Monday, December 1, 2014
Liberals' darling Elizabeth Warren defends Israeli attacks on Gaza schools and hospitals
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| Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) (Reuters / Joshua Roberts) |
Israel has the right to shell Palestinian hospitals and schools out of self defense as long as Hamas stores rocket launchers next to them, US Sen. Elizabeth Warren said during a town hall meeting in Massachusetts this week.
Warren, darling du jour of American liberals, defended her vote to send more defense funding to Israel in the middle of its recent fierce offensive on Gaza, saying she believes civilian casualties are the “last thing Israel wants,” according to the Cape Cod Times.
"But when Hamas puts its rocket launchers next to hospitals, next to schools, they're using their civilian population to protect their military assets. And I believe Israel has a right, at that point, to defend itself,"she said.
Israel and Palestinian authorities reached a long-term ceasefire agreement this week after Israel started its campaign in Gaza on July 8. The death toll from the Gaza conflict has reached at least 2,120 people, of which 577 are children, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.
During the conflict, Israel targeted schools and hospitals in Gaza, claiming that rockets and militant fighters were nearby. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency criticized both Hamas for storing rockets in two schools and Israel for attacks on separate schools.
Attacks on hospitals are prohibited by the Geneva Convention’s Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War "unless they are used to commit, outside their humanitarian duties, acts harmful to the enemy."Even then, civilian hospitals can only be targeted "after due warning has been given, naming, in all appropriate cases, a reasonable time limit and after such warning has remained unheeded."
Warren said Hamas has attacked Israel "indiscriminately.” Thanks to Israel’s vaunted Iron Dome defense system, though, those rockets have "not had the terrorist effect Hamas hoped for."
Warren supported Israel’s military aggression, justifying its use of force based on America’s “very special relationship with Israel.”
"Israel lives in a very dangerous part of the world, and a part of the world where there aren't many liberal democracies and democracies that are controlled by the rule of law,” she said. “And we very much need an ally in that part of the world."
Warren also expressed unease with conditioning future US funding for Israel on the cessation of Israeli settlements in the West Bank.
"I think there's a question of whether we should go that far," Warren said.
Last month, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said Israel may have committed war crimes in Gaza. Navi Pillay said house demolitions and the killing of children raise the “strong possibility” that Israel is violating international law.
More than 17,000 homes in Gaza were destroyed or damaged beyond repair, making around 100,000 Palestinians homeless, since the war began, according to UN estimates.
According to a senior UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) official, 373,000 Palestinian children are in need of “immediate psychosocial first aid” due to the onslaught of Israeli strikes.
“The impact has truly been vast, both at a very physical level, in terms of casualties, injuries, the infrastructure that's been damaged, but also importantly, emotionally and psychologically in terms of the destabilizing impact that not knowing, not truly feeling like there is anywhere safe place to go in Gaza,”Pernilla Ironside said last week.
UNICEF estimated that at least 219 schools have been damaged by Israeli airstrikes, while 22 were completely destroyed.
To demonstrate the extent of the damage in Gaza, Ironside estimated that it could take up to 18 years to rebuild the 17,000 housing units that were damaged in the conflict and in light of the ongoing blockade of the region limiting the movement of goods and people.
Israel has also barred major human rights organizations from entering Gaza territory.
Meanwhile, back in the United States, US Sen. Bernie Sanders, American liberals’ other favorite among establishment progressive politicians, has also defended US funding and arms for Israel. At a recent tense town hall in his native Vermont, Sanders condemned Israeli targeting of civilians, but then defended Israel “in a situation where Hamas is sending missiles into Israel” sent from “populated areas.”
"This is a very depressing and difficult issue. This has gone on for 60 bloody years," he said. "If you're asking me, do I have a magical solution? I don't. And you know what, I doubt very much that you do."
ISRAEL SETS NEW LOW: JAILS AN 11-MONTH-OLD PALESTINIAN BABY GIRL (VIDEO)
Israel has for a long time now committed a number of crimes against Palestinian women and children, but has just recently hit a new low – they have officially taken into custody the world’s youngest reported prisoner to date — an 11 month old girl.
The infant, Balqis Ghawadra, was attempting to visit her father on Wednesday, November 26, 2014, in the Ishel Israeli prison in Beer Sheba, with her mother and older 2 year-old sibling, when they were suddenly separated and held in confinement.
Director of the Ahrar Center Fu’ad Khuffash, currently working to free the family, stated:
"This is a flagrant violation of human rights, and a crime against humanity."
While this latest news is simply horrid just by itself, this kind of behavior towards Palestinian children is hardly surprising given Israel’s track record.
From May through September of this year, over 991 children have been imprisoned, according to the latest records that are available from DCI-Palestine, who keeps track of the figures.
Part of the overall Israeli strategy is to prey on these young children and recruit them as informants, who are considered to be the weakest links. It is estimated that out of every 10 people that are arrested, four of them are children.
Israel regularly jails Palestinian Children. Photo viaimemc.org
"According to those youths who have been in confinement, a variety of methods are used, including beatings, threatening with long sentences, repercussions against the family, sexual assault, and public shaming. "
The Israelis can and do detain children for up to 6 months without trial even when charges are never formally filed. And, to top it off, the detention is often based on “secret evidence.”
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| Palestinian child being detained by an Israeli soldier. Photo viaspace4peace.blogspot.com |
" Israeli Military Order 1591 empowers the military to detain children as young as 12 if there are reasonable grounds to presume that the security of the area or public security require the detention. This period can even be extended by additional six-month periods indefinitely."
Israel continues to operate in this fashion despite having signed both the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Convention against Torture.
It clearly states:
" No child shall be subjected to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. Neither capital punishment nor life imprisonment without possibility of release shall be imposed for offences [sic] committed by persons below eighteen years of age."
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| Palestinian child seperated from its parents. Photo via http://www.imemc.org |
Yet, it is general practice for Israeli military police to raid the house of an unsuspecting family in the middle of the night, drag a child out of his bed, separate him from his parents, and bring him into questioning, in direct violation of the same international customs it has agreed to.
A large percentage of the children they do take into captivity are abused sexually and emotionally, as well. In fact, around 40 percent of Palestinian children are sexually abused by Israeli soldiers,according to a report by the Palestinian Prisoners Club.
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