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Category: Human rights/civil liberties

Veteran State Dept. official says she quit over Biden administration ‘twisting the facts’ on Gaza

Veteran State Dept. official says she quit over Biden administration ‘twisting the facts’ on Gaza

HuffPost reports: Veteran State Department official Stacy Gilbert quit the agency because the Biden administration is “twisting the facts” to make a “patently, demonstrably, quantifiably false” claim that Israel is not blocking humanitarian aid for Gaza in order to justify his administration’s continued military support to the country, she told HuffPost on Wednesday in the first interview since her resignation. Gilbert, who has over 20 years experience in U.S. policy toward global crises and conflicts, said she is convinced Israel’s…

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Israeli campaign against ICC may be ‘crimes against justice’, say legal experts

Israeli campaign against ICC may be ‘crimes against justice’, say legal experts

The Guardian reports: Efforts by Israel’s intelligence agencies to undermine and influence the international criminal court (ICC) could amount to “offences against the administration of justice” and should be investigated by its chief prosecutor, legal experts have said. Responding to revelations about Israeli surveillance and espionage operations against the ICC, multiple leading international law experts said the conduct of Israeli intelligence services could amount to criminal offences. The disclosures about Israel’s nine-year campaign against the court were published on Tuesday…

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U.S.-made munitions used in deadly strike on Rafah tent camp, CNN analysis shows

U.S.-made munitions used in deadly strike on Rafah tent camp, CNN analysis shows

CNN reports: Munitions made in the United States were used in the deadly Israeli strike on a displacement camp in Rafah on Sunday, a CNN analysis of video from the scene and a review by explosive weapons experts has found. At least 45 people were killed and more than 200 others injured after a fire broke out following the Israeli military’s strike on the outskirts of Gaza’s southernmost city, most of them women and children, according to the Gaza Health…

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Spying, hacking and intimidation: Israel’s nine-year ‘war’ on the International Criminal Court exposed

Spying, hacking and intimidation: Israel’s nine-year ‘war’ on the International Criminal Court exposed

The Guardian reports: When the chief prosecutor of the international criminal court (ICC) announced he was seeking arrest warrants against Israeli and Hamas leaders, he issued a cryptic warning: “I insist that all attempts to impede, intimidate or improperly influence the officials of this court must cease immediately.” Karim Khan did not provide specific details of attempts to interfere in the ICC’s work, but he noted a clause in the court’s foundational treaty that made any such interference a criminal…

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EU foreign ministers discuss sanctions against Israel

EU foreign ministers discuss sanctions against Israel

Politico reports: EU foreign ministers have for the first time engaged in a “significant” discussion on sanctioning Israel if it doesn’t comply with international humanitarian law, Irish Foreign Minister Micheál Martin said Monday. “There was a very clear consensus about the need to uphold the international humanitarian legal institutions,” Martin told reporters following the Foreign Affairs Council. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled Friday that Israel must immediately halt its offensive in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, and…

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Biden was my boss. I resigned because as a Jew I cannot endorse the Gaza genocide

Biden was my boss. I resigned because as a Jew I cannot endorse the Gaza genocide

Lily Greenberg Call writes: Until last week, President Biden was my boss. Last week, I resigned from my post at the United States Department of the Interior, becoming the first Jewish politically appointed administration official to publicly resign in protest – and in mourning – of President Biden’s endorsement of genocide in Gaza, where more than 35,000 Palestinians have been murdered. This was an incredibly difficult decision, but one that was necessary – and one that felt even more urgent,…

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Israel is committing genocide, says Human Rights Watch founder and Holocaust survivor, Aryeh Neier

Israel is committing genocide, says Human Rights Watch founder and Holocaust survivor, Aryeh Neier

Read Aryeh Neier’s article on Israel and the question of genocide here: https://t.co/nX1cUoauuC https://t.co/zQomIrXw16 — The New York Review of Books (@nybooks) May 27, 2024 Columbia University World Leaders Forum: Before joining the Open Society Institute and the Soros Foundations as President in September 1993, Aryeh Neier spent twelve years as Executive Director of Human Rights Watch, of which he was a founder in 1978. Prior to that position, he worked for the American Civil Liberties Union for fifteen years,…

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Israelis celebrate Rafah massacre as attack prompts international outcry

Israelis celebrate Rafah massacre as attack prompts international outcry

VOA reports: The U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees described the situation in Gaza as “hell on earth” Monday, following an Israeli attack in the southern city of Rafah that Gaza’s health ministry said killed at least 45 people. “Information coming out of Rafah about further attacks on families seeking shelter is horrifying,” UNRWA said. “There are reports of mass casualties including children and women among those killed.” Israel’s military said it was reviewing an incident in Rafah following reports that…

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Access to aid in Gaza was dire. Now, it’s worse

Access to aid in Gaza was dire. Now, it’s worse

The New York Times reports: The flow of aid into Gaza has shrunk so much in May that humanitarian officials say their operations are at risk of shutting down, and that the threat of widespread starvation is more acute than ever. The entry of aid trucks through Gaza’s southern crossings, where most aid has arrived since the war began, has nearly ground to a halt since Israel expanded its fighting in the southern city of Rafah. In northern Gaza, new…

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Biden’s bogus ‘red line’ on Rafah operation

Biden’s bogus ‘red line’ on Rafah operation

These public comments from Satterfield confirm what I’ve already heard privately: the impact on civilians of the Rafah operation is as bad as the administration feared, Biden has simply chosen not to enforce his red line. https://t.co/30PDE7Cxnc pic.twitter.com/YuofGtThoH — Matt Duss (@mattduss) May 26, 2024 Jacobin reports: A little more than a month ago, President Joe Biden very publicly and explicitly identified the point that he would not allow Israel’s war on Gaza to reach: an offensive on the city…

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EU foreign chief says Israel must respect UN court, control settler violence in the West Bank

EU foreign chief says Israel must respect UN court, control settler violence in the West Bank

The Associated Press reports: The European Union’s foreign policy chief insisted Sunday that Israel must abide by the U.N. top court’s rulings and end its offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah and, at the same time, questioned the possible involvement of authorities in the settler violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank. On a day that visiting Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa basked in the attention after two EU nations and Norway pledged to recognize a Palestinian…

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What really happened at Columbia? Bruce Robbins, a Jewish humanities professor, speaks out

What really happened at Columbia? Bruce Robbins, a Jewish humanities professor, speaks out

  “[Columbia] deserves a better administration than they’ve got right now” This week on Real Talk, we speak to Bruce Robbins, a Jewish professor at Columbia University, about what really happened during the recent student protests on campus, their demands for divestment from Israel, and the media coverage of it all. Filmed: 14 May 2024 Real Talk is a Middle East Eye interview show hosted by Mohamed Hashem that delves into the stories and experiences of a diverse range of…

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Biden’s vanishing red line: White House silent as top UN court orders Israel to halt Rafah attack

Biden’s vanishing red line: White House silent as top UN court orders Israel to halt Rafah attack

The Independent reports: Joe Biden said months ago that a major Israeli offensive in the city of Rafah, where more than a million displaced Palestinians have been sheltering from the war, would be a “red line” that would force him to reconsider US support for the longtime ally. Since then, more than 800,000 have fled Israeli bombardment in the southern Gaza city and aid agencies have compared the situation there to “hell on earth”. And yet, the president has shown…

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This Holocaust survivor (an American-Israeli lawyer and judge) recommended arrest warrants for Israeli and Hamas leaders

This Holocaust survivor (an American-Israeli lawyer and judge) recommended arrest warrants for Israeli and Hamas leaders

The Forward reports: By the age of 14, he had survived the Holocaust; by 44, he was an Israeli diplomat; now, at the age of 94, Theodor Meron recommended the International Criminal Court seek arrest warrants of Israeli and Hamas leaders for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Meron, a New York University professor emeritus who has served as legal counsel for both the U.S. and Israeli governments, was one of eight legal and academic experts who were convened in…

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EU’s Borrell says some European countries are trying to intimidate ICC judges, while Israel slams Germany

EU’s Borrell says some European countries are trying to intimidate ICC judges, while Israel slams Germany

Reuters reports: European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said on Friday some European countries were trying to intimidate International Criminal Court judges over a case against Israeli leaders, and must stop “meddling” and respect the court. ICC chief prosecutor Karim Khan announced on Monday that he had filed for arrest warrants against Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, as well as three Hamas leaders. “The prosecutor has done nothing more than make an accusation and…

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