Saturday
06.15.2019 US medical team removes Israeli bullet from head of Palestinian infant Middle East Monitor. Article says occupation trooper shot the child three weeks ago as she sat in her mother’s lap. A team of American doctors that does difficult surgeries operated on the child to extract the bullet. Is this a great picture or what?
06.15.2019 On 61st Friday of Great March of Return and Breaking Siege, Israeli forces wound 92 Palestinian civilians, 28 of them were children, and four were medics, including female Paramedic IMEMC. Jewish snipers, firing from the safety of military embankments on the Israeli side, continued their violent suppression of Palestinian civilian protests of the Gaza siege.
Firing barrages of gas, the Israelis shot 25 people with live ammunition-including a child they shot in the chest-, shot 52 civilians with rubber coated steel bullets, and fired so many gas canisters that they wounded 15 civilians with direct hits of gas bombs.
06.15.2019 Israeli soldiers attack Palestinian detainees in Asqalam IMEMC. The day before Palestinian prisoners began a hunger strike to protest conditions, occupation troops attacked them in their cells. The first demand the prisoners have to their jailers is to stop attacking them in their cells. Other demands are improved health care for four seriously ill prisoners, air conditioning in the hallways, hot water and an end to arbitrary sanctions against prisoners.
06.15.2019 Soldiers attack father and his son, confiscate money, in Hebron IMEMC. Jewish occupation troops ransacked the Jarour home, beat the father and son with clubs and rifles, stole their money, and left. Article mentions the occupiers raided several other neighborhoods in the area.
06.15.2019 Illegal colonist settlers occupy a Palestinian store in Hebron IMEMC. Jewish colonist threw out a shop owner, changed the locks on his place, and they’re making alterations. Occupation troops won’t help so the owner is left with trying to get his place back through Israeli military government courts.
06.15.2019 Weapons malfunction kills a Qassam fighter in Gaza IMEMC. 25-year-old Mohammad Kallomb died in what appears to be a training accident. No specifics given.
06.15.2019 Female Palestinian detainees announce demands, plan for collective strike IMEMC. Women prisoners at Damon have issued a list of demands and are planning a hunger strike if they’re not met. They want their confiscated books and family pictures returned, opening of a library and classroom for the girls, removal of intrusive surveillance cameras, and more exercise time.
06.15.2019 Rare photograph reveals ancient Jerusalem mosque destroyed in 1967 Haaretz by Nir Hassan. The mosque was built in Salidin’s time, around 1190 AD. [about the time Nortre Dame Cathedral was built.] Photo mentioned in the title was taken in 1931 from a German Zepplin. The Israelis destroyed the mosque in 1967 after they captured Jerusalem. Article makes the claim [believed by no one] that the Israeli Antiquities Authority “did not realize the mosque’s importance.”
6.15.2019 Hamas: our struggle is against the Israeli occupation, not the Jews IMEMC After Hamas member Fathi Hamad made inflammatory statements advocating killing Jews wherever they are, Hamas made an official statement denouncing those comments, stating empathically that the comments were against Islam and against Hamas official policy. Article notes that Hamas has repeatedly condemned attacks against Jewish religious places around the world.
Sunday
06.16.02019 Welcome to Trump Heights, the Israeli town that doesn’t exist Haaretz by Noa Landau. In a bizarre public relations ploy, Israel has put a big sign with gold colored letters, “Trump Heights,” on a patch of fake grass, on the occupied Golan Heights, which legally belongs to Syria. That’s all that’s there. Just the sign. Knesset member Zvi Hauser notes, “There is no funding. There is no planning. There is no locations, and there is really no committed discussion.”
06.16.2019 Israeli soldiers abduct four Palestinians in Bethlehem and Ramallah IMEMC. Night and fog raids.
06.16.2019 Soldiers abduct five Palestinians in Jerusalem. IMEMC. More night and fog raids.
06.16.2019 Army injures many Palestinians in Southern Gaza IMEMC. Jewish siege troops fired barrages of high-velocity gas bombs at homes in Gaza causing choking problems and lung irritation. Five, including children, taken to hospital.
06.16.2019 Sara Netanyahu admits criminal offense in plea deal, will pay fine. Haaretz. Charged with aggravated fraud, fraud, and breach of trust, indictment alleges Netanyahu’s wife ordered $100,000 of catered meals to the PM’s residence and concealed that the residence already had a cook. She has agreed to pay $15,000 fine.
Monday
06.17.2019 Israeli soldiers uproot Palestinian trees in al-Isawiya IMEMC East Jerusalem: Jewish occupiers killed dozens more Palestinian olive trees today claiming the trees were in the way of occupation surveillance cameras.
06.17.2019 Israeli soldiers continue the bulldozing of Palestinian lands south of Nablus IMEMC Jewish occupation troops continued to destroy the land owned by Khirbat village, which is now surrounded by five illegal colonies and outposts. It is the subject of regular attacks by occupation troops and colonists.
Also from IMEMC
06.17.2019 Israeli colonists attack Palestinians in Hebron
06.17.2019 Israel expands illegal colonist outpost near Jenin.
06.17.2019 After court orders demolition of 100 flats Israeli police demand removal of protest tent in Jerusalem.
06.17.2019 Israel approves plans to cut down 2,000 olive trees near Bethlehem.
06.17.2019 Illegal Israeli colonists puncture car tires, write racist graffiti, near Ramallah.
06.17.2019 Israeli soldiers abduct 16 Palestinians in the West Bank.
06.17.2019 Updated: “Israeli soldiers destroy four sheds, solar panels. IMEMC Jewish occupation troops flattened four sheds, including one that was home to ten members of Mohamad Ali Dabasa’s family.
06.17.2019 ‘There will be war’” Hebrew graffiti sprayed on West Bank mosque Haaretz. Kosher thugs spray paint mosque with Star of David and other racist graffiti. Also puncture tires on Palestinian cars. Get away with it.
06.17.2019 Mohamed Morsi, ousted President of Egypt, dies in court. The Guardian by Ruth Michaleson. 67-year-old Morsi, collapsed in the prisoner’s cage and died. He has been in prison since July 03, 2013 when he was overthrown in a military coup by the present dictator al-Sisi. al-Sisi’s regime is accused by almost everybody of causing Morsi’s death. Morsi became Egypt’s first democratically elected President in 2012 with 57.7 percent of the vote. Article notes that after seizing power al-Sisi’s troops attacked large camps of protesters who were demanding Morsi’s reinstatement. They killed 1,150 protesters.
Tuesday
06.18.2019 Jurgen Todenhofer: Why did Israeli soldiers shoot me? (video) IMEMC. Jurgen Todenhofer is a 78-year old German journalist/author. As a young man he was a lawyer, judge, and he served as a member of the German parliament for eighteen years. On June 14, 2019, an Israeli sniper shot him in the back with a rubber coated steel bullet, as he was standing several hundred meters (a couple football fields) away from Israel’s segregation fence. He was holding a sign that read, in English: “Dear Israelis, Please treat Palestinians the same way you want to be treated!” He said later on social media, “Watch the 7 minute video! There is no other constitutional state in the world where you are shot for such a conciliatory sentence. It can’t go on like this.”
06.18.2019 Fearing for the patient’s life: PCHR warns of medicine shortage in Gaza Strip hospitals. IMEMC. Palestinian Center for Human Rights called on the Palestinian Authority and the international community to send urgently needed medical supplies through Israel’s blockade. Gaza hospitals are full of seriously ill people (not to mention wounded people) with cancer, kidney failure, etc. who can’t be treated adequately because Israel won’t let in supplies.
06.18.2019 Dani Dayan: We’re fed up with BDS, Louis Farrakhan, and Women’s March. The Jerusalem Post. by Imri Nahmias. The always hilarious Dani Dayan speaks out to Americans on Israel’s disapproval of the First Amendment of our Constitution. [Hey Dani, if you don’t like it, don’t let the door hit you on the way out.]
Also from IMEMC.
06.18.2019 Illegal colonists uproot Palestinians lands near Bethlehem
06.18.2019 Soldiers demolish a hardware store in Jerusalem Occupation troops surrounded the neighborhood so no one could enter or leave. Then they demolished the store.
06.18.2019 Army demolishes agricultural shed, cuts trees, near Nablus More dead olive trees. The 42 square meter shed Israel wrecked was built with funds provided by international relief groups to help the family after the last time Israel destroyed their place.
06.18.2019 Army demolishes an under-construction building in Shufat refugee camp: East Jerusalem: Jewish occupation troops with bulldozers surrounded the neighborhood then destroyed a two story building.
06.18.2019 Israeli soldiers invade Biet Ummar north of Hebron. Occupation troops attacked and ransacked homes. Gassed the children who came out to throw rocks at them. Fired rubber coated steel bullets and concussion grenades.
06.18.2019 Two siblings forced to demolish their homes in Jerusalem. IMEMC. The old story, occupiers won’t issue building permits, when someone puts on a needed addition the occupiers order the building demolished. If people don’t do it themselves, Israel demolished it and charges them exorbitant rates, plus fines.
06.18.2019 Cartoonists draw their fury toward the New York Times: ‘It seems we have touched a nerve.’ Washington Post by Michael Cavna. ‘A week ago, Patrick Chappatte wrote on his blog that he was a freshly ousted contract contributor to the NYT, which, as of July, 01, would cease running political cartoons in its international edition, bringing it “into line” with the domestic paper.”
06.18.2019 Cars vandalized, malicious graffiti sprayed in Palestinian town Haaretz, by Jack Khoury. Deir Istiya village: Jewish thugs slashed tires, spray painted Star of David and other hate graffiti around this Arab community. 23 vehicles damaged.
Wednesday
06.19.2019 Child released a month after losing his leg when Israeli soldiers shot him with expanding dum dum bullet IMEMC. Because of the horrific injuries they cause, expanding bullets have been banned-by international agreement-from combat for over a hundred years. But Israel uses them on civilians, including children. In this case, 14-year-old Mahmoud Salah was playing soccer with his friends when Jewish occupation troops shot him. He said the ball went out of the field. He ran over, picked it up, and was running back with it when the Israelis gunned him down. “I just ran a few feet, then I fell and the soldiers ran to me and started kicking and beating me up, and later took me behind the (annexation) wall where I was kept for about 2 hours, until an ambulance came and took (me) to the hospital.” The boy slipped into a coma and next day doctors amputated his leg. There’s a video with the article showing him learning how to walk with crutches.
06.19.2019 Palestinian from Jerusalem dies from serious wounds suffered two weeks ago IMEMC. Jewish undercover troops attacked a 60-year-old Palestinian man in front of his home in occupied East Jerusalem. They beat him so savagely, including breaking his ribs, that he was rushed to the hospital. Now he has died.
Also, from IMEMC
06.19.2019 Army abducts three Palestinians in Hebron
06.19.2019 Israeli soldiers demolish under construction home in Jericho.
06.19.2019 Israeli soldiers abduct four Palestinians in Bethlehem. Night and fog raids.
06.19.2019 Illegal Israeli colonists attack Palestinians near Salfit (Central West Bank) 64-year-old man was injured with the stones by10 or more Jewish colonists throwing stones at people and houses.
06.19.2019 Japan, UNDP support solar power to treat Gaza waste water. UN Development Programme, the Japanese Government, and the Palestinian Government have inaugurated a $500,000 solar powered waste water treatment program.
06.19.2019 Villagers live in fear and uncertainty as four more homes destroyed in South Hebron Hills Israel wrecked four homes in two villages yesterday. Article says the Dababar family which was in one of the homes mentioned yesterday, has lived in the region for generations, is now homeless and living in tents donated by the Red Cross. The occupiers beat local people during the demolitions and threatened activists who were filming the crimes.
06.19.2019 NYT cartoon controversy shows: When it comes to political correctness, Israelis are hypocrites Haaretz by Ofri Ilany. After New York Times published the cartoon of Netanyahu as a wiener seeing eye dog leading blind Trump, Israel supporters had a hissy fit until NYT announced it would stop publishing political cartoons in its international edition. In this article Ilany writes: “The racist and Islamaphobic statements voiced in (Israeli) TV studios would never be broadcast in Western countries, or perhaps only on explicitly right-wing channels. Israeli politicians also freely stereotype Arabs, Muslims, and blacks.
“Israel is the country of victims and victimhood is at the core of its identity… Israeli propaganda, as is its wont, seeks to have its cake and eat it too. Israel attacks the dialog of the politically correct when it’s convenient to do so, and turns to claims of victimhood when that seems useful.”
06.19.2019 Dianne Feinstein’s billionaire husband and his love affair with Israel Haaretz by Judy Maltz.
06.19.2019 Settlements continue to expand despite international conventions IMEMC.
06.19.2019 Jordan to head UNRWA (UN Relief and Works Agency) for Palestinian refugees IMEMC. Turkey has passed chairmanship of UNRWA to Jordan but says it will continue to support Palestinians.
06.19.2019 Does Israel violate human rights? Here’s what the top Democratic candidates say The Forward by Aiden Pink. Nine American candidates, groveling to Israel, don’t answer the question. If you’ve got the stomach, see it for yourself.
06.19.2019 The two-state solution is dead. Let us take the obvious and humane path forward Mondoweiss by Mike Gravel. Presidential candidate, and former Alaska senator Mike Gravel, lays it on the line. He was not interviewed by the Forward when they asked American presidential candidates about Israel. So, here are some points from Mike:
*The two-state solution is dead. We have killed it.
*If Bill Clinton or Barak Obama couldn’t end the occupation, Biden or Buttigieg won’t either.
*Without a two state solution, a one-state solution is what’s left. Maybe none of the sides will be happy about it, but it’s more viable than a two-state solution that can only lead to more bloodshed.
*As a first step Gravel proposes making AIPAC, ZOA, and other Israeli lobby groups register as foreign agents.
*America should stop military aid to Israel because of Israel’s crimes against Palestinian people.
*America should refuse to take unconstitutional steps to stifle BDS. “an individual or group’s decision not to associate with anther group or country is a legitimate exercise of the freedoms of speech and association guaranteed by the constitution, and using the power of the government to influence those decisions is wrong. Senators Amy Klobucher and Cory Booker should be ashamed of themselves for supporting federal laws to restrict BDS…
The current policy is the exact one that George Washington warned against in his farewell address: “a passionate attachment of one nation for another,” the creation of “an imaginary common interest in cases where on real common interest exists.”
Thursday
06.20.2019 A Jerusalem hospital where Palestinian babies die alone The Guardian. by Oliver Holmes.
Critically ill babies from Gaza die alone because Israel won’t let their mothers go with them to get medical care Gaza hospitals cannot provide because of the Israeli siege. Sometimes Israel lets a parent though the siege gates but some parents don’t try because Israel’s military bureaucracy delays treatment as they evaluate the mother’s level of threat against Israel. Article notes that six babies have died alone since the beginning of last year. 56 babies have been separated from their mothers.
Story of one mother of premature triplets who Israel let through the blockade. She delivered the babies, her permit expired, Israel forced to back to Gaza, leaving the babies in intensive care. She was notified by phone when the first baby died at nine days old. She was notified again when her second baby died two weeks later.
Her third baby was in intensive care at the hospital for months without her mother. After The Guardian requested an explanation from Israel, the regime allowed the mother to go to her baby the same day that Israel responded to The Guardian.
Israeli NGO Physicians for Human Rights, said Israel has issued over 7,000 permits for minors needing medical treatment outside the Gaza stockade but less than 2,000 permits have been issued to parents. Meaning that a majority of parents aren’t allowed out when their children need treatment.
Any woman who has ever nursed a baby, and who supports Israel, should read this article.
06.20.2019 The occupation’s damage has reached Berlin Haaretz by Eli Yassif. Professor emeritus of Jewish studies in Tel Aviv Eli Yassif, lays out some of (non-Jewish) Peter Schafer’s bona fides as a scholar of Judaism. “I can’t think of another non-Israeli scholar who has done so much to promote Jewish studies worldwide.”
Schafer was Director of Berlin’s Jewish Museum. He resigned under duress after attacks on him for tweeting in support of BDS. Author Yassif calls out the Jewish community of Berlin that attacked Shafer over the tweet.
“When the U.S. congress and the German Bundestag (I’m not counting regimes with Fascist tendencies like Hungary and Brazil) act according to the dictates of Israel’s occupation government and try to silence any protest against the occupation, it should be clear to us all that this damage is spreading beyond our borders.”
06.20.2019 The International Day of Refugees 2019 Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics ((PCBS). In 2018 about six million Palestinians were registered as refugees with the U.N. Relief Works Agency. That includes 64 percent of Gaza’s population. Article notes 39 percent of Palestinians overall are under fifteen (15!) years old. Also notes that refugees have more physical ailments like vision and mobility issues, higher poverty rates including deep poverty, and unemployment. At the same time these same refugees tend to be higher educated than the norm.
06.20.2019 The sea of Galilee is heating up Zavit (Science and environment in Israel) by Racheli Wacks, Amiee Teplitskiy. Once Israel’s major source of drinking water, Lake Kinneret still provides 1-2% of Israel’s drinking water. (Last year the lake dropped within inches of the Black Line, where irreversible damage occurs from saline springs under the lake bed.) A good rain year in 2018/9 raised the wasted lake by 11.4 feet. That’s the good news.
Dr. Gideon Gal, head of the Kinneret Limnological Laboratory, says zoo plankton-the base of the food chain-are already depleted along with everything that relies on them for food. He also describes increasing blooms of cyanobacteria colonies that can make the lake water toxic and undrinkable. “We need to be aware that this is likely to happen—and that it already appears to be happening.”*
Air temperatures around the lake have been increasing by 0.65 degrees C (1.17 F) every decade. Frequency, intensity, and duration of heat waves are increasing. Between 1950 and 1989 average time between heat waves was 8-9 days. Between 2005-2015 it was 6-6.5 days.
Kinneret’s temperatures, which previously were about 80 degrees could go as high as 98.6 F in the top 5-10 meters of the lake (where Israel gets its irrigation water.)
*[High cyanobacteria levels can make water undrinkable, unswimmable, and unusable for irrigation. It can produce liver and neurotoxins (that are implicated in Alzheimer’s disease). Master of Environmental Science student Kansas Keeton’s thesis ‘Toxic blue-green algae in irrigation waters: a public health threat to the city of Sydney?’ (University of Sydney, 06.22.2018)describes how vegetables irrigated with water containing cyanobacteria will incorporate and concentrate the colonies which remain after washing and cooking. She also notes finding marine cyanobacteria in fresh water near Sydney.]
Also from IMEMC
06.20.2019 Soldiers demolish two agricultural sheds, bulldoze lands in Hebron Occupiers also closed agricultural road so farmers can’t reach their fields.
06.20.2019 Soldiers abduct three Palestinians in Ramallah, one in Qalqila Night and fog raids. Undercover occupation troops broke into a residential building kidnapped two, while other occupation troops black-bagged three in Ramallah, and an 18-year old east of Quilqila.
06.20.2019 Israeli soldiers abduct two Palestinians in Bethlehem.
Friday
06.21.2019 Iran says it refrained from shooting down U.S. plane with 35 aboard:Tasnim News Reuters. Iran shot down an American Global Hawk Pegasus drone [$100 million per copy] that was spying on Iran in Iranian airspace. Iran says it could have shot down the American P-8, with 35 crew aboard, that was accompanying the drone but—they didn’t. Article notes that based on American provocations like this, Russia is accusing the U.S. of deliberately pushing Iran to the brink of war.
06.21.2019 Gheith denounces serious escalation against Palestinian homes in Jerusalem IMEMC. Palestinian governor of occupied East Jerusalem speaks out on recent surge in attacks by the Zionist occupiers.
06.21.2019 Israeli police detain a Palestinian worker IMEMC.32-year-old was working in Israel without a permit.
06.21.2019 U.S. embassy in Israel bars employees from West Bank during Bahrain conference Haaretz by Noa Landau. The conference is between June 24-26. May see some anti-American protests as the U.S. tries to sell out the Palestinians in favor of Israel. [Everyone, that is everyone involved knows Trump’s ‘Deal of the Century’ is a joke, so the protests will probably be muted.
06.21.2019 Analysis//Morsi’s death could become Egypt’s Kashoggi affair Haaretz by Zvi Bar’el. This is a really interesting, wide-ranging article. Stay with it. It’s worth reading. Here’s a synopsis:
Part 1 Morsi:
*Egypt’s current strongman, al Sisi, deposed the democratically elected president Mohammed Morsi in 2013. Since then al Sisi’s government has held Morsi prisoner.
*Last week Morsi conveniently dropped dead in court as he was testifying.
*Pretty much everybody believes the al Sisi regime killed Morsi because he knew too much. It didn’t help that al Sisi’s regime then ordered a secret funeral for Morsi and banned media from writing about it—or Morsi—or Morsi’s presidency.
Part 2 Sudan:
*Sudan lies between Egypt and Ethiopia. al Sisi, the Saudis, and UAE are a troika trying to effect regime change in Sudan.
*In return for Egyptian support of their crimes, the Saudis and UAE support a military regime so Sudan will cooperate with Egypt in whatever is about to happen, [possibly war] between Egypt and Ethiopia as Ethiopia builds a dam that will tap the Blue Nile.
*The Blue Nile dam is in Ethiopian territory, tapping Ethiopian water, but it will reduce the flow of water to Egypt hundreds of miles away on the other side of Sudan. (Sudan’s former president Bashir was not as supportive of giving Egypt all the water as al Sisi wanted.)
*The Sudanese military elite is close to the Muslim Brotherhood, but Egypt thinks they will get in line if Egypt gives them the international recognition they want.
Part 3 Libya:
*Libya today is a violent mess with two governments, Islamic State and multiple factions fighting each other.
*Egypt and UAE support Libyan Army commander Khalifa Haftar who is trying to take over Libya.
Part 4 Egypt, Israel, and the Arab Gulf states:
*Egypt supports Israel by putting the brakes on Hamas but hasn’t negotiated anything resembling a peace settlement between them and Israel.
*Because Saudi Arabia is in the dog house with the U.S. after they murdered American Saudi journalist Jamal Kashoggi at the Turkish embassy and chopped up his body, the Saudis are courting Russia and China.
*Egypt and the Gulf States like Trump but know they may lose him in 2020 so they’re hedging their bets by courting Russia and China. Especially the Saudis.
*The Saudis were supposed to make Trump’s ‘Deal of the Century’ work by pressuring Jordan and the Palestinians. Instead, the Palestinians are boycotting the talks, altogether and Jordan has rejected the deal.
06.21.2019 Israeli police ban PA sponsored event in Jerusalem WAFA Israeli Minister of the Interior Gilad Erdan ordered occupation troops to suppress a poets forum called: “Not to War, Yes to Peace” in occupied East Jerusalem. [the Israelis attacked just as the event was about to start.
06.21.2019 Photos: 79 Palestinians injured by Israeli forces in Great March of Return IMEMC. Jewish snipers, firing from the safety of military embankments, shot 79 more unarmed civilians, including two paramedics, today. The Jewish state also gassed hundreds of civilians.
06.21.2019 Israeli high court grants green light for demolishing 16 buildings of 100 apartments IMEMC. This is in Area A, which under the Oslo Accords is supposed to be under complete Palestinian control. Israel built its Annexation Wall close to the buildings and now it claims the buildings threaten Israeli ‘security.’ Palestinian Colonization Wall Resistance Commission notes in a report that Israel demolished 471 Palestinian buildings in 2018 and issued orders to destroy another 546 structures including 50 schools.
