As Gazans die, NYU makes “Zionist” a protected class – Day 325
Compilation of news reports – IAK staff
“Zionist” is now a protected class at NYU
The Intercept reports:
New York University students who speak out against Zionism will now risk violating the school’s nondiscrimination policies.
As students and faculty in the U.S. return to campuses for the fall semester, there are innumerable reasons to continue demonstrating against institutional complicity with Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. The need for those protests is as urgent as it’s ever been.
But New York University shared an updated code of student conduct last week that, while ostensibly aimed at curtailing bigotry, the new language instead shuts down dissent by threatening to silence criticism of Zionism on campus. Students who speak out against Zionism — an ethno-nationalist political ideology founded in the late 19th century — will now risk violating the school’s nondiscrimination policies.
The university’s nondiscrimination and anti-harassment policy, known as NDAH, is intended to reflect the school’s legal obligations, including to Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination and harassment based on a student’s race, color, national origin, religious identity, shared ancestry, or ethnicity.
Tucked into a document purportedly offering clarification on school policy, the new NYU guidelines introduce an unprecedented expansion of protected classes to include “Zionists” and “Zionism.” Referring to the NDAH, the updated conduct guide says, “Speech and conduct that would violate the NDAH if targeting Jewish or Israeli people can also violate the NDAH if directed toward Zionists.”
“Using code words, like ‘Zionist,’” the guide says, “does not eliminate the possibility that your speech violates the NDAH policy.”
(Read the full article here.)
RECOMMENDED READING: The Moral Decadence of Zionism
Gaza: Israeli Aid Obstruction Inflaming Polio Outbreak
Human Rights Watch statement:
Israeli military attacks on healthcare infrastructure and water supplies and ongoing aid obstruction are contributing to a potentially catastrophic polio outbreak in Gaza, Human Rights Watch said today. Polio, which is entirely preventable but spreads fast, particularly among children under 5, can cause disabilities, including paralysis, and death among unvaccinated children.
On August 16, 2024, the Palestinian Ministry of Health confirmed the first case of polio in an unvaccinated 10-month old child in Gaza. On August 23, WHO confirmed that the 10-month old child is now paralyzed.
“If the Israeli government continues to block urgent aid and destroy water and waste management infrastructure, it will facilitate the spread of a disease that has been nearly eradicated globally,” said Julia Bleckner of Human Rights Watch. “Israel’s partners should press the government to lift the blockade immediately and ensure unfettered humanitarian access in Gaza to enable the timely distribution of vaccines to contain the unfolding polio outbreak.”
Before the case was confirmed on August 16, Palestine had been polio-free for more than 25 years, thanks to a successful childhood vaccination program. However, Israel’s ongoing decimation of healthcare, water, and sanitation facilities in Gaza and its obstruction of aid and humanitarian access have created “the perfect environment for diseases like polio to spread,” according to WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
International humanitarian law requires Israel, as the occupying power in Gaza, to ensure that the basic needs of the civilian population are provided for. In addition, all parties to the conflict are obligated to “allow and facilitate rapid and unimpeded passage of humanitarian relief for civilians in need.”
RECOMMENDED READING: Israel’s obscene mismanagement of the Covid-19 vaccine
![Palestinian families line up with their children to receive polio vaccines from the Palestine Red Crescent Society at al-Amal Hospital in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis city on August 22 [Hani Alshaer/Anadolu Images]](https://israelpalestinenews.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/8-27-V-300x225.jpg)
“I was severely beaten if I moved”: Palestinian children held without charge or trial by Israeli forces
Defense for Children International-Palestine reports:
Israeli authorities are unlawfully detaining Palestinian children from the occupied West Bank by holding them without charge or trial and subjecting them to torture and ill-treatment.
“Israeli forces arrested me after blindfolding and handcuffing me,” 16-year-old Jamal told Defense for Children International – Palestine. “They transferred me in a military vehicle to the military tower at the entrance to Arroub camp and forced me to lie on the ground for an hour, during which one of the soldiers stepped on my back the entire time.”
Israeli forces detained Jamal after entering and damaging his home in Arroub refugee camp, north of Hebron in the southern occupied West Bank, at 3 a.m. on July 16. Jamal has an injury in his knee with an exit wound caused by live ammunition fired by Israeli forces and he was scheduled to undergo surgery for this injury on the date of his arrest…
(Read Jamal’s and other youths’ testimonies here.)
NY Times’ contradictory accounts of “rescue” of Bedouin hostage
New York Times reports:
An elite Israeli military unit [allegedly] rescued a frail and gaunt hostage from a tunnel deep beneath the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, the eighth living captive to be freed by Israeli troops in nearly 11 months of war and the first to be found alive in the subterranean labyrinth used by Hamas.
The rescued hostage, Farhan al-Qadi, 52, a member of Israel’s Bedouin Arab minority, was [allegedly] freed by commandos without a fight after being discovered in a room roughly 25 yards underground, Israeli officials said. More than 100 hostages remain in Gaza, at least 30 of whom are now presumed dead by the Israeli authorities.
The Israeli military’s chief spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, portrayed the operation to rescue Mr. al-Qadi as “complex and brave.” He said the soldiers reached him after “precise intelligence” was collected by Israel’s security services.
But that account was at odds with details provided by two senior Israeli officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity in order to discuss a sensitive matter.
Mr. al-Qadi, the Israeli officials said, was found by chance during an operation to capture a Hamas tunnel network. A team led by Flotilla 13, Israel’s equivalent to the U.S. Navy SEALs, were combing the tunnels for signs of Hamas when, to the forces’ surprise, they found Mr. al-Qadi on his own, without guards, the officials said.
NOTE: Israel is currently holding about 9,900 Palestinian prisoners in inhumane conditions where many are systematically tortured – 250 of them are children, 86 are women, and over 3,400 are administrative detainees – being held without charge or trial. Administrative detention is intended to be used only in “exceptional” circumstances, but Israel uses it widely. Read more here.
RECOMMENDED READING: The Genocide in Israeli Prisons and Palestinians massacred in “rescue” operation lauded by US.
Israel withholding bodies of 552 Palestinians: Prisoners’ society
Al Jazeera reports:
Israel continues to withhold the bodies of at least 552 Palestinians, including 149 killed during the continuing war, according to the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society.
These figures do not include an estimated additional hundreds of Palestinians killed in Gaza, for which Israeli authorities have not released an official count, according to the group.
Israel regularly keeps the bodies of Palestinians it killed who were accused of violent crimes against Israelis, a policy denounced by rights groups as unlawful.
RECOMMENDED READING: Dying to leave Gaza – and get back in
West Bank: Two Palestinians killed in Israeli raid on Jenin
WAFA reports:
Two Palestinians were killed Tuesday night as Israeli occupation forces started a wide-scale raid on the city of Jenin, according to medical sources.
The Ministry of Health reported that Qassam Mohammed Jabareen, 25, and Asem Walid Dabaya, 39, were killed by Israeli gunfire during the raid.
Several others sustained injuries during the attack.
NOTE: After midnight on Wednesday, Israel began a major offensive on the West Bank, which is being called the largest offensive on the occupied West Bank since the Second Intifada, attacking three cities – Jenin, Tulkarm and Tubas – from land and air.
The operation is expected to last several days. Eleven Palestinians have been reported killed so far. IAK will bring detail in our next update.
Jerusalem’s Armenian Quarter under threat: Urgent call for protection
Jerusalem Post opinion piece:
The Armenian community is one of Jerusalem’s oldest, with the first Armenians arriving as early as the 4th century CE and the Armenian Patriarchate being active in the city since the 7th century. Jerusalem is the most important center of the Armenian community outside its homeland; and the Armenians were the first to convert to Christianity as a nation in 301 AD.
But this glorious history does not help the small community in dealing with the ambitions of the far-Right to take over the Armenian Quarter.
The Armenians in Jerusalem are one of the smallest and most vulnerable communities; they are neither Palestinian nor Israeli, and have no interest in being dragged into the ongoing conflict. They do not have the support of strong churches or states such as the Catholics, Greek Orthodox, Russian Provo Slavs, or Protestants.
Being in this vulnerable position, they are reluctantly at the forefront of an ongoing struggle to prevent settlers and real estate moguls from harming the multiculturalism and multi-religiosity of Jerusalem – the city’s most important resource and what makes it a lodestone to the entire world.
Turning this charming and unique quarter into an arena for interreligious confrontations will only continue to harm Jerusalem’s status. The defense of the quarter is not only a moral imperative to protect a small but rooted minority that has tied its fate to the city, but a basic need to protect the name, image, and location of Jerusalem as a city that constitutes a spiritual and religious center for three different monotheistic religions.
(Read the full article here.)
Israel buys up Google Ads to expand smear campaign against UNRWA: Report
The Cradle reports:
The Israeli government has paid for a Google advertising campaign pushing Tel Aviv’s allegations that the UN agency for Palestinian refugees is linked to “terrorism” and was involved in Hamas’ Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, according to a WIRED report.
The US-based tech magazine reported on 26 August that Israel has bought advertising that pops up when the terms UNRWA or UNRWA USA are searched in a bid to “draw potential donors to a webpage full of allegations about why the UNRWA couldn’t be trusted.”
“The anti-UNRWA campaign is just one volley of ads that Israel has orchestrated in recent months that have drawn complaints both inside and outside of the company,” several current and former Google employees told WIRED.
It shows “the delicate relationship Google has kept with its advertising client, Israel, and the limits of the company’s policing of alleged misinformation in ads,” WIRED wrote.
Israel has also aired ads in the US via Google, reading “UNRWA is inseparable from Hamas” and “keeps employing terrorists.”
(Read the full article here.)
RECOMMENDED READING FROM DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS: Proposal to designate UNRWA as a terrorist organization an outrageous attack on humanitarian assistance
![UNRWA is the key agency providing humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza [GETTY]](https://israelpalestinenews.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/8-6-u-300x169.jpg)
An update on the ICC arrest warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant
Mondoweiss reports:
ICC Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan’s request for arrest warrants against Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant has been mired in attempts to shield Israel from accountability since May, but this soon could change.
In his ‘consolidated response’ to the pile of amicus briefs opposing the Pre-Trial Chamber (PTC)’s approval of arrest warrants, Khan suggests that genocide charges are on his mind.
“Israel has deprived the Palestinian population of objects indispensable to their survival,” Khan told the PTC in his 49-page brief, submitted to the Chamber this past Friday.
Regarding the complementarity principle – that Israel should be given the chance to prosecute its own top leaders before arrest warrants are issued — he said, “There is no information indicating that [Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant] are being criminally investigated or prosecuted, and indeed the core allegations against them have simply been rejected by Israeli authorities.”
He added, “The situation in the oPt, including Gaza, is catastrophic, owing in large part to the ongoing criminality described in the [arrest warrant] Applications.”
Citing a key provision of the Rome Statute, Khan advised the 3-judge panel that “the arrest of the persons named in the Applications appears necessary” — “to prevent [them] from continuing with the commission of that crime or a related crime which is within the jurisdiction of the Court.”
According to a “Panel of Experts” convened by Prosecutor Khan, additional crimes are “under investigation and expected to lead to additional applications [for arrest warrants] in the future.”
Khan’s most likely added charges against Netanyahu and Gallant: Israel’s settlement enterprise — a war crime under the Rome Statute – and the crime against humanity of genocide.
Applications against Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir may well sit in Karim Khan’s top drawer, ready to be submitted to the PTC once warrants against Netanyahu and Gallant have gone out the door.
White House’s Kirby says US would defend Israel in Iranian attack
Reuters reports:
The United States remains committed to defending Israel in any Iranian attack, and was hopeful about a possible Gaza ceasefire agreement, White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said on Tuesday.
Kirby told Israel’s Channel 12 that it was tough to predict the chances of an attack but the White House takes Iranian statements seriously.
“We believe that they are still postured and poised to launch an attack should they want to do that, which is why we have that enhanced force posture in the region,” he said.
“Our messaging to Iran is consistent, has been and will stay consistent. One, don’t do it. There’s no reason to escalate this. There’s no reason to potentially start some sort of all-out regional war. And number two, we are going to be prepared to defend Israel if it comes to that.”
Iran has vowed a severe response to the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, which took place as he visited Tehran late last month and which it blamed on Israel. Israel has neither confirmed or denied its involvement.
The U.S. maintains two aircraft-carrier strike groups in the Middle East, as well as an extra squadron of F-22 fighter jets.
We, alumni recipients of the MLK Spirit Award, return our awards and urge the University of Michigan to divest
Juan Cole shares a public letter:
We, the undersigned, are alumni recipients of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Spirit Award at the University of Michigan.
In January of this year, the University awarded recent alum Salma Hamamy the MLK Spirit Award in recognition of her steadfast activism promoting Indigenous sovereignty and Palestinian liberation — activism that included calling for the University to divest from weapons manufacturers. The University also awarded the MLK Spirit Award to the student group Hamamy led as president, Students Allied for Freedom and Equality.
Five months later, in May, Provost Laurie McCauley sent a letter to Hamamy’s personal home stating, “With the full support of the Board of Regents and President Ono, I am writing to notify you that your award has been revoked effective immediately,” based on an Instagram story post from her personal social media account. In the letter, Provost McCauley characterized Hamamy’s post as “inconsistent with the University’s values.”
This letter was dated May 21, 2024 — the same day that campus police violently removed the University’s Gaza solidarity encampment from the Diag. Whether intentional or not, it planted the decision firmly within the context of a broader attempt to suppress the burgeoning anti-war student movement.
To our knowledge, never before in the 18-year history of this award have university administrators interfered with — let alone nullified — the careful deliberation and unanimous decision of the Central Campus MLK Spirit Award Selection Committee, a diverse, 13-member body representing the full breadth of central campus undergraduate and graduate programs.
Administrators did not consult the Committee. Allowing administrators and the politically influenced University Board of Regents to overturn a tradition led by students, faculty and staff sets a dangerous precedent that threatens the integrity and prestige of this historic award.
Had the administrators taken the time to speak with Hamamy directly, they would have learned the following, which she shared with us recently…
(Read the full open letter, Hamamy’s document, and a list of signatories here.)
Chief rabbi of France calls for Israel to ‘finish the job’ in Gaza
Middle East Eye reports:
Chief rabbi of France Haim Korsia justified Israeli actions in Gaza during a French television interview and urged Israel to “finish the job”.Broadcast on BFM TV, Korsia expressed his support for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is facing a potential arrest warrant at the International Criminal Court on charges of war crimes in Gaza.
Korsia described the violence in Gaza as “acts of war” and defended Israel’s actions, saying that they were necessary to “protect its nationals”. He said that Israel’s military response was justified in the context of defending its citizens against Hamas, which he said is responsible for the ongoing conflict.
When the journalist giving the interview pressed Korsia about the civilian casualties in Gaza, he responded: “It’s an act of war that no country in the world would conduct like Israel is doing, and I have absolutely nothing to be ashamed of in how Israel is conducting the fighting.”
When asked if he was uncomfortable with Netanyahu’s policy in Gaza, the rabbi replied: “I’m never uncomfortable with a policy that consists of defending one’s citizens.”
MORE NEWS:
IMEMC Daily Reports.
The Cradle: Netanyahu accused of blocking ceasefire talks again with ‘outdated, unacceptable’ Netzarim plan
AntiWar: Israel says US has delivered 50,000 tons of military aid since start of Gaza slaughter
STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – AUGUST 27:
Palestinian death toll from October 7, 2023 – August 27, 2024: at least 41,188* (40,534 in Gaza* – 11,445 women (30%), 16,251 children as of July 22. [The Ministry’s figures have been contested by the Israeli authorities, although they have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN, and WHO. These data are supported by independent analyses, comparing changes in the number of deaths of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) staff with those reported by the Ministry, which found claims of data fabrication implausible.]
This is expected to be a significant undercount since thousands of those killed have yet to be identified – and at least 654 in the West Bank (~147 children). This does not include an estimated 10,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 46,848 Palestinian deaths.
Lancet: “Applying a conservative estimate of four indirect deaths per one direct death9 to the 37,396 deaths reported, it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza.
Ralph Nader earlier estimated 200,000 Palestinians may have been killed in Gaza.
- At least 45 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons (27 from Gaza, 23 from West Bank).
- At least 41 Palestinians have died due to malnutrition**.
- About 1.9 million of Gaza’s 2.3 million population are currently displaced.
- Almost 500,000 Gazans are currently experiencing catastrophic levels of food insecurity.
Palestinian injuries from October 7 – August 27: at least 99,198 (including at least 93,778 in Gaza and 5,420 in the West Bank, including 830 children). [It remains unknown how man Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.]
Reported Israeli death toll from October 7, 2023 – August 27, 2024: ~1,452 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 288*** military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza; 25 military and civilians in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Israel) and~10,000 injured.
NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries of Israelis on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers.
*Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so.
**Euro-Med Monitor reports that Gaza’s elderly are dying at an alarmingly high rate. The majority die at home and are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the Strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries. Additionally, according to Euromed, thousands have died from starvation, malnourishment, and inadequate medical care; these are considered indirect victims as they were not registered in hospitals.
***Approximately ten of the deaths listed above were Israeli soldiers killed by Hezbollah in fighting at the Israel-Lebanon border. The figure does not include the reportedly 53 Israeli soldiers – nearly 16% of the total Israeli military deaths – killed due to friendly fire in Gaza and other military-related accidents.
† For most of the conflict, women and children accounted for about 70% of deaths in Gaza, with children making up a little over 40% of those killed, according to official statistics.
Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here.
Source: IsraelPalestineTimeline.org
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