DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .

An article by Lauren Jefferson for the Augusta Free Press

In an Iraqi mall on Valentine’s Day, shoppers were treated to a unique sight. Twenty-eight young people wearing traditional dress from the many cultures in the country congregated to sing, dance, and hand out flowers and balloons with messages of love and co-existence. The event, one of 42 created and implemented by Iraqi youth across Iraq, was to promote peaceful coexistence and tolerance among Iraqi communities struggling through a divisive political climate.

The project brings together Eastern Mennonite University’s Center for Justice and Peacebuilding and the Iraqi al-Amal Association in a multi-phase project that focuses on youth and academics to build a culture of peace in the country.

As key stakeholders in Iraqi social fabric, youth and academics are “seen as instrumental in strengthening social cohesion and promoting civil society initiatives and dialogue between various ethnic and religious groups,” according to the project grant, which is funded by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

Five EMU faculty and alumni are involved: Dr. Alma Abdul-hadi Jadallah, president and managing director of Kommon Denominator, and CJP adjunct faculty; Aala Ali MA ’14, UNDP development officer; Cynthia Nassif MA ’14 of Lebanon , and Najla El Mangoush MA ’15 of Libya, both doctoral students at George Mason University; and Ahmed Tarik MA ’16, of Iraq. Nassif, Mangoush and Tarik designed workshops on conflict resolution in Arabic for both youths and academics. Jadallah provided the first training for youth in October 2016, followed by two others for youth and three for academics from Iraqi universities. While the academic trainings will lead to a peace building curricula that would be shared by universities across Iraq, the youth trainings culminated in a series of community peacebuilding project proposals.

Mangoush appreciated the opportunity to work together with CJP alumni on one project, “practicing our beliefs and skills as peacebuilders from different Arabic countries to assist peace in Iraq.” An important aspect of the project, she adds, is “acknowledging the need to promote peace from a local perspective and through religious tolerance.”

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A culture of peace in Iraq, Is it possible?

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More than 563 youth from Najaf, Nineveh and Baghdad applied to participate in the trainings. Seventy-two were selected, with criteria including age, potential, experience, connections, responsibility, diversity and vision.

After the trainings, participants created project proposals that employed sports, arts, social media, listening and dialogue to address a variety of topics: women’s rights, children’s education, displaced persons and host community engagement, interfaith dialogue and conflict resolution workshops, according to Nassif. El Mangoush and Nassif evaluated and selected proposals for funding.

Muntather Hassan, youth program coordinator for the Iraqi al-Amal Association, has attended each training, worked with youth on their proposals, and watched selected projects come to fruition.

A Facebook page that provides a space for artworks created on the theme of peace. Five artists started this project, and they’ve been joined by 50 others.Besides the Valentine’s Day project, other funded projects include:

Visitation programs in Erbil, where Muslim activists visited internally displaced Christian children in Erbil, and in Baghdad, where both Christian and Muslim activists visited Muslim children.

Though Iraq is full of problems, Hassan says young people see a chance to make a difference and to address issues “the older generation can’t see.” They are motivated, he said, by the desire to live a normal life without fear, “ordinary needs that give them motivation.”

“A journey like this comes once a life,” wrote one participant. Another shared that he felt “loved, respected, supported and listened to.” Yet another learned not all Muslims are ISIS.”

“Mohammed came back from Erbil as a different person, a better one,” said one participant’s parents.

About the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding

Eastern Mennonite University’s Center for Justice and Peacebuilding offers graduate programs in restorative justice (the first program of its kind in North America) and conflict transformation, as well as professional development and training for global peacebuilders through several programs: the Summer Peacebuilding Institute, Women’s Peacebuilding Leadership Program, Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resilience (STAR), and the Zehr Institute for Restorative Justice. CJP’s vision is to prepare, transform, and sustain leaders to create a more just and peaceful world.

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .

An article from Deutsche Welle

Some 15,000 Israelis at a Tel Aviv rally have demanded progress on the long awaited two-state solution, almost 50 years since Israel occupied Palestinian land. Opposition leader Isaac Herzog said chances had been wasted.

(Click on photo to enlarge)

Israeli supporters of a Palestinian state alongside Israel, including the non-government group Peace Now, heard a written message from Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas that it was time for both peoples to “live together in harmony.”

It was read out at the Tel Aviv rally, where the turnout was 15,000, according to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz.

“It is time to live together in harmony, security and stability,” Abbas was quoted as saying.

Missed opportunities

Attending Saturday evening’s rally on Tel Aviv’s Rabin Square, Israeli opposition Labour party leader Isaac Herzog accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of sowing fear and of missing opportunities for apeace settlement based on two states.

Early this week, Netanyahu hosted US President Donald Trump, who also visited East Jerusalem’s Western Wall and Abbas in Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank, but made no specific mention of the two-state model.

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How can a culture of peace be established in the Middle East?

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Fifty years ago

In June 1967, Israel seized the West Bank and east Jerusalem from Jordan during the so-called Six-Day War withneighboring Arab-majority states.

Israel’s later annexation of east Jerusalem was never recognized by the international community. Palestinians claim the city’s eastern part as the future capital of their anticipated state.

Netanyahu’s right-wing government has pressed settlement in the West Bank despite international legal objections, raising the settler count to beyond 400,000.

‘Lack of hope’ being perpetuated

Peace Now head Avi Buskila said Saturday’s rally was to protest what he termed “the lack of hope being offered by a government perpetuating occupation, violence and racism.”

“The time has come to prove to the Israelis, the Palestinians and the entire world that an important segment of the Israeli population is opposed to occupation and wants a two-state solution,” Buskila said.

Hunger strike ends as Ramadan begins

Saturday’s rally coincided with the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and the end of a hunger strike by hundreds Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.

The Middle East peace process has been deadlocked since April 2014 when indirect negotiations led by then US secretary of state John Kerry collapsed.

. .DISARMAMENT & SECURITY. ,

An article by Richard Falk reprinted by Transcend Media Service

Six months ago, the UN’s Economic and Social Commission for West Asia (ESCWA) asked Virginia Tilley and me to write a study examining the applicability of the international criminal law concept of apartheid to Israel’s policies and practices toward the Palestinian people. We were glad to accept the assignment, and conceived of our role as engaging in an academic undertaking. ESCWA, one of several UN regional commissions, requested the study as a result of an uncontested motion adopted by its 18 Arab member governments.

A Palestinian woman argues with Israeli soldiers at a West Bank checkpoint south of Hebron on August 16, 2016. (Reuters / Mussa Qawasma)

Almost within hours of its release on March 15, our report was greeted by what can only be described as hysteria. The US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, denounced it and demanded that the UN repudiate it. The newly elected secretary general, António Guterres, quickly and publicly called for ESCWA to withdraw the report from its website, and when Rima Khalaf, the head of the commission, resisted, Guterres insisted. Rather than comply, Khalaf resigned. Soon thereafter, the report was withdrawn from the commission’s website, despite its having been published with a disclaimer noting that it represents the views of its authors and not necessarily that of ESCWA or the UN.

What is striking about this response, which resembles in many respects the US government response to the Goldstone Report (the UN Fact-Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict of 2008-9), is the degree to which Israel’s supporters, in response to criticism, have sought to discredit the messenger rather than address the message.

We had hoped that our analysis would prompt debate, dialogue, and consideration of our recommendations.

Tilley, a professor of political science at Southern Illinois University Carbondale, and I, as well as ESCWA, would welcome substantive discussion of and critical feedback on our report, and we had hoped that our analysis and conclusions would provide the basis for dialogue and further consideration of the recommendations appended at the end. ESCWA, for its part, took steps to ensure that the report lived up to scholarly standards, submitting the draft text to three prominent international jurists, who anonymously submitted strong positive appraisals along with some suggestions for revision, which we gratefully incorporated before the final text was released. For government officials and others to dismiss our report as a biased polemic is irresponsible, with respect both to the authority of the UN and to international law.

During my tenure as the UN’s Special Rapporteur on human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories (2008-14), I saw how defenders of Israel attempt to discredit critics. My reports in that post often contained sharp criticisms of Israel and other actors, ranging from defiance of international law, unlawful expansion of settlements, excessive use of force, and complicity of international corporations and banks that do business for profit with the settlements. To my surprise, I never received substantive pushback regarding my allegations, but I did have the unpleasant experience of having my words on unrelated issues torn out of context. Among my harshest critics were not only the usual ultra-Zionist NGOs, but also Barack Obama’s diplomats at the UN, including Susan Rice and Samantha Power, as well as then-Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. I mention this personal experience only to note that it falls into a longstanding pattern of rebuttal that prefers to smear rather than engage in reasoned debate about important issues of law and justice.

The international crime of apartheid was set forth in the 1973 Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid. The main elements of the crime consist in deliberate and systematic acts of racial discrimination with the purpose of maintaining unlawful structures of domination by one race over another. Our report also considered whether, in the context of inquiring into the presence of apartheid, it was appropriate to consider Jews and Palestinians as distinct races; we found that there was abundant grounding to do so. As our report shows, “race” in this context is treated as a socially and politically constructed category defining a distinct people. It has no necessary correlation with biogenetic realities, which in this case show an overlap between Jews and Palestinians.

Even Palestinian citizens of Israel, who can vote and form political parties, are subject to many discriminatory laws.

The report also proceeds from the proposition that whether apartheid exists or not depends on the overall treatment of the Palestinian people as a whole. Adopting what we believed to be innovative methodology, we approached this challenge by dividing the Palestinians into four domains that correspond to the manner in which Israel has exercised its authority over the course of many decades, although specific tactics of control have varied through time. In the past, a thorough study by international law scholars found that Israel’s practices in the occupied Palestinian territories are consistent with apartheid. It called attention to the discriminatory treatment of Palestinians, who are subject to military administration as compared to the Jewish settler population, which enjoys the full benefit of the rule of law as it is observed in Israel in relation to Jewish nationals. That study found that such features as “settler-only roads,” dual legal systems, and the draconian separation of the two populations into regions on the basis of race are the hallmark of apartheid. Repressive practices that have made the lives of ordinary Palestinians a daily ordeal are part of this system, as international law establishes that penalizing resistance to apartheid is itself a crime of apartheid.

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Presenting the Palestinian side of the Middle East, Is it important for a culture of peace?

How can a culture of peace be established in the Middle East?

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A second domain investigated in the report involves Palestinians who are residents of Jerusalem. Here the apartheid character of Israeli rule is exhibited in the way the government undermines the security of those Palestinians, manipulating their rights of residence as well as imposing a variety of discriminatory practices, ranging from fiscal measures to the issuance of building permits.

The third domain concerns the Palestinian minority living in Israel, perhaps the most problematic component in terms of establishing a definition of apartheid that encompasses the entire Palestinian population. In this category are some 1.7 million citizens of Israel, who are allowed to form political parties and vote in elections. But this minority, which makes up about 20 percent of the overall Israeli population, is prohibited by law from challenging the proclaimed Jewish character of the state and is subject to a wide range of discriminatory nationality laws as well as administrative practices that severely restrict their rights, with effects on land acquisition, property, immigration, family reunification, and marital freedom.

International law has detached apartheid from its South African origins; it’s now a stand-alone crime against humanity.

A fourth domain, and the one affecting the largest demographic segment, is made up of Palestinians registered as refugees by UN procedures or living under conditions of involuntary exile. In the background is the non-implementation of UN General Assembly Resolution 194 (1948), which confirms the right of return enjoyed by Palestinians dispossessed or displaced by Israel in 1948. This right of return is declared in General Assembly Resolution 3236 to be an “inalienable right,” which thus presumably incorporates those additional several hundred thousand Palestinians displaced by the 1967 war. As far as is known, no Palestinian displaced since the establishment of Israel in 1948 has been granted the right of return to resume residence.

From the perspective of international law, the crime of apartheid has been detached from its historical origins in South Africa. Neither the 1973 Convention nor the 1998 Rome Statute underlying the International Criminal Court ties apartheid to South Africa, but rather treats its practice as a stand-alone crime against humanity. Thus, there are important differences between the way apartheid operated in South Africa and the way it is currently being imposed on the Palestinians, but these differences are not relevant to the question of whether it fairly and accurately applies to Israel. One notable difference is that in South Africa the Afrikaner leadership forthrightly proclaimed apartheid as a reflection of its ideological belief in the separation of races, whereas for Israel such a structure of separation on the basis of race is denied and repudiated. There are other differences as well, relating to degrees of labor dependence and the demographic ratio.

This quasi-permanent structure of domination cannot be justified convincingly by reference to Israeli security needs.

Our report concludes that Israel has deliberately fragmented the Palestinian people in relation to these four demographic domains, relying on systematic discrimination, including “inhuman acts,” to maintain its control, while continuing to expand territorially at the expense of the Palestinian people. On the basis of these findings—backed up by detailed presentations of empirical data, including reliance on Israeli official sources—we conclude that the allegation of apartheid as applied to the Palestinian people is well founded.

We realize that our report is the work of academic investigators and is not an authoritative finding by a formal judicial or governmental institution. At this point it has not—contrary to media reports and diplomatic denunciations—even been endorsed or accepted by the UN, or even ESCWA. We do recommend such an endorsement, and we urge the UN, national governments, and civil society to take measures designed to encourage Israel to dismantle its apartheid regime and treat the Palestinian people in accord with the dictates of international law and human rights, as well as elementary morality.

The broader setting associated with our contention that Israel has become an apartheid state draws on the reality that there is no peaceful resolution to the conflict on the diplomatic horizon, and thus no foreseeable prospect for ending the discriminatory regime. This quasi-permanent structure of domination cannot be justified convincingly by reference to Israeli security needs. A people cannot be permanently repressed in these various ways without viewing the structure that has emerged as an apartheid regime. Indeed, part of the reason for not awaiting a more formal assessment of these charges is our sense of urgency in ending a set of arrangements that have for so long been responsible for so much suffering and denial of basic rights, above all the right of self-determination.

It remains our central hope, one shared by ESCWA, that the widespread availability of the report will lead to a clearer understanding of the Palestinian plight and encourage more effective responses by the UN, by governments, and by civil society. Beyond this, it is our continuing wish that people of good will throughout the world, especially within Israel, will work toward a political solution that will finally allow Jews and Palestinians to live together in peace, with justice.