Israel bombs shelter in Gaza, killing orphans and widows – Day 350
One year ago, Benjamin Netanyahu came to the UN with a vision of a “new Middle East” anchored by Israel’s growing ties with its Arab partners in the region. Now he is on the brink of launching a major escalation against Hezbollah, ignoring calls for restraint from his allies over the Gaza war and defying criticism that he is prevaricating in negotiations over a temporary ceasefire.
Declassified UK reports:
When retired Israeli general Doron Almog boarded his flight from Tel Aviv on 11 September 2005, he expected to soon step foot on British soil.
But an arrest warrant had been issued for the former army chief over alleged war crimes committed in Gaza, and British police officers were waiting at the immigration desk to seize him.
Almog remained on the plane for two hours before departing again for Israel.
The incident seemingly marked the first time that an arrest warrant had been issued in Britain for an Israeli national over abuses against Palestinians, and it sent shockwaves through the Knesset.
What followed was a decade-long campaign by the Israeli government to ensure that something like this could never happen again, leaked files reviewed by Declassified reveal.
The campaign focussed on lobbying Britain to change its approach to universal jurisdiction legislation, which allows for the most serious crimes to be prosecuted in another country.
The goal was to allow Israeli officials to visit Britain without fear of arrest, particularly those accused of serious abuses against the Palestinians.
(Read the full article here.)
No one is safe: The global threat of Israel’s weaponized pagers
The Cradle reports:
Israel’s coordinated attacks on Lebanon, marked by the near-simultaneous explosion of thousands of pager and walkie-talkie devices over two days, resulted in the deaths of at least 37 people, including children, and left thousands severely wounded.
This is a stark reminder that the occupation state’s criminal actions know no limits.
In the wake of this aggression, who can guarantee that Israeli exports to other countries won’t be weaponized in future conflicts? The “pager attack” serves as yet more evidence that Israel poses a global threat, ushering in a dangerous, dystopian new era in which civilians are no longer safe, even in their own homes.
When analyzing the pager detonations from a legal standpoint, it becomes clear that Israel’s killing spree in Lebanon this week lies somewhere between a war crime and an act of terrorism. The legal classification depends on the current state of affairs between Lebanon and Israel. If Lebanon is considered to be at war with Israel, the targeting of civilians — non-combatants — through the bombing of pagers blatantly violates international laws of warfare, including the Geneva Conventions.
Article 51 of Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions (1949) strictly prohibits indiscriminate attacks on civilians, and Article 85 lists attacks on civilians as grave breaches that amount to war crimes.
The Guardian notes that half a century after the Second World War, a global treaty — to which Israel is a signatory — came into force, which “prohibited in all circumstances to use booby-traps or other devices in the form of apparently harmless portable objects that are specifically designed and constructed to contain explosive material.”
However, if we consider that Lebanon is not in a formal state of war with Israel, the aggression falls under a different legal classification: terrorism.
According to the International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings (1997), Israel’s actions can be categorized as a “terrorist bombing.” The use of civilian devices, like pagers, in non-military zones with the intent to spread fear aligns with the convention’s definition of terrorism, which criminalizes the unlawful use of explosives to target civilians or infrastructure with the intent to intimidate populations or coerce governments…
(Read the full analysis here.)
RECOMMENDED READING: From Stuxnet to Gospel to Pager Bombs, Israel is leading the Weaponization of the digital World
![Ambulances are being dispatched to the area in Beirut, Lebanon while security forces take precautions after at least eight people, including a child, were killed in a mass explosion of wireless communication devices known as pagers on September 17, 2024 [Houssam Shbaro – Anadolu Agency]](https://israelpalestinenews.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/9-18-a-300x200.jpg)
Biden Didn’t “Fail” To Get A Ceasefire; He Never Tried
From Caitlyn Johnstone’s newsletter:
The Wall Street Journal reports that senior US officials don’t think the Biden administration will secure a ceasefire in Gaza before Biden’s term is up. Anyone who told you that Biden or Harris were seriously working on a ceasefire lied to you.
I’ve seen some people calling this a “failure” on the part of the Biden administration, and that needs to stop. It’s not a failure. You can only fail at something you tried to do. Biden and Harris didn’t “fail” at anything, they SUCCEEDED at their goal of helping Israel destroy Gaza.
Biden could have ended this at any time by withholding weapons, or even by simply threatening to. He could have ended it with a phone call. The killing continued because he and his handlers wanted it to.
IMEMC Daily Reports.
The Cradle: Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya in bed with Israeli army to ‘shape Gaza coverage’: Report
STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – SEPTEMBER 21:
Palestinian death toll from October 7, 2023 – September 21, 2024: at least 42,147* (41,431 in Gaza* – 11,308 women (30%), 16,715 children as of September 5. [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 716 in the West Bank (~148 children). This does not include an estimated 10,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 49,032 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 300,000 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 (at least 37 of them children)**.
- 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 – September 21: at least 101,518 (including at least 95,818 in Gaza and 5,700 in the West Bank, including 830 children). [It remains unknown how many Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.]
Reported Israeli death toll from October 7, 2023 – September 21, 2024: ~1,457 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 293*** 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 twelve 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
- Human rights reports on Israel-Palestine (regularly updated)
- From the Americas to Gaza: Spreading disease has long been used by colonizers to commit genocide
- Contrived charges of antisemitism are the new ‘Red Scare’
- How Israel’s quadcopters traumatize, maim and kill Palestinians in Gaza
- Israeli society’s dehumanization of Palestinians is now absolute
- The unpublished genocide diaries of Refaat Alareer
- An arms embargo on Israel is not a radical idea — it’s the law
- Israel is redrawing the West Bank, cutting into a prospective Palestinian state
- Gaza breakdown: 20 times Israel used US arms in likely war crimes
- U.S. universities spent the summer strategizing to suppress student activism. Here is their plan.
- ‘Words like Slaughter:’ A comparative study of The New York Times reporting in Ukraine and Gaza
- Cracks in the Dome: Israel’s security mirage
- Israel Suddenly Has A Problem With Attacks On Population Centers
- Americans are always the last to know…about Israel’s crimes
- Does Any Other Country besides Israel have the Right to Defend Itself?
- ‘Raped by female soldiers’: Palestinian in leaked Sde Teiman photo speaks out
- Alison Weir trending on social media – what the buzz is about
- Israeli media’s coverage of the rape of Palestinian detainees shows support for sexual violence in service of genocide
- Inside Israel’s torture, rape, and dehumanization centers
- I’m a pediatrician. The scars I saw on Gaza’s children will take generations to heal.
- What Harris’s Jewish outreach director said at a private DNC afterparty
- ‘Strong record of supporting the U.S.-Israel relationship’: a look at Tim Walz’s votes on Palestine as a member of Congress
- Nearly Two-Thirds of All Campaign Funds for Cori Bush Challenger Came From AIPAC
- Israeli army probe covered up “friendly fire” killings on October 7
- Are US officials’ investments of public funds in Israeli bonds ethical? How much is too much?
- Honoring the memory of a Gazan Olympic hero: Majed Abu Maraheel
- An American was just shot in the West Bank. The American press can’t be bothered.
No comments:
Post a Comment