Human Rights

By Juan Cole UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said on Wednesday that Israel’s military actions are responsible for the death of a child every hour in recent days and observed, “Respect for the right to life of civilians, including children, should be a foremost consideration. Not abiding by these principles may amount […]

Apartheid

The World Asks: Is Israel Targeting Civilians in Gaza?

contributors

By Luisa Gandolfo via The Conversation When the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, accused Hamas of using “telegenically dead Palestinians for their cause”, he overlooked an element of the conflict that could not be skewed for the viewing public: the damage to Gaza’s infrastructure. Since the start of Operation Protective Edge 15 days ago, approximately […]

Apartheid

Gaza: Inside Israel’s massacre at al-Shujayeh: “I can’t Believe I Survived”

contributors

By Mohammed Suliman via al-Akhbar “A massacre, a massacre!” were the words my brother, who works as a doctor at Gaza’s al-Shifa Hospital, said as he yelled over the phone urging me to come to Gaza’s main hospital immediately. “Come witness the massacre,” he said. At first light, as I readied myself to go to […]

Apartheid

On ‘Human Shielding’ in Gaza: The Israeli army has tried to justify striking civilian areas

contributors

By Neve Gordon and Nicola Perugini All fighting within cities and all bombardments of urban spaces, even the most "precise and surgical", is a potential death trap for civilians. Consequently, the permeation of war into cities inevitably transforms their inhabitants into potential human shields. For Palestinians living in Gaza today, simply spending time in their […]

Apartheid

Dodging Israeli Bombs in Gaza: A Personal Journal of Survival

contributors

By Omar Ghraieb Gaza – Every night I seem to think it’s the worst night, until I go through the next one. I got so used to the house shaking and moving from the consecutive blasts that it now feels weird when everything is still. Flashing lights, the ground shaking all around, that’s my house […]

Apartheid

Gaza: The Israeli Army’s Unlawful Targeting Practices are bad for Children

contributors

By Bill Van Esveld, Human Rights Watch The Israel Defense Force has an answer to the shelling yesterday that killed four children near the Gaza City port. At a media briefing yesterday, an IDF official reportedly said the attack had targeted an “identified Hamas structure,” and that Israeli forces had misidentified the boys as “fleeing […]

Apartheid

Gaza: Netanyahu, Goaded by Israeli Far Right, Risks Breaking Int’l Law

contributors

Gaza invasion gets underway as pressure mounts on Netanyahu By Simon Mabon, Lancaster University “Phase two” of Operation Protective Edge has begun: Israeli military forces have launched a ground incursion into Gaza. Protective Edge began on July 8, with the stated goal of protecting Israeli citizens from the rocket attacks of Hamas and Islamic Jihad […]

Apartheid

Health Catastrophe in Gaza after Israel bombs water infrastructure

contributors

By: Ahmed Hadi Gaza – Bassem Siam carried two plastic gallons as he left his home in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood in northern Gaza, ignoring the intense bombardment and the continued Israeli military flights. He went to his neighbors who happen to have a small supply of drinking water to get a sip of water […]

Displaced and Refugees

Blow-Back: How Bush-Cheney Reduced Iraq to Ashes

contributors

By Dahr Jamail [This essay is a joint TomDispatch/Truthout report.] For Americans, it was like the news from nowhere. Years had passed since reporters bothered to head for the country we invaded and blew a hole through back in 2003, the country once known as Iraq that our occupation drove into a never-ending sectarian nightmare. […]