

Action, not words: The noble spirit of the universal declaration of human rights is betrayed by a lack of help for Gaza

Karen AbuZayd, the commissioner general of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, in the Guardian:

As we approach the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the steadily rising death toll in Gaza highlights the painful gap between its peaceful rhetoric and the desperate reality for Palestinian people.

The declaration was a pivotal statement in which the world community recognised the "inherent dignity and the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family as the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world". True to its nobility of spirit, it declares "the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom from fear and want as the highest aspiration of the common people".

Sixty years on, the fate of the Palestinian people should be a cause for universal soul-searching. The need to give substantive meaning to the protection of Palestinians has never been greater. The former high commissioner for human rights, Mary Robinson has said that in Gaza, nothing short of a "civilisation" is being destroyed. Desmond Tutu has called it "an abomination". The humanitarian coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territory, Maxwell Gaylard, said that in Gaza there was a "massive assault" on human rights. Most recently, the European commissioner, Louis Michel, described the blockade of Gaza as a "form of collective punishment against Palestinian civilians, which is a violation of international humanitarian law".

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Kucinich Seeks End of Gaza Blockade

From Rep. Dennis Kucinich's website:

Washington, Dec 2 -

Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) today sent a letter urging Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to ensure that Israel ends the blockade of Gaza. The letter was sent in support of the U.N. High Commissioner of Human Rights, Ms. Navi Pillay’s call for the immediate end of the blockade.

“Israel has a right to defend itself and its citizens. This includes taking action against Hamas for its abominable mortar attacks into southern Israel. However that action should not and cannot amount to collective punishment against the Palestinian people, prohibited by Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva convention, as it does today,” wrote Kucinich in the letter.

Read Rep. Kucinich's letter to Secretary Rice here >

Thank Rep. Kucinich by writing or calling his office >

Bank crisis in Gaza even though Israel eases blockade

From the BBC:

Israel has allowed some humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip, easing its blockade of the Hamas-controlled Palestinian territory.

Forty truckloads of food and medicines entered the strip, and fuel supplies were pumped to Gaza's only power plant, according to Palestinian officials.

Foreign journalists are also being allowed through, Israel said.

Israel recently tightened its economic blockade of Gaza amid regular border clashes with Palestinian militants.

The office of the Israeli defence minister, Ehud Barak, said the decision to allow some aid into Gaza was a goodwill gesture ahead of the forthcoming Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha.

Meanwhile banks across the Gaza Strip have been shutting down because of what they say is a cash shortage caused by the Israeli blockade.

The Palestinian Prime Minister, Salam Fayyad, has urged Israel to allow a cash shipment to Gaza.

He said thousands of civil servants would not be paid this month unless it does so. Israel said the request was being considered.

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Gaza Border Crossings are closed for 27th consecutive day

On December 2nd, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights reported that the Gaza Border Crossings had been closed for a 27^th consecutive day. Among the effects of this closure have been:

• The Gaza power plant has been forced to shut down due to lack of fuel, and Gazans are now totally dependent on electricity generated from Israel, and to a lesser extent, from Egypt.
• There are also chronic severe shortages of domestic cooking gas.
• Israel has not permitted any consignments of flour to enter the Gaza Strip for one week (not including UNWRA supplies), and current stocks are sufficient for just less than three days. Five of the six flourmills in the Gaza Strip have been forced to close.
• Patients who require urgent medical treatment outside the Gaza Strip are facing immense travel restrictions, with an average of just seventeen patients a day currently permitted to leave Gaza in order to access emergency medical treatment in Israel.
• Civilians are enduring power cuts for up to ten hours a day across the Gaza Strip, which is severely affecting every aspect of life in Gaza. Local emergency health services are teetering on the brink of collapse as they try to respond to critical cases amidst constant and severe shortages of electricity, medication and other vital, life-saving equipment. In addition, many Gazan families are being denied access to drinking water, as there is insufficient fuel for the electric water pumps that supply domestic drinking water.

Read the entire report here >