Aljazeera.Net - Israel blamed for Christian exodus: "Monday 13 December 2004, 21:33 Makka Time, 18:33 GMT


The mayor of Bethlehem has blasted the Israeli occupation as an oppressive siege which is forcing Christians to leave the traditional birthplace of Jesus Christ in ever increasing numbers.



Hanner Nasir, the Christian mayor of this West Bank town, on Monday said living under an occupation was an offence to human dignity.

"Each year I try not to be gloomy in my Christmas message," he said. "But the harsh facts on the ground and the clouds of instability and suffering that continue to overshadow Bethlehem strongly push me to this direction.

"Living under occupation is certainly the most painful experience man can face and the biggest offence to human rights and dignity," he said at a news conference in the city hall.

"We each day have to swallow the bitterness of the Israeli practices: killing of our people, demolition of houses, arrest and humiliation.
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Christians leaving

About 2400 Christians out of a total of approximately 40,000 living in Bethlehem and surrounding areas in the southern West Bank have left since the September 2000 start of the Palestinian intifada, according to Nasir.

"Imagine the city of Bethlehem with no Christians," he said.

"Christians all over the world should know this reality. If we don't have a quick breakthrough in the peace process more are going to leave."


- posted by Editor @ 9:31 PM

Excite News: "Israeli Army Commander Admonishes Troops | Dec 7, 10:33 AM (ET) | By RAMIT PLUSHNICK-MASTI

JERUSALEM (AP) - Israel's military must hold itself to the highest moral standards even under the most trying circumstances, the army chief said Tuesday, after an elite unit was suspended on suspicion it killed a wounded and unarmed Palestinian militant.

Lt. Gen. Moshe Yaalon spoke a day after a senior officer told a parliamentary committee he believed some 20 percent of soldiers had racist attitudes toward Palestinians and that the behavior of troops at roadblocks in the West Bank and Gaza Strip was sometimes problematic.

In recent weeks, high-level officers have made a series of admissions that they were concerned about their soldiers' conduct during more than four years of Israeli-Palestinian fighting, much of it in densely populated urban areas.
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B'tselem also said that of the more than 3,000 Palestinians killed by army fire, more than 1,600 were civilians. However, the army has opened only 92 investigations, some of them ongoing, into soldiers' actions, according to the army. Twenty-seven soldiers have been indicted and four convicted of wrongful shootings.

Previously, the military generally dismissed reports of soldiers violating Palestinian human rights, calling them isolated incidents. But several recent questionable shootings of Palestinians have fueled a debate over soldiers' values.
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Danny Yatom, a former head of Israel's Mossad spy agency and former army general, said he is "very troubled" by what has happened to the military since 2000.

"This (Dobie's killing) is not an isolated incident. It joins a long list of episodes in which soldiers have violated orders and rules," Yatom said.
- posted by Editor @ 8:15 AM

The Observer | International | Israel's new road plans condemned as 'apartheid': "Conal Urquhart in Jerusalem | Sunday December 5, 2004 | The Observer
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It has been repeated by Ariel Sharon and by ministers, yet now government papers suggest that Israel intends to bypass the peace plan, creating a Palestinian state of enclaves, surrounded by walls and linked by tunnels and special roads.

Israel has released plans for the upgrade of roads and construction of 16 tunnels which would create an 'apartheid' road network for Palestinians in the West Bank.

Existing roads would be reserved for Jews, linking their settlements to each other and to Israel. The plans came to light when Giora Eiland, Israel's director of national security, requested international funding for the project. At a meeting with World Bank officials, he told them the roads would maximise freedom of movement for Palestinians without compromising security for Jewish settlers.

Eiland asked for an estimated £110 million, which would come from taxpayers in Europe, the US and Japan. The international community unanimously rejected the request, stating they could not finance a project not supported by the Palestinian Authority.
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Ghassan Khatib, the Palestinian planning minister, said the proposals were at odds with everything the international community had proposed for the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

'Two communities living under different laws and regulations with different standards of living and road networks: this is what apartheid is all about,' he said.
- posted by Editor @ 4:08 PM