Two Palestinians with connections to Fatah were arrested by the Dubai police in connection with this whole assassination thing (reported in the NYTimes). Fatah would certainly want a top Hamas figure dead, and probably wouldn't have too much trouble stealing the identities of a bunch of Israelis with foreign passports. So that is another possibility for who was behind this.
Whoever it was though, I applaud them. A known murderer was killed, and no-one else was hurt in the process. Better if he could be arrested? Sure, but you can't arrest people outside your country, and clearly no one in Dubai or Syria or Lebanon or anywhere else this guy went was looking to arrest him. So as far as I'm concerned score one for the good guys!
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
Two Palestinians with connections to Fatah were arrested by the Dubai police in connection with this whole assassination thing (reported in the NYTimes). Fatah would certainly want a top Hamas figure dead, and probably wouldn't have too much trouble stealing the identities of a bunch of Israelis with foreign passports. So that is another possibility for who was behind this.
Whoever it was though, I applaud them. A known murderer was killed, and no-one else was hurt in the process. Better if he could be arrested? Sure, but you can't arrest people outside your country, and clearly no one in Dubai or Syria or Lebanon or anywhere else this guy went was looking to arrest him. So as far as I'm concerned score one for the good guys!
how well do you know your Israeli history? Or did you just happen to forget Adolf Eichmann, who was arrested by Mossad agents in Argentina and flown back to Israel for a trial. Despite the obvious moral and legal flaws in that move, they atleast gave a Nazi war criminal a trial. There are obvious intentions behind Israel's cold-blooded murder of a man in another country. Israel has shown many things through this move: 1. it does not respect sovereignty, which is something anyone with half a brain and some mild knowledge of this conflict should by now realize anyway, 2. they could care less about international law, or about anything like the use of passports (congratulations everyone by the way, your passport has just been shown out to be worthless), and 3. they have no moral boundary when it comes to crossing the law, and 4. they obviously want to show everyone that they will not tolerate any policy that involves any armed struggle: violence is their job. Not the job of anyone else.
haha, most of you who read this probably think I've obviously crossed the line for talking sense, "he's clearly just biased, or some other hilarious word you'll invent to try to place any rational argument, that disputes other people's points with facts, in some group where it can be disregarded. so that's just pretty funny. alright, carry on.
....and probably wouldn't have too much trouble stealing the identities of a bunch of Israelis with foreign passports. So that is another possibility for who was behind this. !
Fatah stealing the identities of mossad agents who stole the identities of civilians.... so far fetched you wouldn't even see that in a piss-take of a spy movie!
Two Palestinians with connections to Fatah were arrested by the Dubai police in connection with this whole assassination thing (reported in the NYTimes). Fatah would certainly want a top Hamas figure dead, and probably wouldn't have too much trouble stealing the identities of a bunch of Israelis with foreign passports. So that is another possibility for who was behind this.
Whoever it was though, I applaud them. A known murderer was killed, and no-one else was hurt in the process. Better if he could be arrested? Sure, but you can't arrest people outside your country, and clearly no one in Dubai or Syria or Lebanon or anywhere else this guy went was looking to arrest him. So as far as I'm concerned score one for the good guys!
how well do you know your Israeli history? Or did you just happen to forget Adolf Eichmann, who was arrested by Mossad agents in Argentina and flown back to Israel for a trial. Despite the obvious moral and legal flaws in that move, they atleast gave a Nazi war criminal a trial.
of course they gave Adolf Eichmann a trial. why asassinate him? it might be a story for a few days but take him to trial and Israel had way better opportunity to publically elicit an emotional response around the world.
afterall, nazi war crimes have become the moral compass to justify Israel's genocide of the Palestinian people. those ordinary Palestinians, who Israel deliberately subjects to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment in order to terrorize, intimidate and humiliate them.
that's the only reason Israel can continue to act without any respect for international law. that's the reason why no one has even attempted stop their aggression. that's the reason why none of their leaders have ever been charged with war crimes or loudly condemned by the US Government.
Two Palestinians with connections to Fatah were arrested by the Dubai police in connection with this whole assassination thing (reported in the NYTimes). Fatah would certainly want a top Hamas figure dead, and probably wouldn't have too much trouble stealing the identities of a bunch of Israelis with foreign passports. So that is another possibility for who was behind this.
Whoever it was though, I applaud them. A known murderer was killed, and no-one else was hurt in the process. Better if he could be arrested? Sure, but you can't arrest people outside your country, and clearly no one in Dubai or Syria or Lebanon or anywhere else this guy went was looking to arrest him. So as far as I'm concerned score one for the good guys!
killing someone like that is a bad ,shitty thing,,no matter what he did.there is no score for the good guys here.there are murderers who killed in cold blood another person..this is a fuckin circle and will never ends if people continue act like that. with this type of action when the next bomb explode in tel aviv and u see inj news israelians to cry this time u will feel sad...and the same time someone from the other side will say..
score one for the good guys....
"...Dimitri...He talks to me...'.."The Ghost of Greece..".
"..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
“..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
OK ... So people got REALLY irritated with me a while back when I suggested that some of the threads on here veer close to sympathizing with Hamas. And now, everyone is freaking out and losing sleep because someone who lives by a violent ideology and who plans terror attacks got bumped off. Now, we are not talking about kids or other civilians in Palestine (to which I can understand the outrage). Instead, we are all pissed because Israel killed a known terrorist? Someone explain this stuff to me, I am truly confused now. Does all the outrage really stem from "violating international law"?[/quote]
haha, most of you who read this probably think I've obviously crossed the line for talking sense, "he's clearly just biased, or some other hilarious word you'll invent to try to place any rational argument, that disputes other people's points with facts, in some group where it can be disregarded. so that's just pretty funny. alright, carry on.
....and probably wouldn't have too much trouble stealing the identities of a bunch of Israelis with foreign passports. So that is another possibility for who was behind this. !
Fatah stealing the identities of mossad agents who stole the identities of civilians.... so far fetched you wouldn't even see that in a piss-take of a spy movie!
I think you've misunderstood what's been reported so far. The passports that were used belonged to Israeli citizens living in Israel who also had passports from other countries. If this was indeed the mossad then they stole these people's identities. If it was Fatah, then they stole these people's identities. I'm only suggesting that Fatah stole the identities (maybe, if it was them) of a bunch of Israeli civilians, not that they stole the identity of mossad agents.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
Whoever it was though, I applaud them. A known murderer was killed, and no-one else was hurt in the process.
So you'll applaud if Netanyahu or Tzivi Lipni are murdered too then?
This really doesn't deserve a response, but...please show me one instance where either Bibi or Livni ordered the kidnapping and intentional murder of anyone (and please leave aside this case itself, which I would argue is really no different than America or Britain assassinating terrorists with drones in Pakistan, i.e. a killing within the context of an asymmetrical war).
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
And Triumphant...genocide of the Palestinian people?! Not going to deny that really bad stuff is going on, but genocide?! Come on, you debase the seriousness of the charge when you misapply the term. There is no systematic effort underway to kill all the Palestinians. There simply isn't. This is not Rwanda, or Darfur, or Nazi Germany, or Ottoman Turkey, or Cambodia, or Stalinist Ukraine. Let's please keep some perspective here.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
And Triumphant...genocide of the Palestinian people?! Not going to deny that really bad stuff is going on, but genocide?! Come on, you debase the seriousness of the charge when you misapply the term. There is no systematic effort underway to kill all the Palestinians. There simply isn't. This is not Rwanda, or Darfur, or Nazi Germany, or Ottoman Turkey, or Cambodia, or Stalinist Ukraine. Let's please keep some perspective here.
i am keeping perspective. look at the number of dead. thousands of palestinians per every 100 isrealis are dead. it may not be genocide as you are referring to, with death camps and the like, but the isrealis are keeping healthcare and aid workers from getting into gaza, and they are continuing to steal the palestinian land. people are starving and dying of easily curable disease there. the wounded can't even get to hospitals without having to go through numerous check points and red tape. not to mention the targeting of palestinian civillians and the horrible use of depleted uranium and white phosphorus munitions in the recent war there..they may not be actively murdering people now, but their actions are clearly contributing to their suffering and deaths. it is as close to ethnic cleansing as you can get. it is the "cold war" of genocide...no outward murders, yet people suffering and dying as a result of other factors...
"You can tell the greatness of a man by what makes him angry." - Lincoln
Whoever it was though, I applaud them. A known murderer was killed, and no-one else was hurt in the process. Better if he could be arrested? Sure, but you can't arrest people outside your country, and clearly no one in Dubai or Syria or Lebanon or anywhere else this guy went was looking to arrest him. So as far as I'm concerned score one for the good guys!
and yet you defend Israel in commemorating a terrorist organization, who targeted civilians and wiped out an arab town to steal land, in their role in the creation and establishment of the country.... :roll:
And Triumphant...genocide of the Palestinian people?! Not going to deny that really bad stuff is going on, but genocide?! Come on, you debase the seriousness of the charge when you misapply the term. There is no systematic effort underway to kill all the Palestinians. There simply isn't. This is not Rwanda, or Darfur, or Nazi Germany, or Ottoman Turkey, or Cambodia, or Stalinist Ukraine. Let's please keep some perspective here.
out of curiosity do you get upset when people refer to the Israeli athlete's being killed at the olympics in the 70's as a massacre as it is constantly referred to as??
don't compete; coexist
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
This is getting old...I don't defend them for the Lehi thing, I just don't really think it's such a big deal, and I think you're taking something out of context and blowing it out of proportion.
As for the Munich athletes, yeah, I have no problem calling that a massacre, because these people were innocent civilians intentionally killed by terrorists, not innocent civilians unintentionally killed by soldiers who were trying to kill terrorists (hiding among the civilians). I also have no problem with people calling Deir Yassin a massacre. I'm not one sided, I just object to untruths, half-truths, and hyperbole, but I have no problem calling a spade a spade.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
And Triumphant...genocide of the Palestinian people?! Not going to deny that really bad stuff is going on, but genocide?! Come on, you debase the seriousness of the charge when you misapply the term. There is no systematic effort underway to kill all the Palestinians. There simply isn't. This is not Rwanda, or Darfur, or Nazi Germany, or Ottoman Turkey, or Cambodia, or Stalinist Ukraine. Let's please keep some perspective here.
The vast majority of people here - even if they had the economic means to escape, even if they actually wanted to give up resisting on their land and just leave (which appears to be maybe the less nefarious of Sharon's possible goals), can't leave. Because they can't even get into Israel to apply for visas, and because their destination countries won't let them in (both our country and Arab countries). So I think when all means of survival is cut off in a pen (Gaza) which people can't get out of, I think that qualifies as genocide.
This is getting old...I don't defend them for the Lehi thing, I just don't really think it's such a big deal, and I think you're taking something out of context and blowing it out of proportion.
As for the Munich athletes, yeah, I have no problem calling that a massacre, because these people were innocent civilians intentionally killed by terrorists, not innocent civilians unintentionally killed by soldiers who were trying to kill terrorists (hiding among the civilians). I also have no problem with people calling Deir Yassin a massacre. I'm not one sided, I just object to untruths, half-truths, and hyperbole, but I have no problem calling a spade a spade.
you don't support Israel commemorating a terrorist organization, you just don't have a problem with it, got it!
they unintentionally fired white phosphorous rounds over and on top of a UN safehouse with 700+ palestinians hiding from the war? they unintentionally bombed UN and Red Cross buildings even though they had those coordinates BEFORE the started the attacks?
also, people in the IDF like a squad leader disagree, they say their orders were everyone was a target, just as Israel said it was ok to kill 100's of palesitnian police officers because since they were civil servants they worked for hamas so they were valid targets.
it's just funny you will call the death of 11 israeli's a massacre but you will argue the death of hundreds of innocent women and children is not....
don't compete; coexist
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
I don't support killing babies, but I don't have a problem with abortion! It's called nuance.
As for massacre's, we aren't going to agree, but one case is fairly black and white as far as I can see (Munich), while Gaza is anything but.
As for "genocide," I'll simply say that Rachel Corrie is just as wrong in her use of language as you are. I think Orwell had a very good quote regarding the abuse of language...
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
Because genocide implies that those being killed are entirely innocent, and those doing the killing are wholly monstrous. It is a powerful word that ends discussion, so people who cannot see any nuance in the situation reach for the most extreme terms, whether they are warranted or not, because their own understanding of events is itself extreme.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
Why is it so important to you guys that the specific label "genocide" be used?
i use it in this instance because i know it's warranted. what other word can i use to describe it?
why is it so important to you that i have used it?
Clearly you disagree, so what word would you use to describe the ongoing illegal, brutal, inhuman, cruel and systematic destruction of ordinary Palestinians, if it's not genocide?
As for "genocide," I'll simply say that Rachel Corrie is just as wrong in her use of language as you are.
that's your opinion. i disagree.
by the way, did you even bother to read the link i provided earlier, because you made no comment on that?
Stunned and outraged, the world watched as Israeli air and ground forces ushered in the new year by slaughtering defenseless, captive Palestinians in Gaza. From the surprise air attack that caught children on their way home from school, through the repeated targeting of unarmed families, women, children, and United Nations personnel, to the last hours before Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert announced a unilateral ceasefire so the bloody massacre would not distract from news coverage of the inauguration of U.S. President Barack Obama, the wildly disproportionate violence of the Israeli military campaign revealed the hideous reality of the world's most heinous crime, genocide.
Hundreds of thousands protested Israel's attack on Gaza in cities and towns around the world. Many spoke the name of the crime, among them the world's highest ranking elected official, the President of the 63rd General Assembly of the United Nations, H. E. Father Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann, M.M.
"'The number of victims in Gaza is increasing by the day... The situation is untenable. It's genocide,' d'Escoto said at the U.N. in New York. About 970 Palestinians have been killed and 4,300 injured since Israel began its Gaza offensive on December 27, which it says is to stop Palestinian fighters attacking Israel with rockets," reported Al-Jazeera on January 14.
Born in the United States, Fr. d'Escoto spent his childhood years in Nicaragua but returned to attend the Catholic seminary at Maryknoll in New York and was ordained in 1961. He later earned a Master of Science degree at the Columbia University School of Journalism. From 1979 to 1990, Fr. d'Escoto served as the foreign minister of Nicaragua. He played a prominent role in the Nicaraguan Government's 1984 claim at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) against the United States for supporting military and paramilitary actions against the country. The ICJ subsequently ruled in favor of Nicaragua.
In late 2008, after Fr. d'Escoto criticized Israel with language reminiscent of former U.S. President Jimmy Carter's statements about apartheid, a campaign of death threats directed at Fr. d'Escoto caused alarm at UN headquarters.
In the aftermath of the Israeli attack on Gaza, unsurprisingly, Israel, its operatives, supporters, and useful idiots are reacting to widespread public expressions of anger and indignation by denying that genocide occurred.
In an article published on February 2, by Al-Jazeera, Mark LeVine, a professor of Middle East history at the University of California, Irvine argued that, "however horrific the situation in Gaza, it does not meet the definition of genocide used by the main bodies that prosecute such crimes, such as the European Court of Human Rights, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and the International Court of Justice. All of these bodies define genocide as involving the intention to bring about the 'physical-biological destruction' of a large enough share of an 'entire human group' (national, ethnic, racial or religious) as to put the group's continued physical existence in jeopardy," wrote LeVine.
LeVine, perhaps best known as the author of Heavy Metal Islam: Rock, Resistance, and the Struggle for the Soul of Islam, based his argument and his definition of intent on statistics, numbers of dead and percentages of dead compared to total numbers of targeted groups in Warsaw, Gaza, Rwanda, and Bosnia while avoiding the definition of genocide found in Convention on Genocide.
Jeffrey Weiss, American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) Peace Education Director, Central Region, bestirred himself to suggest Israel's innocence of the crime of genocide even before the Israeli assault ended. Weiss's remarks came toward the end of his presentation about "International Law and Gaza" at an event described as an informational forum at the Des Moines Public Library on the afternoon of Saturday, January 17. The event, which drew about 85 people to the library's main meeting room, was organized by the Middle East Peace Education Project, an umbrella group sponsored and directed by AFSC personnel.
"As... a student of international law and history, I am uncomfortable with the term 'genocide' and I am uncomfortable with the term 'holocaust.' That's my personal perspective, but, I, you can read the Genocide Convention and draw conclusions as always based on 'what is genocide?' But since the word 'genocide' has been used, I personally would not use 'genocide' to refer to what is taking place today," said Weiss.
The featured speaker at the event, Sheik Ibrahim Dremali, of Austin, TX, had presented a media program and talk titled "The Gaza Narrative from a Palestinian Perspective." Weiss's remarks indicated disagreement with Dremali, who had referred to Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip and mass murder of civilians as "genocidal" and a "holocaust" just three days after Fr. d'Escoto's use of the term "genocide" in New York.
Weiss's suggestion that Israeli attack did not constitute genocide – even before the Israeli attack ended and prior to any official investigation – struck The Independent Monitor as unseemly and impolitic at best. During the Q&A, The Independent Monitor asked Weiss if numbers were included in the Convention on Genocide's definition of the crime and asked him elaborate on his previous comments.
"I think there is a siege and on-going violations of the Geneva Conventions. … If you were teaching a class on, sometimes I call it the 'G' word, you would have a lot of people disagree about what it is," said Weiss.
The Convention on Genocide's definition of the crime does not include specific numbers, said Weiss, but "oftentimes refers to the systematic destruction of an entire people."
"So, there may be some people who would argue that the siege, the death toll, the ongoing occupation reached 'genocide'. My personal perspective on 'genocide', the word and what it means, is that it should be reserved for the Pol Pots and the Hitlers," said Weiss, who was sporting eyewear with high-contrast yellow lenses.
The most obvious and glaring flaw in the argument of those who insist on defining genocide by relying on huge numbers of dead and on numbers of dead compared to the total numbers in targeted groups is that they are useful only after the worst has occurred and the numbers of the dead, in their millions, can be estimated – when it is too late for the law to serve a prevention function. Reliance upon such definitions robs the Convention of its intended prevention function.
Raphael Lemkin, a Polish lawyer of Jewish descent, lost 49 members of his family in the Nazi holocaust. Lemkin, who coined the word "genocide" in 1943 and worked tirelessly to ban war crimes, authored a draft resolution for a Genocide Convention treaty that ultimately resulted in the "Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Approved and proposed for signature and ratification or accession by General Assembly resolution 260 A (III) of 9 December 1948". Lemkin viewed the prevention function as essential and central to the legislation. "By declaring genocide a crime under international law and by making it a problem of international concern, the right of intervention on behalf of minorities slated for destruction has been established. … The usefulness of a future international treaty on genocide lies in facilitating the prevention and punishment of the crime and apprehension of criminals," wrote Lemkin in "Genocide as a Crime under International Law", American Journal of International Law (1947) Volume 41(1):145-151.
The Convention on Genocide makes no mention of numbers or percentages in its definition of the crime, which is found in Article II: "In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group." There we find but two elements, intent, and a list of acts – no numbers, no percentages.
So, why do Israel's defenders deny that genocide occurred in Gaza and insist on making the definition of genocide a numbers game? Zionists lobby for a definition of genocide that takes the focus off the element of intent in order to protect the Zionist program of land theft, ethnic cleansing, and mass murder in Palestine and Israeli political, military, and religious leaders who have given voice to their genocidal intentions.
In Feb. 2008, Matan Vilnai, Israel's deputy defense minister, publicly warned that Palestinians risked "bringing an even bigger Shoah" upon themselves if they continued to fire rockets into Israel. The word "Shoah" is rarely used in Israel outside discussions of the Nazi holocaust of Jews because many Israelis, like ardent Zionists in other countries, do not countenance its use to describe other events.
In March 2008, Rabbi Yisrael Rosen, director of the Tsomet Institute, a religious school attended by students and soldiers in the Israeli settlements of the West Bank, issued a religious opinion that appeared to authorize the killing of all Palestinians. Rosen was widely quoted as having written, "All of the Palestinians must be killed; men, women, infants, and even their beasts." Rosen's ruling garnered support among leading Israeli rabbis authorized to issue Jewish religious opinions.
Recent news reports indicate that Israeli military rabbis urged IDF soldiers to kill indiscriminately in Gaza. In a widely available article titled "Black Flag" published on January 31 on the Gush Shalom web site, Uri Avnery wrote, "In the last decades, the state-financed religious educational system … indoctrinates its pupils with a violent tribal cult, totally ethnocentric, which sees in the whole of world history nothing but an endless story of Jewish victimhood. This is a religion of a Chosen People, indifferent to others, a religion without compassion for anyone who is not Jewish, which glorifies the God-decreed genocide described in the Biblical book of Joshua.
"The products of this education are now the 'rabbis' who instruct the religious youths. With their encouragement, a systematic effort has been made to take over the Israeli army from within. … The most outstanding example is the 'Chief Army Rabbi', Colonel Avichai Ronsky, who has declared that his job is to reinforce the 'fighting spirit' of the soldiers. He is a man of the extreme right, not far from the spirit of the late Rabbi Meir Kahane, whose party was outlawed in Israel for its fascist ideology. Under the auspices of the army rabbinate, religious-fascist brochures of the ultra-right 'rabbis' were distributed to the soldiers.
"This material includes political incitement, such as the statement that the Jewish religion prohibits 'giving up even one millimeter of Eretz Israel', that the Palestinians, like the Biblical Philistines (from whom the name Palestine derives), are a foreign people who invaded the country, and that any compromise (such as indicated in the official government program) is a mortal sin. The distribution of political propaganda violates, of course, army law," wrote Avnery.
Avnery calls on Israeli courts to intervene and hold accountable those who have already committed war crimes, and he expresses regret that they are unlikely to do so. Apparently he, at least, understands and fears the potential consequences of inaction. Avnery's analysis is that of a seasoned and well-informed observer. There is no reason to doubt it.
The Independent Monitor contacted Professor Francis A. Boyle of the University of Illinois College of Law for an expert opinion on the question of genocide in Gaza. A scholar in the areas of international law and human rights, Professor Boyle received a J.D. degree magna cum laude and A.M. and Ph.D. degrees in political science from Harvard University. Prior to joining the faculty at U of I College of Law, he was a teaching fellow at Harvard and an associate at its Center for International Affairs.
"As long ago as October 19, 2000, the then United Nations Human Rights Commission (now Council) condemned Israel for inflicting 'war crimes' and 'crimes against humanity' upon the Palestinian people, most of whom are Muslims," said Boyle.
"But I want to focus for a moment on Israel's 'crimes against humanity' against the Palestinian people – as determined by the U.N. Human Rights Commission itself, set up pursuant to the requirements of the U.N. Charter. What are 'crimes against humanity'? This concept goes all the way back to the Nuremberg Charter of 1945 for the trial of the major Nazi war criminals in Europe. In the Nuremberg Charter of 1945, drafted by the United States Government, there was created and inserted a new type of international crime specifically intended to deal with the Nazi persecution of the Jewish people: Crimes against humanity: namely, murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, and other inhumane acts committed against any civilian population, before or during the war, or persecutions on political, racial or religious grounds in execution of or in connection with any crime within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal, whether or not in violation of the domestic law of the country where perpetrated.
"The paradigmatic example of 'crimes against humanity' is what Hitler and the Nazis did to the Jewish people. This is where the concept of 'crimes against humanity' came from. And this is what the U.N. Human Rights Commission determined that Israel is currently doing to the Palestinian people: crimes against humanity. Expressed in legal terms, this is just like what Hitler and the Nazis did to the Jews. That is the significance of the formal determination by the U.N. Human Rights Commission that Israel has inflicted 'crimes against humanity' upon the Palestinian people. The Commission chose this well-known and long-standing legal term of art quite carefully and deliberately based upon the evidence it had compiled.
"Furthermore, the Nuremberg 'crimes against humanity' are the historical and legal precursor to the international crime of genocide as defined by the 1948 Genocide Convention. The theory here was that what Hitler and the Nazis did to the Jewish people was so horrific that it required a special international treaty that would codify and universalize the Nuremberg concept of 'crimes against humanity.' And that treaty ultimately became the 1948 Genocide Convention," Boyle told The Independent Monitor.
"As documented by Israeli historian Ilan Pappe in his seminal book The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine (2006), Israel's genocidal policy against the Palestinians has been unremitting, extending from before the very foundation of the State of Israel in 1948, and is ongoing and even intensifying against the 1.5 million Palestinians living in Gaza. Zionism's 'final solution' to Israel's much touted 'demographic threat' allegedly posed by the very existence of the Palestinians has always been genocide," said Boyle.
"Certainly, Israel and its predecessors-in-law – the Zionist agencies, forces, and terrorist gangs – have committed genocide against the Palestinian people that actually started on or about 1948 and has continued apace until today in violation of Genocide Convention Articles II(a), (b), and (c). For at least the past six decades, the Israeli government and its predecessors-in-law – the Zionist agencies, forces, and terrorist gangs – have ruthlessly implemented a systematic and comprehensive military, political, and economic campaign with the intent to destroy in substantial part the national, ethnical, racial, and different religious (Jews versus Muslims and Christians) group constituting the Palestinian people. This Zionist/Israeli campaign has consisted of killing members of the Palestinian people in violation of Genocide Convention Article II(a). This Zionist/Israeli campaign has also caused serious bodily and mental harm to the Palestinian people in violation of Genocide Convention Article II(b). This Zionist/Israeli campaign has also deliberately inflicted on the Palestinian people conditions of life calculated to bring about their physical destruction in substantial part in violation of Article II(c) of the Genocide Convention.
"Article I of the Genocide Convention requires all contracting parties such as the United States 'to prevent and to punish' genocide. Yet to the contrary, historically the 'Jewish' state's criminal conduct against the Palestinians has been financed, armed, equipped, supplied and politically supported by the 'Christian' United States. Although the United States is a founding sponsor of, and a contracting party to, both the Nuremberg Charter and the Genocide Convention, as well as the United Nations Charter, these legal facts have never made any difference to the United States when it comes to its blank-check support for Israel and their joint and severable criminal mistreatment of the Palestinians – truly the wretched of the earth!" said Boyle.
"The doctrine of 'humanitarian intervention' so readily espoused elsewhere when U.S. foreign policy goals are allegedly at stake has been clearly proved to be a joke and a fraud when it comes to stopping the ongoing and accelerating Israeli campaign of genocide against the Palestinian people. Rather than rein in the Israelis – which would be possible just by turning off the funding pipeline – the United States government, the U.S. Congress, and U.S. taxpayers instead support the 'Jewish' state to the tune of about 4 billion dollars per year, without whose munificence this instance of genocide – and indeed conceivably the State of Israel itself – would not be possible. What the world witnesses here is (yet another) case of 'dishumanitarian intervention' or 'humanitarian extermination' by the United States and Israel against the Palestinians and Palestine," said Boyle.
"In today's world genocide pays so long as it is done at the behest of the United States and its de jure or de facto allies such as Israel," said Boyle.
In April 1993 and again in September 1993, Boyle won World Court Orders on the basis of the 1948 Genocide Convention for the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina against the rump Yugoslavia to cease and desist from committing all acts of genocide against the Bosnians.
In an era of weapons of mass destruction, the seriousness of the crime of genocide and the importance of the public understanding and discussion of genocide are impossible to overestimate. Outside the interests of genocidaires, there is no benefit associated with defining mass murder as genocide only after huge numbers of dead make it impossible to deny that genocide has been committed. Those who define genocide by the numbers of millions of dead would eliminate the prevention function of the Convention on Genocide, making it possible for genocide to occur again and again.
Failure to define and prosecute genocide earlier and proactively, based on evidence of intent and acts committed, invites potentially catastrophic consequences for all humanity. The burden of proof must be placed where it belongs, on those who commit war crimes and, also, on those who rush to condone such crimes even before investigations begin, an act that may have, and may be calculated to have, the effect of reducing or thwarting public pressure for investigations.
The most serious of crimes are eminently worthy of serious public discussion and debate. Any well-informed discussion of war crimes will involve the careful examination, with an appropriate degree of skepticism, of statements by public figures about such crimes. Indeed, without such public scrutiny and discussion, however uncomfortable it may make some, we can hardly expect to avoid the worst. Americans must question and hold accountable their leaders and public figures at every level who condone or deny genocide and other, lesser war crimes, perhaps especially those who are responsible for educating us about human rights.
The Convention on Genocide will serve its intended prevention function only when more citizens demand that courts and governments recognize and act on evidence of intent when such evidence is available in combination with any of the acts listed in Article II of the Convention.
It is time to restore the prevention function of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
It's believed Nicole McCabe's indentity was stolen, and the Australian Government has stated they will be making sure this is fully investigated and Israel is held accountable if Australian identities have been used by the Israeli Government.
Mossad use Aussie passports: ex-officer
A former Mossad officer says he has no doubt Israel's spy agency has forged Australian passports for use regularly in intelligence operations.
"Very few people know very much about Australia," Victor Ostrovsky, a case officer at Mossad for several years in the 1980s, told ABC Radio on Friday.
The agency had obtained blank passports in the past from Canada and the UK.
"If not, they just manufacture them," Mr Ostrovsky said, adding there was a company inside Mossad headquarters which was dedicated to forging passports.
Using an Australian passport was an easy cover to take, he said.
"I know people had been under Australian cover not once (but) quite a few times.
"It doesn't take much of an accent to be an Australian or New Zealander, or an Englishman for that matter."
The federal government has warned Israel it will not be considered "a friend" if it is found to have being involved in passport fraud targeting three Australians.
Three Australian passport-holders, Joshua Bruce, Adam Korman and Nicole McCabe, are believed to have had their identities stolen and used in fake passports held by three suspects in the assassination.
The passports were carried by three other people suspected of being involved in the assassination of senior Hamas operative Mahmud al-Mabhuh in Dubai on January 20.
Mossad, Israel's secret service, is widely believed to be behind the organised hit on al-Mabhuh.
Earlier, Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard assured Australians their passports are safe.
"We do know that in terms of passports in this country basically they're very safe," Ms Gillard told the Nine Network on Friday.
"It's less than half a per cent that go missing each year and most of them would be lost in pretty benign circumstances.
"You know they're at the back of the sock drawer and no one can find them."
Ms Gillard said any use of Australian identities by the Israeli government for secret police assassinations would not be tolerated.
"If there's any suggestion Australian identities have been used by the Israeli government for this purpose then that is completely unacceptable," she said.
"Democracies have to be accountable for their actions and we'll be making sure that Israel is accountable and this is fully investigated."
As for "genocide," I'll simply say that Rachel Corrie is just as wrong in her use of language as you are. I think Orwell had a very good quote regarding the abuse of language...
The official definition of 'Genocide' which shows that Rachel Corrie's use of the word in relation to the Israeli occupation was accurate:
'Genocide is the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group.'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocide
'The term "genocide" was coined by Raphael Lemkin (1900–1959), a Polish-Jewish legal scholar, in 1944, firstly from the Latin "gens, gentis," meaning "birth, race, stock, kind" or the Greek root génos (γένος) (same meaning); secondly from Latin -cidium (cutting, killing) via French -cide.
Defining genocide in 1943, Lemkin wrote:
Generally speaking, genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when accomplished by mass killings of all members of a nation. It is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves. The objectives of such a plan would be the disintegration of the political and social institutions, of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups, and the destruction of the personal security, liberty, health, dignity, and even the lives of the individuals belonging to such groups.
In 1948, the UN General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide which legally defined the crime of genocide for the first time.
The CPPCG was adopted by the UN General Assembly on 9 December 1948 and came into effect on 12 January 1951 (Resolution 260 (III)). It contains an internationally-recognized definition of genocide which was incorporated into the national criminal legislation of many countries, and was also adopted by the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, the treaty that established the International Criminal Court (ICC). The Convention (in article 2) defines genocide:
...any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
– Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Article II
Because genocide implies that those being killed are entirely innocent, and those doing the killing are wholly monstrous.
No it doesn't. The official definition of genocide makes no reference whatsoever to implied innocence or guilt.
Stop using slippery lawyers tactics to defend Israel's crimes.
To begin with I'm not the one getting into the specific definitions of the term genocide, so this is really the pot calling the kettle black with "slippery lawyer tricks." (By the way, why the hatred towards lawyers? Perhaps because there is a stereotype about Sheister Jew lawyers? Just musing...(a joke, lest anyone not have a sense of humor)) I was talking about the term's cultural effects, which should have been patently obvious.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
'Genocide is the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group.'
How are Israel's actions deliberate or systematic, and how has it resulted in the destruction of the entire Palestinian people? The Palestinian population is growing, not shrinking, so either Israel, one of the most advanced militaries in the world, are just a bunch of brain-dead idiots who can't figure out to "point then shoot," or they aren't committing genocide. The fact that the UN says it, or some other group says it, doesn't mean it's true. It's true if it is actually happening, which it quite obviously isn't.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
'Genocide is the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group.'
How are Israel's actions deliberate or systematic, and how has it resulted in the destruction of the entire Palestinian people? The Palestinian population is growing, not shrinking, so either Israel, one of the most advanced militaries in the world, are just a bunch of brain-dead idiots who can't figure out to "point then shoot," or they aren't committing genocide. The fact that the UN says it, or some other group says it, doesn't mean it's true. It's true if it is actually happening, which it quite obviously isn't.
Look at the definition again.... in part....
Israels actions are deliberate and systematic and there is genocide. The rest of the world sees it, the culprit doesn't.
If you say there is no genocide and one of the reasons given is that the Palestinian population is growing, can I then say the same thing about jews? That there was no genocide of the jews by the nazis because the jewish/israeli population is growing. Or maybe there was no genocide of the jews because the nazis did not kill the ENTIRE jewish population? Flawed reasoning.
Comments
Whoever it was though, I applaud them. A known murderer was killed, and no-one else was hurt in the process. Better if he could be arrested? Sure, but you can't arrest people outside your country, and clearly no one in Dubai or Syria or Lebanon or anywhere else this guy went was looking to arrest him. So as far as I'm concerned score one for the good guys!
haha, most of you who read this probably think I've obviously crossed the line for talking sense, "he's clearly just biased, or some other hilarious word you'll invent to try to place any rational argument, that disputes other people's points with facts, in some group where it can be disregarded. so that's just pretty funny. alright, carry on.
Fatah stealing the identities of mossad agents who stole the identities of civilians.... so far fetched you wouldn't even see that in a piss-take of a spy movie!
afterall, nazi war crimes have become the moral compass to justify Israel's genocide of the Palestinian people. those ordinary Palestinians, who Israel deliberately subjects to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment in order to terrorize, intimidate and humiliate them.
that's the only reason Israel can continue to act without any respect for international law. that's the reason why no one has even attempted stop their aggression. that's the reason why none of their leaders have ever been charged with war crimes or loudly condemned by the US Government.
So you'll applaud if Netanyahu or Tzivi Lipni are murdered too then?
byrnzie i was going to say that but you beat me to it...
so yosi you have no problem with any of this??
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
score one for the good guys....
"..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
“..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
:?:
I think you've misunderstood what's been reported so far. The passports that were used belonged to Israeli citizens living in Israel who also had passports from other countries. If this was indeed the mossad then they stole these people's identities. If it was Fatah, then they stole these people's identities. I'm only suggesting that Fatah stole the identities (maybe, if it was them) of a bunch of Israeli civilians, not that they stole the identity of mossad agents.
This really doesn't deserve a response, but...please show me one instance where either Bibi or Livni ordered the kidnapping and intentional murder of anyone (and please leave aside this case itself, which I would argue is really no different than America or Britain assassinating terrorists with drones in Pakistan, i.e. a killing within the context of an asymmetrical war).
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
and yet you defend Israel in commemorating a terrorist organization, who targeted civilians and wiped out an arab town to steal land, in their role in the creation and establishment of the country.... :roll:
out of curiosity do you get upset when people refer to the Israeli athlete's being killed at the olympics in the 70's as a massacre as it is constantly referred to as??
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
As for the Munich athletes, yeah, I have no problem calling that a massacre, because these people were innocent civilians intentionally killed by terrorists, not innocent civilians unintentionally killed by soldiers who were trying to kill terrorists (hiding among the civilians). I also have no problem with people calling Deir Yassin a massacre. I'm not one sided, I just object to untruths, half-truths, and hyperbole, but I have no problem calling a spade a spade.
-Rachel Corrie (2003)
you don't support Israel commemorating a terrorist organization, you just don't have a problem with it, got it!
they unintentionally fired white phosphorous rounds over and on top of a UN safehouse with 700+ palestinians hiding from the war? they unintentionally bombed UN and Red Cross buildings even though they had those coordinates BEFORE the started the attacks?
also, people in the IDF like a squad leader disagree, they say their orders were everyone was a target, just as Israel said it was ok to kill 100's of palesitnian police officers because since they were civil servants they worked for hamas so they were valid targets.
it's just funny you will call the death of 11 israeli's a massacre but you will argue the death of hundreds of innocent women and children is not....
what are you but my reflection? who am i to judge or strike you down?
"I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank." - Barack Obama
when you told me 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'
i was thinkin 'death before dishonor'
As for massacre's, we aren't going to agree, but one case is fairly black and white as far as I can see (Munich), while Gaza is anything but.
As for "genocide," I'll simply say that Rachel Corrie is just as wrong in her use of language as you are. I think Orwell had a very good quote regarding the abuse of language...
why is it so important to you that i have used it?
Clearly you disagree, so what word would you use to describe the ongoing illegal, brutal, inhuman, cruel and systematic destruction of ordinary Palestinians, if it's not genocide?
by the way, did you even bother to read the link i provided earlier, because you made no comment on that?
Stunned and outraged, the world watched as Israeli air and ground forces ushered in the new year by slaughtering defenseless, captive Palestinians in Gaza. From the surprise air attack that caught children on their way home from school, through the repeated targeting of unarmed families, women, children, and United Nations personnel, to the last hours before Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert announced a unilateral ceasefire so the bloody massacre would not distract from news coverage of the inauguration of U.S. President Barack Obama, the wildly disproportionate violence of the Israeli military campaign revealed the hideous reality of the world's most heinous crime, genocide.
Hundreds of thousands protested Israel's attack on Gaza in cities and towns around the world. Many spoke the name of the crime, among them the world's highest ranking elected official, the President of the 63rd General Assembly of the United Nations, H. E. Father Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann, M.M.
"'The number of victims in Gaza is increasing by the day... The situation is untenable. It's genocide,' d'Escoto said at the U.N. in New York. About 970 Palestinians have been killed and 4,300 injured since Israel began its Gaza offensive on December 27, which it says is to stop Palestinian fighters attacking Israel with rockets," reported Al-Jazeera on January 14.
Born in the United States, Fr. d'Escoto spent his childhood years in Nicaragua but returned to attend the Catholic seminary at Maryknoll in New York and was ordained in 1961. He later earned a Master of Science degree at the Columbia University School of Journalism. From 1979 to 1990, Fr. d'Escoto served as the foreign minister of Nicaragua. He played a prominent role in the Nicaraguan Government's 1984 claim at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) against the United States for supporting military and paramilitary actions against the country. The ICJ subsequently ruled in favor of Nicaragua.
In late 2008, after Fr. d'Escoto criticized Israel with language reminiscent of former U.S. President Jimmy Carter's statements about apartheid, a campaign of death threats directed at Fr. d'Escoto caused alarm at UN headquarters.
In the aftermath of the Israeli attack on Gaza, unsurprisingly, Israel, its operatives, supporters, and useful idiots are reacting to widespread public expressions of anger and indignation by denying that genocide occurred.
In an article published on February 2, by Al-Jazeera, Mark LeVine, a professor of Middle East history at the University of California, Irvine argued that, "however horrific the situation in Gaza, it does not meet the definition of genocide used by the main bodies that prosecute such crimes, such as the European Court of Human Rights, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and the International Court of Justice. All of these bodies define genocide as involving the intention to bring about the 'physical-biological destruction' of a large enough share of an 'entire human group' (national, ethnic, racial or religious) as to put the group's continued physical existence in jeopardy," wrote LeVine.
LeVine, perhaps best known as the author of Heavy Metal Islam: Rock, Resistance, and the Struggle for the Soul of Islam, based his argument and his definition of intent on statistics, numbers of dead and percentages of dead compared to total numbers of targeted groups in Warsaw, Gaza, Rwanda, and Bosnia while avoiding the definition of genocide found in Convention on Genocide.
Jeffrey Weiss, American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) Peace Education Director, Central Region, bestirred himself to suggest Israel's innocence of the crime of genocide even before the Israeli assault ended. Weiss's remarks came toward the end of his presentation about "International Law and Gaza" at an event described as an informational forum at the Des Moines Public Library on the afternoon of Saturday, January 17. The event, which drew about 85 people to the library's main meeting room, was organized by the Middle East Peace Education Project, an umbrella group sponsored and directed by AFSC personnel.
"As... a student of international law and history, I am uncomfortable with the term 'genocide' and I am uncomfortable with the term 'holocaust.' That's my personal perspective, but, I, you can read the Genocide Convention and draw conclusions as always based on 'what is genocide?' But since the word 'genocide' has been used, I personally would not use 'genocide' to refer to what is taking place today," said Weiss.
The featured speaker at the event, Sheik Ibrahim Dremali, of Austin, TX, had presented a media program and talk titled "The Gaza Narrative from a Palestinian Perspective." Weiss's remarks indicated disagreement with Dremali, who had referred to Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip and mass murder of civilians as "genocidal" and a "holocaust" just three days after Fr. d'Escoto's use of the term "genocide" in New York.
Weiss's suggestion that Israeli attack did not constitute genocide – even before the Israeli attack ended and prior to any official investigation – struck The Independent Monitor as unseemly and impolitic at best. During the Q&A, The Independent Monitor asked Weiss if numbers were included in the Convention on Genocide's definition of the crime and asked him elaborate on his previous comments.
"I think there is a siege and on-going violations of the Geneva Conventions. … If you were teaching a class on, sometimes I call it the 'G' word, you would have a lot of people disagree about what it is," said Weiss.
The Convention on Genocide's definition of the crime does not include specific numbers, said Weiss, but "oftentimes refers to the systematic destruction of an entire people."
"So, there may be some people who would argue that the siege, the death toll, the ongoing occupation reached 'genocide'. My personal perspective on 'genocide', the word and what it means, is that it should be reserved for the Pol Pots and the Hitlers," said Weiss, who was sporting eyewear with high-contrast yellow lenses.
The most obvious and glaring flaw in the argument of those who insist on defining genocide by relying on huge numbers of dead and on numbers of dead compared to the total numbers in targeted groups is that they are useful only after the worst has occurred and the numbers of the dead, in their millions, can be estimated – when it is too late for the law to serve a prevention function. Reliance upon such definitions robs the Convention of its intended prevention function.
Raphael Lemkin, a Polish lawyer of Jewish descent, lost 49 members of his family in the Nazi holocaust. Lemkin, who coined the word "genocide" in 1943 and worked tirelessly to ban war crimes, authored a draft resolution for a Genocide Convention treaty that ultimately resulted in the "Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Approved and proposed for signature and ratification or accession by General Assembly resolution 260 A (III) of 9 December 1948". Lemkin viewed the prevention function as essential and central to the legislation. "By declaring genocide a crime under international law and by making it a problem of international concern, the right of intervention on behalf of minorities slated for destruction has been established. … The usefulness of a future international treaty on genocide lies in facilitating the prevention and punishment of the crime and apprehension of criminals," wrote Lemkin in "Genocide as a Crime under International Law", American Journal of International Law (1947) Volume 41(1):145-151.
The Convention on Genocide makes no mention of numbers or percentages in its definition of the crime, which is found in Article II: "In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group." There we find but two elements, intent, and a list of acts – no numbers, no percentages.
So, why do Israel's defenders deny that genocide occurred in Gaza and insist on making the definition of genocide a numbers game? Zionists lobby for a definition of genocide that takes the focus off the element of intent in order to protect the Zionist program of land theft, ethnic cleansing, and mass murder in Palestine and Israeli political, military, and religious leaders who have given voice to their genocidal intentions.
In Feb. 2008, Matan Vilnai, Israel's deputy defense minister, publicly warned that Palestinians risked "bringing an even bigger Shoah" upon themselves if they continued to fire rockets into Israel. The word "Shoah" is rarely used in Israel outside discussions of the Nazi holocaust of Jews because many Israelis, like ardent Zionists in other countries, do not countenance its use to describe other events.
In March 2008, Rabbi Yisrael Rosen, director of the Tsomet Institute, a religious school attended by students and soldiers in the Israeli settlements of the West Bank, issued a religious opinion that appeared to authorize the killing of all Palestinians. Rosen was widely quoted as having written, "All of the Palestinians must be killed; men, women, infants, and even their beasts." Rosen's ruling garnered support among leading Israeli rabbis authorized to issue Jewish religious opinions.
Recent news reports indicate that Israeli military rabbis urged IDF soldiers to kill indiscriminately in Gaza. In a widely available article titled "Black Flag" published on January 31 on the Gush Shalom web site, Uri Avnery wrote, "In the last decades, the state-financed religious educational system … indoctrinates its pupils with a violent tribal cult, totally ethnocentric, which sees in the whole of world history nothing but an endless story of Jewish victimhood. This is a religion of a Chosen People, indifferent to others, a religion without compassion for anyone who is not Jewish, which glorifies the God-decreed genocide described in the Biblical book of Joshua.
"The products of this education are now the 'rabbis' who instruct the religious youths. With their encouragement, a systematic effort has been made to take over the Israeli army from within. … The most outstanding example is the 'Chief Army Rabbi', Colonel Avichai Ronsky, who has declared that his job is to reinforce the 'fighting spirit' of the soldiers. He is a man of the extreme right, not far from the spirit of the late Rabbi Meir Kahane, whose party was outlawed in Israel for its fascist ideology. Under the auspices of the army rabbinate, religious-fascist brochures of the ultra-right 'rabbis' were distributed to the soldiers.
"This material includes political incitement, such as the statement that the Jewish religion prohibits 'giving up even one millimeter of Eretz Israel', that the Palestinians, like the Biblical Philistines (from whom the name Palestine derives), are a foreign people who invaded the country, and that any compromise (such as indicated in the official government program) is a mortal sin. The distribution of political propaganda violates, of course, army law," wrote Avnery.
Avnery calls on Israeli courts to intervene and hold accountable those who have already committed war crimes, and he expresses regret that they are unlikely to do so. Apparently he, at least, understands and fears the potential consequences of inaction. Avnery's analysis is that of a seasoned and well-informed observer. There is no reason to doubt it.
The Independent Monitor contacted Professor Francis A. Boyle of the University of Illinois College of Law for an expert opinion on the question of genocide in Gaza. A scholar in the areas of international law and human rights, Professor Boyle received a J.D. degree magna cum laude and A.M. and Ph.D. degrees in political science from Harvard University. Prior to joining the faculty at U of I College of Law, he was a teaching fellow at Harvard and an associate at its Center for International Affairs.
"As long ago as October 19, 2000, the then United Nations Human Rights Commission (now Council) condemned Israel for inflicting 'war crimes' and 'crimes against humanity' upon the Palestinian people, most of whom are Muslims," said Boyle.
"But I want to focus for a moment on Israel's 'crimes against humanity' against the Palestinian people – as determined by the U.N. Human Rights Commission itself, set up pursuant to the requirements of the U.N. Charter. What are 'crimes against humanity'? This concept goes all the way back to the Nuremberg Charter of 1945 for the trial of the major Nazi war criminals in Europe. In the Nuremberg Charter of 1945, drafted by the United States Government, there was created and inserted a new type of international crime specifically intended to deal with the Nazi persecution of the Jewish people: Crimes against humanity: namely, murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, and other inhumane acts committed against any civilian population, before or during the war, or persecutions on political, racial or religious grounds in execution of or in connection with any crime within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal, whether or not in violation of the domestic law of the country where perpetrated.
"The paradigmatic example of 'crimes against humanity' is what Hitler and the Nazis did to the Jewish people. This is where the concept of 'crimes against humanity' came from. And this is what the U.N. Human Rights Commission determined that Israel is currently doing to the Palestinian people: crimes against humanity. Expressed in legal terms, this is just like what Hitler and the Nazis did to the Jews. That is the significance of the formal determination by the U.N. Human Rights Commission that Israel has inflicted 'crimes against humanity' upon the Palestinian people. The Commission chose this well-known and long-standing legal term of art quite carefully and deliberately based upon the evidence it had compiled.
"Furthermore, the Nuremberg 'crimes against humanity' are the historical and legal precursor to the international crime of genocide as defined by the 1948 Genocide Convention. The theory here was that what Hitler and the Nazis did to the Jewish people was so horrific that it required a special international treaty that would codify and universalize the Nuremberg concept of 'crimes against humanity.' And that treaty ultimately became the 1948 Genocide Convention," Boyle told The Independent Monitor.
"As documented by Israeli historian Ilan Pappe in his seminal book The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine (2006), Israel's genocidal policy against the Palestinians has been unremitting, extending from before the very foundation of the State of Israel in 1948, and is ongoing and even intensifying against the 1.5 million Palestinians living in Gaza. Zionism's 'final solution' to Israel's much touted 'demographic threat' allegedly posed by the very existence of the Palestinians has always been genocide," said Boyle.
"Certainly, Israel and its predecessors-in-law – the Zionist agencies, forces, and terrorist gangs – have committed genocide against the Palestinian people that actually started on or about 1948 and has continued apace until today in violation of Genocide Convention Articles II(a), (b), and (c). For at least the past six decades, the Israeli government and its predecessors-in-law – the Zionist agencies, forces, and terrorist gangs – have ruthlessly implemented a systematic and comprehensive military, political, and economic campaign with the intent to destroy in substantial part the national, ethnical, racial, and different religious (Jews versus Muslims and Christians) group constituting the Palestinian people. This Zionist/Israeli campaign has consisted of killing members of the Palestinian people in violation of Genocide Convention Article II(a). This Zionist/Israeli campaign has also caused serious bodily and mental harm to the Palestinian people in violation of Genocide Convention Article II(b). This Zionist/Israeli campaign has also deliberately inflicted on the Palestinian people conditions of life calculated to bring about their physical destruction in substantial part in violation of Article II(c) of the Genocide Convention.
"Article I of the Genocide Convention requires all contracting parties such as the United States 'to prevent and to punish' genocide. Yet to the contrary, historically the 'Jewish' state's criminal conduct against the Palestinians has been financed, armed, equipped, supplied and politically supported by the 'Christian' United States. Although the United States is a founding sponsor of, and a contracting party to, both the Nuremberg Charter and the Genocide Convention, as well as the United Nations Charter, these legal facts have never made any difference to the United States when it comes to its blank-check support for Israel and their joint and severable criminal mistreatment of the Palestinians – truly the wretched of the earth!" said Boyle.
"The doctrine of 'humanitarian intervention' so readily espoused elsewhere when U.S. foreign policy goals are allegedly at stake has been clearly proved to be a joke and a fraud when it comes to stopping the ongoing and accelerating Israeli campaign of genocide against the Palestinian people. Rather than rein in the Israelis – which would be possible just by turning off the funding pipeline – the United States government, the U.S. Congress, and U.S. taxpayers instead support the 'Jewish' state to the tune of about 4 billion dollars per year, without whose munificence this instance of genocide – and indeed conceivably the State of Israel itself – would not be possible. What the world witnesses here is (yet another) case of 'dishumanitarian intervention' or 'humanitarian extermination' by the United States and Israel against the Palestinians and Palestine," said Boyle.
"In today's world genocide pays so long as it is done at the behest of the United States and its de jure or de facto allies such as Israel," said Boyle.
In April 1993 and again in September 1993, Boyle won World Court Orders on the basis of the 1948 Genocide Convention for the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina against the rump Yugoslavia to cease and desist from committing all acts of genocide against the Bosnians.
In an era of weapons of mass destruction, the seriousness of the crime of genocide and the importance of the public understanding and discussion of genocide are impossible to overestimate. Outside the interests of genocidaires, there is no benefit associated with defining mass murder as genocide only after huge numbers of dead make it impossible to deny that genocide has been committed. Those who define genocide by the numbers of millions of dead would eliminate the prevention function of the Convention on Genocide, making it possible for genocide to occur again and again.
Failure to define and prosecute genocide earlier and proactively, based on evidence of intent and acts committed, invites potentially catastrophic consequences for all humanity. The burden of proof must be placed where it belongs, on those who commit war crimes and, also, on those who rush to condone such crimes even before investigations begin, an act that may have, and may be calculated to have, the effect of reducing or thwarting public pressure for investigations.
The most serious of crimes are eminently worthy of serious public discussion and debate. Any well-informed discussion of war crimes will involve the careful examination, with an appropriate degree of skepticism, of statements by public figures about such crimes. Indeed, without such public scrutiny and discussion, however uncomfortable it may make some, we can hardly expect to avoid the worst. Americans must question and hold accountable their leaders and public figures at every level who condone or deny genocide and other, lesser war crimes, perhaps especially those who are responsible for educating us about human rights.
The Convention on Genocide will serve its intended prevention function only when more citizens demand that courts and governments recognize and act on evidence of intent when such evidence is available in combination with any of the acts listed in Article II of the Convention.
It is time to restore the prevention function of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
Mossad use Aussie passports: ex-officer
A former Mossad officer says he has no doubt Israel's spy agency has forged Australian passports for use regularly in intelligence operations.
"Very few people know very much about Australia," Victor Ostrovsky, a case officer at Mossad for several years in the 1980s, told ABC Radio on Friday.
The agency had obtained blank passports in the past from Canada and the UK.
"If not, they just manufacture them," Mr Ostrovsky said, adding there was a company inside Mossad headquarters which was dedicated to forging passports.
Using an Australian passport was an easy cover to take, he said.
"I know people had been under Australian cover not once (but) quite a few times.
"It doesn't take much of an accent to be an Australian or New Zealander, or an Englishman for that matter."
The federal government has warned Israel it will not be considered "a friend" if it is found to have being involved in passport fraud targeting three Australians.
Three Australian passport-holders, Joshua Bruce, Adam Korman and Nicole McCabe, are believed to have had their identities stolen and used in fake passports held by three suspects in the assassination.
The passports were carried by three other people suspected of being involved in the assassination of senior Hamas operative Mahmud al-Mabhuh in Dubai on January 20.
Mossad, Israel's secret service, is widely believed to be behind the organised hit on al-Mabhuh.
Earlier, Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard assured Australians their passports are safe.
"We do know that in terms of passports in this country basically they're very safe," Ms Gillard told the Nine Network on Friday.
"It's less than half a per cent that go missing each year and most of them would be lost in pretty benign circumstances.
"You know they're at the back of the sock drawer and no one can find them."
Ms Gillard said any use of Australian identities by the Israeli government for secret police assassinations would not be tolerated.
"If there's any suggestion Australian identities have been used by the Israeli government for this purpose then that is completely unacceptable," she said.
"Democracies have to be accountable for their actions and we'll be making sure that Israel is accountable and this is fully investigated."
The official definition of 'Genocide' which shows that Rachel Corrie's use of the word in relation to the Israeli occupation was accurate:
'Genocide is the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group.'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocide
'The term "genocide" was coined by Raphael Lemkin (1900–1959), a Polish-Jewish legal scholar, in 1944, firstly from the Latin "gens, gentis," meaning "birth, race, stock, kind" or the Greek root génos (γένος) (same meaning); secondly from Latin -cidium (cutting, killing) via French -cide.
Defining genocide in 1943, Lemkin wrote:
Generally speaking, genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when accomplished by mass killings of all members of a nation. It is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves. The objectives of such a plan would be the disintegration of the political and social institutions, of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups, and the destruction of the personal security, liberty, health, dignity, and even the lives of the individuals belonging to such groups.
In 1948, the UN General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide which legally defined the crime of genocide for the first time.
The CPPCG was adopted by the UN General Assembly on 9 December 1948 and came into effect on 12 January 1951 (Resolution 260 (III)). It contains an internationally-recognized definition of genocide which was incorporated into the national criminal legislation of many countries, and was also adopted by the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, the treaty that established the International Criminal Court (ICC). The Convention (in article 2) defines genocide:
...any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
– Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Article II
No it doesn't. The official definition of genocide makes no reference whatsoever to implied innocence or guilt.
Stop using slippery lawyers tactics to defend Israel's crimes.
To begin with I'm not the one getting into the specific definitions of the term genocide, so this is really the pot calling the kettle black with "slippery lawyer tricks." (By the way, why the hatred towards lawyers? Perhaps because there is a stereotype about Sheister Jew lawyers? Just musing...(a joke, lest anyone not have a sense of humor)) I was talking about the term's cultural effects, which should have been patently obvious.
How are Israel's actions deliberate or systematic, and how has it resulted in the destruction of the entire Palestinian people? The Palestinian population is growing, not shrinking, so either Israel, one of the most advanced militaries in the world, are just a bunch of brain-dead idiots who can't figure out to "point then shoot," or they aren't committing genocide. The fact that the UN says it, or some other group says it, doesn't mean it's true. It's true if it is actually happening, which it quite obviously isn't.
Look at the definition again.... in part....
Israels actions are deliberate and systematic and there is genocide. The rest of the world sees it, the culprit doesn't.
If you say there is no genocide and one of the reasons given is that the Palestinian population is growing, can I then say the same thing about jews? That there was no genocide of the jews by the nazis because the jewish/israeli population is growing. Or maybe there was no genocide of the jews because the nazis did not kill the ENTIRE jewish population? Flawed reasoning.