Israeli Diamonds in the Dubai Diamond Exchange

http://english.al-akhbar.com/content/israeli-diamonds-dubai-diamond-exchange

 

By: Ali Haydar

Published Wednesday, July 17, 2013

While the Arab press is reporting that Arab expatriates are facing deportation from Gulf countries, including Dubai, the Israeli dailyMaariv ran an extensive report on the current honeymoon between Israeli diamond dealers and the Gulf emirate, where they travel frequently on their Israeli passports, without any issues.

The Israeli newspaper quoted one of those dealers as saying that they are “known to all people,” and that they are “welcome to come (to Dubai) anytime they wish.”The Israeli newspaper quoted one of those dealers as saying that they are “known to all people,” and that they are “welcome to come (to Dubai) anytime they wish.” The newspaper identified some Israeli dealers who frequent the Dubai Diamond Exchange (DDE) by name.

Many diamond dealers from Dubai, also according to Maariv, take part in conferences in Israel. A few weeks ago, there were news reports that Peter Meeus, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the DDE, would head a delegation of diamond dealers from Dubai to take part in an International Diamond Week event in the Jewish state in late August. This has stirred nothing short of a storm among BDS groups worldwide.

Shortly after, sources in Dubai claimed that the announcement about Meeus’s participation in the Israeli event was made without his knowledge, and denied that a delegation from Dubai would take part.

Maariv also spoke to Israeli diamond analyst Chaim Ivan Zohar, who visited Dubai several times, most recently two months ago. Zohar said that “they in Dubai do not like publicity,” adding that “they work quietly, and I fear that after the recent announcement, they may not come again” to Israel.

Zohar said that the DDE caters to up to 500 companies, and is the “hub of the diamond trade for Gulf and Arab countries,” adding that “through the DDE, we can sell diamonds to the Arab world and the Gulf countries.”

Dubai’s importance for the Israeli diamond industry stems from the fact that it is opening up at a time when the state is looking for new markets, especially after the decline in the US market due to the downturn. Furthermore, Dubai, in addition to China and Turkey, offers great new opportunities for Israeli diamonds, with thousands of potential deals up for grabs.

Israeli diamond dealers who visited Dubai remarked that the atmosphere there is friendly, and said they never experienced fear or hostility in the Gulf emirate. Some stated that they had entered Dubai using their Israeli passports, in coordination with hosts from the DDE. One said: “They take me from the airport like a diplomat, and I move there freely. But I am not identified as an Israeli, and I have a business card with an address in New York. I speak English and a few words in Arabic, and I am dealt with as an American. At the DDE, they know I’m Israeli, and they have no problem with that.”

They take me from the airport like a diplomat, and I move there freely. But I am not identified as an Israeli, and I have a business card with an address in New York.Maariv’s report mentioned that some Israeli dealers are afraid that the DDE may come to compete with the Israeli diamond exchange, though they in Dubai do not fear such competition.Maariv then quoted Ahmed Bin Sulayem, DDE Executive Chairman, who visited Israel before, as saying, “For our part, Israel is not relevant. Our partners are India, Europe, and Africa.” Bin Sulayem also said that the DDE offers an example of tolerance between Arabs and Jews.

According to the Israeli newspaper, four years before the DDE was established, the diamond trade in Dubai shrank to about $5 billion. However, in previous years, the trade boomed and is today worth $35 billion, with Israeli diamonds moving through the DDE worth some $300 million.

The DDE is the world’s fourth largest exchange of its kind. The export of rough diamonds through the exchange expanded from $2.1 billion in 2009 to $6 billion in 2011, while the export of polished diamonds doubled from $7 billion dollars in 2009 to $14 billion in 2011. By comparison, Israeli diamond exports have fallen, and in the first half of 2012, the decline was around 2 percent.

This article is an edited translation from the Arabic Edition.

 

Zionist settlers cut down 1,150 olive trees belonging to 25 families in Awarta - Nablus

http://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/2013/07/11/zionist-settlers-cut-down-1150-olive-trees-belonging-to-25-families-in-awarta-nablus/

Maan News Agency | July 11, 2013

NABLUS (Ma’an) — Israeli settlers on Thursday cut down 1,150 olive trees in Palestinian groves near Nablus, a Palestinian Authority official said.

Residents of Itamar settlement used chainsaws to cut down the trees north of Awarta, said Ghassan Daghlas, who monitors settlement activity in the northern West Bank.

The trees belonged to 25 Palestinian families and were planted in a 600-dunum grove, Daghlas said.

 

Note from occpal: Israel destroyed over 2,5 Million trees Since 1967 only(Report Page 31) while last summer, it was boasting about it’s ‘agricultural development at the Floriade 2012 World Expo (More about that here)

 

 

When Israeli denial of Palestinian existence becomes genocidal

Ilan Pappe 

The Electronic Intifada 

20 April 2013

 

In a regal interview he gave the Israeli press on the eve of the state’s ” Independence Day,” Shimon Peres, the current president of Israel, said the following:

“I remember how it all began. The whole state of Israel is a millimeter of the whole Middle East. A statistical error, barren and disappointing land, swamps in the north, desert in the south, two lakes, one dead and an overrated river. No natural resource apart from malaria. There was nothing here. And we now have the best agriculture in the world? This is a miracle: a land built by people” (Maariv, 14 April 2013).

This fabricated narrative, voiced by Israel’s number one citizen and spokesman, highlights how much the historical narrative is part of the present reality. This presidential impunity sums up the reality on the eve of the 65th commemoration of theNakba, the ethnic cleansing of historic Palestine. The disturbing fact of life, 65 years on, is not that the figurative head of the so-called Jewish state, and for that matter almost everyone in the newly-elected government and parliament, subscribe to such views. The worrying and challenging reality is the global immunity given to such impunity.

Peres’ denial of the native Palestinians and his reselling in 2013 of the landless people mythology exposes the cognitive dissonance in which he lives: he denies the existence of approximately twelve million people living in and near to the country to which they belong. History shows that the human consequences are horrific and catastrophic when powerful people, heading powerful outfits such as a modern state, denied the existence of a people who are very much present.

This denial was there at the beginning of Zionism and led to the ethnic cleansing in 1948. And it is there today, which may lead to similar disasters in the future — unless stopped immediately.

Cognitive dissonance

The perpetrators of the 1948 ethnic cleansing were the Zionist settlers who came to Palestine, like Polish-born Shimon Peres, before the Second World War. They denied the existence of the native people they encountered, who lived there for hundreds of years, if not more. The Zionists did not possess the power at the time to settle the cognitive dissonance they experienced: their conviction that the land was people-less despite the presence of so many native people there.

They almost solved the dissonance when they expelled as many Palestinians as they could in 1948 — and were left with only a small minority of Palestinians within the Jewish state.

But the Zionist greed for territory and ideological conviction that much more of Palestine was needed in order to have a viable Jewish state led to constant contemplations and eventually operations to enlarge the state.

With the creation of “Greater Israel” following the conquest of the West Bank and Gaza in1967, the dissonance returned. The solution however could not easily be resolved this time by the force of ethnic cleansing. The number of Palestinians was larger, their assertiveness and liberation movement were forcefully present on the ground, and even the most cynical and traditionally pro-Israel actors on the international scene recognized their existence.

The dissonance was resolved in a different way. The land without people was any part of the greater Israel the state wished to Judaize in the pre-1967 boundaries or annex from the territories occupied in 1967. The land with people was in the Gaza Strip and some enclaves in the West Bank as well as inside Israel. The land without people is destined to expand incrementally in the future, causing the number of people to shrink as a direct consequence of this encroachment.

Incremental ethnic cleansing

This incremental ethnic cleansing is hard to notice unless one contextualizes it as a historical process. The noble attempt by the more conscientious individuals and groups in the West and inside Israel to focus on the here and now — when it comes to Israeli policies — is doomed to be weakened by the contemporary contextualization, not the historical one.

Comparing Palestine to other places was always a problem. But with the murderous reality in Syria, Iraq and elsewhere, it becomes an even more serious challenge. The last closure, the last political arrest, the last assault, the last murder of a youth are horrific crimes, but pale in comparison to nearby or far-away killing fields and areas of colossal atrocities.

Criminal narrative

The comparison is very different when it is viewed historically and it is in this context that we should realize the criminality of Peres’ narrative which is as horrific as the occupation — and potentially far worse. For the president of Israel, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, there were never Palestinians before he initiated in 1993 the Oslo process — and when he did, they were only the ones living a small part of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

In his discourse, he already eliminated most of the Palestinians. If you did not exist when Peres came to Palestine, you definitely do not exist when he is the president in 2013. This elimination is the point where ethnic cleansing becomes genocidal. When you are eliminated from the history book and the discourse of the top politicians, there is always a danger that the next attempt would be your physical elimination.

It happened before. The early Zionists, including the current president, talked about the transfer of the Palestinians long before they actually disposed them in 1948. These visions of a de-Arabized Palestine appeared in every Zionist diary, journal and inner conversation since the beginning of the 20th century. If one talks about nothingness in a place where there is plenty it can be willful ignorance. But if one talks about nothingness as a vision or undeniable reality, it is only a matter of power and opportunity before the vision becomes reality.

Denial continues

Peres’ interview on the eve of the 65th commemoration of the Nakba is chilling not because it condones any violent act against the Palestinians, but because the Palestinians have entirely disappeared from his self-congratulatory admiration for the Zionist achievement in Palestine. It is bewildering to learn that the early Zionists denied the existence of Palestinians in 1882 when they arrived; it is even more shocking to find out that they deny their existence — beyond sporadic ghettoized communities — in 2013.

In the past, the denial preceded the crime — a crime that only partially succeeded but for which the perpetrators were never brought to justice. This is probably why the denial continues. But this time, it is not the existence of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians which is at stake, but that of almost six million who live inside historic Palestine and another five and half million living outside Palestine.

One would think only a madman can ignore millions and millions of people, many of them under his military or apartheid rule while he actively and ruthlessly disallows the return of the rest to their homeland. But when the madman receives the best weapons from the US, Nobel Peace Prizes from Oslo and preferential treatment from the European Union, one wonders how seriously we should take the Western references to the leaders of Iran and North Korea as dangerous and lunatic?

Lunacy is associated these days, it seems, to possession of nuclear arms in non-Western hands. Well, even on that score, the local madman in the Middle East passes the test. Who knows, maybe in 2014 it would not be the Israeli cognitive dissonance that would be solved, but the Western one: how to reconcile a universal position of human and civil rights with the favored position Israel in general and Shimon Peres in particular receives in the West?

The author of numerous books, Ilan Pappe is professor of history and director of the European Centre for Palestine Studies at the University of Exeter.

 

http://electronicintifada.net/content/when-israeli-denial-palestinian-existence-becomes-genocidal/12388

 

West Bank Wall Art

Israeli airport authorities grill British photojournalist before kicking him out

by Mark Kerrison on March 31, 2013

 

http://mondoweiss.net/2013/03/authorities-british-photojournalist.html

 

“I don’t pretend to know night-time from day, but if I were your God I’d have something to say” (Ben Gurion Prison, 14th March 2013)
 
These words, scrawled inconspicuously on the wall just above my head amid a plethora of other graffiti, drew my eyes as I sat on a dirty, broken bunk in an Israeli ‘facility’.
 
Or at least that’s what the Israelis call it. In my lexicon, rows of cells with no door handles on the inside and double bars across the windows are found in a ‘prison’.
 
That’s where I found myself on 13th March, six hours after arriving at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport at the start of a photographic holiday.
 
Initially, things were as I would have expected on arrival in Israel.

 

At about 4 pm, I waited patiently in a queue to have my passport checked with a colleague from work that I had met by chance on the plane.
 
I stepped forward and was asked why I was visiting Israel and whether I’d visited before. I told the immigration official that I was visiting as a tourist and that I’d visited before as a child and in 2011.
 
This answer sufficed for him to tell me that my passport was being retained and that I should direct myself to a room in a quiet corner of the immigration hall for “a few more questions.”
 
I was surprised - I’ve travelled extensively without problems - but aware that security at Ben Gurion airport is quite unlike anywhere else in the world. I was also uncomfortable at having surrendered my passport, aware that this ran contrary to UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office advice because of the risk of passport cloning by Israeli authorities.
 
At first sight, the room indicated by the immigration official wasn’t too unwelcoming; generic airport seating and a drinks vending machine for those who travel with currency. Every seat was taken, though. I wasn’t sure if that was reassuring or not.
 
However: a young German female and I were the only Caucasians present. Travellers to Israel were being selected for interrogation based on their racial or ethnic profile. This appalled me and I set about counting. During the six hours that I was to spend in and around that room, 25 travelers were similarly detained; only three of us were Caucasian.
 
My turn for interrogation came at 6:40 pm, 2½ hours after my arrival.
 
“Mark, come.”
 
I followed a young Israeli woman in uniform into a small office. We sat at either side of a desk and a computer. On my left sat two casually dressed males. I was later informed that they were officers from Shin Bet, Israel’s internal security service.
 
“Why did you come to Israel?” the woman started aggressively.
 
“For a much-needed holiday, a photographic holiday,” I replied calmly. 
 
She failed to understand and asked me to speak up.
 
I repeated my answer, just as loudly and clearly as I had the first time.
 
It was already clear that no pleasantries were on offer in this office.
 
“Where are you going in Israel?”
 
I told her that I would first spend two or three days in and around Jerusalem, visiting the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to pray for my brother (I explained why) and traveling to Bethlehem and Masada, before moving on to Tel Aviv, Haifa, Galilee and, I hoped, Eilat.
 
I was, of course, faced with the usual conundrum for anyone arriving in Israel wishing to include the West Bank as part of an itinerary. Mention any West Bank destination other than Bethlehem and you will be refused admission to Israel; fail to mention it and have it suspected and you will be refused admission anyway. I did also intend to visit the West Bank.
 
“Who do you know in Israel?”
 
“No one.”
 
“How long in Israel?”
 
“About three weeks.”
 
“What? Three weeks in Israel? Three weeks is too long! No one comes for three weeks to Israel!”
 
I considered pointing out that the Israeli Ministry of Tourism might see things differently, but thought better of it.
 
Instead, I repeated that I had three weeks in which to see as much of the country as I could.
 
One of the two men intervened.
 
“And the Gaza Strip? And the West Bank?”
 
“I am not visiting the Gaza Strip or the West Bank,” I said firmly but politely.
 
I felt as though I had been catapulted into a scene from a cheesy spy thriller, but although uncomfortable at being forced to state only a partial truth, I remained completely calm.
 
“Where are you staying in Israel?” the woman resumed.
 
I told her the name of my guesthouse, that I had booked two nights and handed her a copy of the reservation.
 
“Why only two nights?”
 
I explained that I only ever book one or two nights when I travel, so that I can plan my holiday on the fly and stay longer in places that I like.
 
“Where have you traveled this year?”
 
“Paris, Prague, Dublin and Turkey.”
 
“How can you travel so much? It’s not possible that you can travel so much.”
 
I explained that some of my trips were for work rather than for pleasure.
 
More intrusive questions followed, about my family, my marriage and family holidays.  Almost every question was followed by an inevitable “Are you sure?”
 
One of the men stood up.
 
“What about the Gaza Strip? When did you go to the Gaza Strip?”
 
“I have never been to the Gaza Strip,” I replied calmly.
 
At times, their interrogation, although intimidating, bordered on caricature.
 
The woman resumed.
 
“Is it your first time in Israel?”
 
“No. I came with my school when I was 13 and again in 2011.”
 
“Why did you come with your school? Are you a teacher?”
 
“No, I was 13!”
 
“What’s your job?”
 
I told her that I work in consumer electronics; I didn’t tell her that I also freelance as a photojournalist.
 
“When was the second time?”
 
“2011.”
 
“How long in Israel?”
 
“Two weeks.”
 
“Where did you go?”
 
“Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Bethlehem.”
 
“What? In two weeks? Only Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Bethlehem? That’s not possible!” she mocked.
 
I explained that it would easily have been possible to spend the entire two weeks in Jerusalem, so much was there to see in and around the city. I added that this was the main reason for me returning to see more of Israel.
 
“No one comes to Israel more than once!”
 
Another strapline for the Israeli Ministry of Tourism.
 
Other questions followed in quick succession.
 
I told her the name of the convent where I had stayed and that I had spoken to people in restaurants and shops as well as to other guests in the convent.
 
I reeled off a couple of random first names from memory and told her that we had spoken about Jerusalem’s religious and other tourist sites.
 
I recall thinking that it was a bit like conversing with a persistent toddler.
 
One of the men intervened.
 
“So you didn’t meet any Palestinians?”
 
“No, I didn’t,” I said clearly, gathering that there must be some kind of prohibition on speaking to Palestinians.
 
“Are you sure?”
 
“Very sure.”
 
“So if I take your phone I won’t find the names of any Palestinians?”
 
“No, you won’t.”
 
“It’s better if you tell me now because if I find them you’ll be in big trouble.”
 
I repeated my answer.
 
“Do you know any Arabs in London?”
 
“I have friends from many different countries owing to my work and studies.”
 
“What about Mohamed?”
 
“Mohamed? Who’s he?” I laughed.
 
He asked for my phone.
 
For an instant, I considered refusing - this seemed beyond the bounds of reasonable questioning – but any refusal would have been pointless. 
 
He seemed satisfied with a quick check. I later discovered that he had used £5.00 of my PAYG credit without asking permission.
 
The woman asked me to write down my name, home phone number, mobile phone number, home e-mail address, work e-mail address, father’s name and grandfather’s name.
 
One of the men asked if I had any other e-mail addresses.
 
“No.”
 
“A facebook account?”
 
I had read an article suggesting that Israeli immigration officers ask travelers to open e-mail and facebook accounts for them to trawl, so I opted to say that I hadn’t.
 
This was a mistake.
 
He showed me on-screen an old e-mail address of mine entered in the sign-in page of a facebook account.
 
I started to explain, entirely truthfully, that I’d not actively used the e-mail address for years and that the facebook account has always remained entirely blank, but he cut me short and yelled at me from close proximity.
 
“You’ve been lying since the moment you walked through the door! Everything you’ve said has been a lie! Either you start to tell me the truth or you’re going to find yourself in serious trouble. I can make things very difficult for you. If I refuse you entry to Israel, you will have problems in many other countries. You will have to answer lots of questions about why you were refused entry to Israel. Now, tell me about your time in the West Bank. Who did you meet? Which Palestinians did you meet? Which Israelis did you meet? I want names. NOW!”
 
I repeated, quite simply, that I had not visited the West Bank.
 
“GET OUT! GET OUT!” he snarled at me.
 
It was about 7:25 pm. I shrugged my shoulders and walked outside.
 
He returned ten minutes later with my phone.
 
“You will not be entering Israel tonight.”
 
I sensed that there would be no tomorrow.  
 
A shocked fellow detainee asked him why but he walked away.
 
On the face of it, I had been denied entry because I had forgotten about an e-mail account unused for years and a never-used facebook account; neither contained a single reference to either Israel or Palestine.
 
At 7.55 pm, an immigration officer led me to the baggage handling area.
 
The left-luggage attendant joked that he had completed a claim form because my rucksack had remained unclaimed for so long.
 
I guess he must repeat the same joke every day.
 
I was then led to a large room, closed to prying eyes. Everything was white. It contained a huge x-ray machine and a long row of tables.
 
I said that I didn’t have a laptop but that, as a photojournalist, I was carrying a lot of photographic equipment. This was the first time I mentioned that I also freelance as a photojournalist.
 
My luggage was x-rayed.
 
Two intelligence officers started to rifle through my rucksack with an electronic device as I was gestured into a small room by the immigration officer.
 
“Empty your pockets.”
 
I pulled out some British coins and my press credentials. My passport still hadn’t been returned to me.
 
I was then asked to remove my shirt and shoes and to unbutton my fly. I fixed the official in the eye as if to question this and he indicated that I should proceed.
 
I’d never been subjected to a strip search before.
 
Not in Soviet Russia. Not in Albania. Not in Latin America. Not in the US.
 
Only in Israel.
 
He patted me from head to toe and then swabbed me with an electronic device, including around my genitals.
 
An unwelcome invasion of privacy for me as a Caucasian male, I pondered how degrading and invasive this process must be for other travelers.
 
The contents of my rucksack and hand luggage had now been security-checked and were strewn all over the tables. I was asked to repack. Just the paraphernalia of modern life required by any backpacker on holiday.
 
Minus my bottle of water - they’d thrown that away.
 
At 8.25 pm, I was escorted back to the original room in the immigration hall. There were free seats now. An immigration official sat near to me.
 
A Muslim woman waiting when I arrived just after 4 pm was still there. There was no change in the ethnic profile of those waiting.
 
I had had no access to a toilet for over 5 hours and no food for 12 hours.
 
I phoned my guesthouse, knowing at least that I would no longer need accommodation that evening. I told them that I had been detained by Israeli immigration, that I did not know why and that I may or may not be allowed through the following day.
 
When I finished the call, the immigration official informed me that I was being deported. He apologised that I had not been told before and pointed out that he was not in charge. I asked him whether he knew why I was being deported; he said he didn’t.
 
At 9:20 pm, a female intelligence officer entered the room.
 
She also informed me that I was being deported and said that my flight to the UK would leave at 5 pm the following day.
 
I again asked why I was being deported.
 
“Security.”
 
“But what’s the reason?”
 
“Security. That’s all I can say.”
 
At 9:55 pm, two men told me that they were taking me to a ‘facility’ where I could eat and sleep.
 
One smiled as he read a form bearing my photo given to him by an intelligence officer.
 
“What did you do? Did you throw stones at the soldiers?”
 
I explained that I had just arrived in Israel on holiday and asked him if the form explained why I had been denied entry.
 
He said that my refusal came not from Israeli immigration but from the Shabak. I later learned that Shabak is another name for Shin Bet, Israel’s internal security service.
 
I was transported to a prison in the back of an armored prison van, a journey of around 10 minutes from the airport.
 
Once there, a warder told me to leave my baggage downstairs and to take only my money and any jewellery. I could not take my stomach medication.
 
He asked my nationality and why I was there. I told him that I was from the UK and that I had come to Israel on holiday.
 
He offered me food – which I refused in protest at my unjust detention – and then apologized as he showed me to my cell, adding before he slammed the door that I should bang on the door if I needed anything.
 
It was 10:20 pm, over six hours after my arrival.
 
The lights were off, but I could see that the cell contained three double-bunks. Two were half-occupied and the occupants were trying to sleep.
 
I sat on the free bunk.
 
The cell stank of urine. There were double bars on the window. The door had a peephole but no handle on the inside. I could see a toilet and a basin. The walls of the cell and the underside of the bunk above me were covered in graffiti.
 
I used the toilet – my first opportunity for seven hours – and settled down to meditate on my bunk. I knew I wouldn’t sleep so I didn’t even try. I later discovered that I had been bitten by bed bugs merely from sitting on the filthy bunk.
 
As the night wore on, I could periodically hear other inmates shouting and banging on the doors of cells in the same corridor. Some of the voices were female. The only response I ever heard was an unsympathetic “Go to sleep!”
 
Two more men entered at around 7 am. They talked to one of the other occupants in Russian.
 
As daylight started to penetrate the barred window, I could see more of my surroundings. My bunk was broken in several places and there were bare electric wires sprouting from the wall right next to my head.
 
I began to read the graffiti. Those detained here had come from all over the globe. There were so many different languages represented.
 
I was shocked to think that all these people were being deported.
 
Much, if not all, of the text was harsh in its condemnation of Israel and its human rights record. I noticed a number of slogans calling for a ‘Free Palestine’. The few anti-Semitic comments and swastikas sickened me.
 
My eyes were most drawn, though, to some words in small, inconspicuous lettering immediately above my head: “I don’t pretend to know night-time from day, but if I were your God I’d have something to say.”
 
I found these words comforting and I memorized them.
 
I refused breakfast and lunch and tried to explain to my cellmates – only one of whom spoke a few words of English – that my refusal was in protest at my unjust detention. I should not, in any case, eat without my stomach medication.
 
I was sharing the cell with a Thai and three Moldovans. The Thai was being deported after four years in Israel and one of the Moldovans after ten years.
 
At 10 am, a cleaner arrived and we were ushered out of the cell. The Thai and one of the Moldovans left for their deportation flights. I joined the other two Moldovans for a quick cigarette outside, amusing myself with the thought that this was the only sun I would see in Israel. They also left an hour or so later.
 
At 4:10 pm, 24 hours after my arrival, a warder informed me that I was being taken to catch the 5 pm flight to London. He granted me access to my stomach medication. I had difficulty swallowing it without water. I hadn’t drunk any water for well over 24 hours.
 
I sat alone in a sealed compartment in the middle of an armored truck. Two immigration officers sat in the front, one carrying handcuffs.
 
We passed through a number of security checkpoints.
 
At one, the door to my compartment opened.
 
“Hello,” said a very young Israeli woman.
 
I returned her greeting with a smile and had a strong sense that she found it difficult to imagine that I had done anything wrong.
 
I hadn’t.
 
Maybe she had that feeling every time she saw someone pass in one of those armored trucks on their way to a deportation flight.
 
At 5:45 pm, I was escorted across the tarmac towards my flight, the first passenger to board.
 
One of the immigration officers explained that my passport would be handed to the captain, only to be returned to me when we reached the UK.
 
I was greeted by the Easyjet crew at the top of the mobile stairway. The captain handed me my passport and smiled.
 
“You’re on British soil now,” he said.
 
I still don’t know for sure why I was denied entry to Israel.
 
I imagine, though, that Israeli intelligence Google-searched my human rights photojournalism in advance of my arrival and decided not to interrogate me around that as to deny access to a holidaying photographer is less likely to attract criticism than to deny access to a photojournalist.
 
Until such time as our Governments apply genuine pressure on Israel to permit travelers to openly state on arrival that they wish to visit the West Bank without risk of being denied entry, I fear that other people, too, may find themselves in the same distasteful predicament.

 

 

OCHA Humanitarian monitor monthly report Feb 2013

February Overview

 

Displacement has grave physical, social, economic and emotional impact on people. The main displacement triggers in the occupied Palestinian territory in recent years have included the outbreak in hostilities, restrictive planning, settler activities and natural disasters. Developments and activities during February highlighted the situation of families recently displaced, or at risk of imminent displacement, as well as the role of humanitarian assistance in alleviating the resulting hardship.

 

In the Gaza Strip, over 2,400 people, whose homes were destroyed or damaged beyond repair during the November 2012 escalation in hostilities, are still displaced in rented accommodation or with host families. While reconstruction works are underway for about a third of the 382 affected homes, none has been completed. During the month UN agencies, as well as the local authorities and a few NGOs, finalized the distribution of cash assistance to all the displaced families, aimed at covering rental expenses and the purchase of essential furniture and home items.

 

In East Jerusalem, settler organizations have accelerated their efforts to take over land and property in the strategic Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood. Ongoing eviction proceedings at an Israeli court have placed a family of ten (the Shamasne family) at imminent risk of forced displacement. The Palestinian Authority has provided the family with legal assistance. To date, an estimated 2,000 Israeli settlers reside in Palestinian neighbourhoods in East Jerusalem, resulting in constant tension and the increased fragmentation of the affected areas.

While all 650 people displaced as a result of floods during January’s storm have returned to their homes, there were many whose vulnerability was exacerbated even further by the damage sustained by their already precarious shelters. In an intervention completed during the month, more than 100 herding families in the southern West Bank received assistance to winterize their residential shelters. A number of additional interventions ongoing or completed during February sought to mitigate the impact of the storm’s damage on agricultural livelihoods, estimated at US$ 16.5 million. The interventions’ main priorities were the reduction of livestock mortality, the rehabilitation of greenhouses, and the repair of agricultural roads serving isolated communities.

 

In the West Bank, February also witnessed an escalation in clashes between Palestinians and Israeli forces during demonstrations and protests. Most protests were held in support of Palestinian prisoners on hunger strike in Israeli jails, while a few other demanded the opening of the main street in Hebron City (Shuhada street), currently used only by Israeli settlers, for Palestinian use too. This resulted in the injury of 746 Palestinian civilians, more than a three-fold increase compared to the monthly average of injuries during 2012. Of particular concern is the more frequent firing of rubber-coated metal bullets by Israeli forces, which resulted in the death of one demonstrator and the injury of another 294, a few of whom are in critical condition. The Israel Security Agency (also known as “Shabak”) also recorded a sharp increase in Palestinian attacks against Israeli security forces, mostly throwing of Molotov cocktails, which resulted in the injury of two soldiers.

 

The impact of the financial crisis affecting the PA on the delivery of health services has been of increasing concern. The Ministry of Health’s debt amounts to over US$ 170 million, the large majority to pharmaceutical providers and hospitals providing specialized care. Health employees have taken strike action to protest the irregular payment of salaries and staff shortages, reducing people’s access to medical treatment and forcing hospitals to cancel non-emergency surgeries. The situation of hospitals in East Jerusalem, which are the exclusive providers of some specialized medical treatments, is of particularly concern.

 

http://www.ochaopt.org/documents/ocha_opt_the_humanitarian_monitor_2013_03_25_english.pdf

 

 

 

World Water Day - 22nd March 2013