Civil and Human Rights Looking Deeper into the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
Israel is portrayed as a democracy that shares American values. Is this true? Do all its citizens enjoy the same civil rights before the law? What about the human rights of those under occupation?
Wednesday, December 31, 2003
Israeli soldier arrested for shooting British protester last April: admits that Hundall did not have a pistol as claimed
Excite News: "Israeli Soldier Arrested in Shooting | Dec 31, 3:26 PM (ET) | By PETER ENAV
JERUSALEM (AP) - An Israeli soldier has been arrested for shooting and critically wounding a British man in April in the Gaza Strip, the Israeli military said Wednesday.
Tom Hurndall, a 22-year-old university student, was shot in the head while with the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), a pro-Palestinian group whose activists volunteer to serve as buffers between Israeli soldiers and Palestinians. Witnesses said he was shot as he tried to help children out of the path of an Israeli tank in Rafah, a Palestinian refugee camp.
...
In a statement, the military said the soldier initially claimed Hurndall had been holding a pistol, but later admitted he was unarmed. The military police are still investigating the case, and the miliary prosecutor had not yet decided whether to charge the soldier, the statement said, without identifying the soldier.
...
However, Hurndall's mother, Jocelyn, had doubts. "I remain skeptical as to the outcome of the military police inquiry," she told Sky News, "but I'm hopeful this is the first step towards the truth."
...
In 39 months of Israeli-Palestinian violence, the Israeli military has arrested only a handful of soldiers for harming Palestinians or foreigners.
Thursday, December 25, 2003
Israel Arrests Palestinian Leader's Son: [Pressure on the father?]
Yahoo! News - Israel Arrests Palestinian Leader's Son: "Wed Dec 24, 3:50 PM ET
JERUSALEM - Israeli troops on Wednesday arrested the son of a prominent Palestinian uprising leader, Marwan Barghouti, who has been in an Israeli prison for 20 months, the family's lawyer and relatives said.
Qassam Barghouti, 19, was arrested as he crossed into the West Bank from Jordan, his brother, Sharaf Barghouti, said.
The Israelis threatened Barghouti many times they would arrest his sons, Sharaf said, adding that the arrest is "just to put pressure on my father."
The family's lawyer, Jawad Boulus, said the Israelis had not informed him of any charges against Qassam Barghouti. The teenager was returning to the West Bank from Egypt, where he is a political science student at Cairo University. ...
More than half (54.4 percent) of the non-Jewish Israeli children live below the poverty line
Haaretz Article: "Melchior: 60,000 more poor children in 2003 | By Jonathan Lis, Haaretz Correspondent
Rabbi Michael Melchior, Labor MK and Chairman of the National Council for the Child, told Israel Radio Thursday that in 2003 the number of children living below the poverty level increased by some 60,000, constituting a rise of about 10 percent over 2002 figures, published Wednesday.
According to Wednesday's figures, nearly half of Israel's children (40 percent) live in poverty, squalor and delinquency and another 30 percent could slip into a similar fate. Only 30 percent could be said to have a "happy" childhood, Dr. Yitzhak Kadman, director of the National Council for the Child, said Wednesday.
...
More than half (54.4 percent) of the non-Jewish children live below the poverty line. This is 2.5 times higher than the percentage of Jewish children below the poverty line (20.4 percent).
...
"There is no chance Israeli society will be able to exist in 20 years, standing on the spindly legs of 30 percent of its children. This criminal negligence of a considerable portion of Israel's children who are living in poverty, sickness and neglect is going to cost the state dearly in every way," he said.
Wednesday, December 24, 2003
Chinese workers in Israel sign no-sex contract: almost slave conditions, employers often take away their passports and refuse to pay
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Chinese workers in Israel sign no-sex contract: "Conal Urquhart in Tel Aviv | Wednesday December 24, 2003 | The Guardian
Chinese workers at a company in Israel have been forced to agree not to have sex with or marry Israelis as a condition of getting a job.
According to a contact they are required to sign, male workers may not have any contact with Israeli women - including prostitutes, a police spokesman, Rafi Yaffe, said.
He said there was nothing illegal about the requirement and that no investigation had been opened.
...
The labourers are also forbidden from engaging in any religious or political activity. The contract states that offenders will be sent back to China at their own expense.
About 260,000 foreigners work in Israel, having replaced Palestinian labourers during three years of fighting. ...
...
Advocates of foreign workers, who also come from Thailand, the Philippines and Romania, say they are subject to almost slave conditions, and their employers often take away their passports and refuse to pay them.
