Thursday November 5, 2009, 12:26 pm
The Palestinians have proven that nothing Israel does for them or wants to do for them will satiate their appetite for violence and their dream of pushig Israel into the Sea. If your neighbor felt that way and acted out, what would you do? Everyone and every country has a right to defend itself but not against people that are anxious and willing to help you and have proven this by providing the Paestinians with medical care, education, jobs and help with their economy. President Obama can never get them together unless he comes down on the right country (Palestine). Give Israel a break, they only want to build a country that is safe and people can live togeher in harmony. If they need to and want to build homes on a waste land I think it is commendable.

Thursday November 5, 2009, 1:17 pm
Actually it's the goal of Israel to totally eliminate the Palestinian population~~~ Some people are not getting the true story of this conflict. The Israelis provide nothing to the Palestinians. Israel blockades food and needed supplies, they've destroyed the water and sewer systems, medical care is not readily available.An ambulance can wait at a check point for days with a dying patient. The Palestinians are right now being forced from their long time family homes to make way for Israelis. Settlements are built so as to separate the Arabs from fields, groves and orchards long the domain of Palestinian families.Right now Arabs in East Jerusalem which is Arab territory, but an occupied land~~are being forced from their homes on the pretext that permits were not obtained decades ago to build. When these families move into makeshift tents the tents are torn up by big equipment. Many of these people are way elderly. The Arab homes " built without permits" are then handed over to Israelis, if they're not destroyed to make room for another settlement. I get my info from Democracy Now, Mosaic and Al Jazeera, English.All news programs on cable. I wish everyone did.

Thursday November 5, 2009, 2:28 pm
Marilyn, I was wondering if you could back your comment with facts. You must know that the Palestinians don't stand a chance against our military might. Gaza has been besieged for the last three years. It has been like one large prison, full of unemployed people who can barely survive. It is (still) targeted on a daily basis.

I think your comment is a bit naive. It is true that Kesamim have hit Israel, but it you compare..... come on...

Thursday November 5, 2009, 2:29 pm
The reason that Israel rejects the one state solution is that since Palestinians have more children, on the average, within 50 years, the Palestinians will be the majority. So if there would be elections, it would be the end of the State of Israel, as it exists today.

Thursday November 5, 2009, 3:09 pm
This is how Israel is dealing with Palestinians.How do you want Palestinians to react?

UNITED NATIONS
A
General Assembly
Distr.
GENERAL
A/HRC/12/NGO/10
4 September 2009
ENGLISH ONLY
HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL Twelfth session
Agenda item 7
HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION IN PALESTINE AND OTHER OCCUPIED ARAB TERRITORIES
Joint written statement* submitted by Adalah – The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, the Badil Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights, the Habitat International Coalition (HIC), non-governmental organizations in special consultative status
The Secretary-General has received the following written statement which is circulated in accordance with Economic and Social Council resolution 1996/31.
[27 August 2009]
* This written statement is issued, unedited, in the language(s) received from the submitting non-governmental organization(s).
GE.09-15619
A/HRC/12/NGO/10
page 2
Recurring Dispossession and Displacement of 1948 Palestinian Refugees in the Occupied Palestinian Territory1
1. During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, Palestinians fled or were expelled from parts of Mandate Palestine, many finding refuge in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), including East Jerusalem (“Palestinian Refugees”). At the beginning of 2009, there were over 1,813,000 Palestinian refugees in the OPT representing 45% of its population of approximately 4 million Palestinians. More than 754,000 reside in the occupied West Bank, and over 1,059,000 in the occupied Gaza Strip.2
2. Israel not only disrespects the right of these refugees to return to their homes of origin, but continues to dispossess and displace them within their place of refuge, namely the OPT over which Israel exercises effective control as an occupying power.
3. While aiming at illegally asserting control over the maximum amount of land with a minimum number of Palestinians and implanting Jewish-only settlements, Israel is forcibly displacing the Palestinian civilian population, refugees and non-refugees, in the OPT including East Jerusalem. Different measures have been adopted by Israel to achieve its goal, such as land confiscation, home demolition, eviction and the construction of the Wall. These practices run counter to international human rights and humanitarian law.
4. Dispossession and displacement of Palestinians, including refugees, in occupied East Jerusalem, illegally annexed by Israel, has noticeably increased. These policies and practices aim at asserting pressure on this community to leave the city.3 Of particular concern are Palestinian neighborhoods that face ongoing mass eviction and home demolition including those in Sheikh Jarrah, Silwan, Beit Hanina and Al-Turi.4
5. In some cases, Israel expropriates Palestinian-owned property through a complex system of legal, administrative and institutional mechanisms, subsequently leasing or transferring these properties to Jewish settlers. In other cases, settlers make use of Israeli courts to lay claim to property inhabited by Palestinians, claiming ownership by Jewish individuals or associations prior to 1948. The Israeli Supreme Court has ruled in favor of such claims while failing to recognize the rights of Palestinian refugees to reclaim lost land and property.
6. For example, some Palestinian refugees who moved to Sheikh Jarrah in 1956 following an agreement between UNRWA and the Government of Jordan were evicted from their homes by Israeli authorities on 2 August 2009, following a court ruling.5 As a result, 53 Palestinian refugees, including 20 children, have once again been displaced. With no alternative residence,
1 Arab Association for Human Rights (HRA), Association for the Defense of the Rights of the Internally Displaced Persons in Israel (ADRID), Al-Maqdese for Society Development, Civic Coalition for Defending Palestinian Rights in Jerusalem (CCDPRJ), Comitato Internazionale per lo Sviluppo dei Popoli (CISP), Israeli Committee against House Demolitions (ICAHD), Palestinian Grassroots Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign and Zochrot Association, Center on Housing Rights and Evictions (COHRE), the Housing and Land Rights Network, also share the views expressed in this statement.
2 Badil, Survey of Palestinian Refugees and Internally Displaced Persons 2008 (forthcoming).
3 OCHA, Special Focus: The Planning Crisis in East Jerusalem: Understanding the Phenomenon of
“illegal” Construction, April 2009.
4 Ibid.
5 Civil Court case 4744/02, TPS 12705.
A/HRC/12/NGO/10
page 3
the families are forced to camp out on the street in front of their homes. Their appeal to overturn the eviction was rejected on 9 August 2009. Their properties were handed over to a settler organization that intends to build a new settlement in the area, while placing 300 refugees living in the area at imminent risk of forced eviction dispossession and displacement.6
7. Settlers have also laid claim to several other plots in Sheik Jarrah, including 33 buildings that are home to almost 175 people, most of whom are refugees. Although the case is still pending in the Israeli courts, a group of settlers, accompanied by Israeli police entered the area on 26 July 2009 and occupied one of the buildings.7
8. While the Israeli executive branch plans what it calls the “Judaization” of East Jerusalem, and the judiciary fails to respect and protect the rights of Palestinian refugees and their property, it is the legislative branch that plays an active role in preventing refugees from reclaiming lost land and property. On 3 August 2009, one day after the eviction of tens of Palestinian refugees in Sheikh Jarrah, the Knesset adopted a new land reform law – Israel Land Administration (ILA) Law - that legalizes the privatization of land originally owned by Palestinians, including refugees who currently reside in the OPT. This law retroactively legitimizes the ILA’s sale of absentee property, which includes refugee property. Thus, for instance, 96 such tenders were issued in 2007, while 106 tenders were published in 2008.8 The new law has repercussions on the right of Palestinian refugees to restitution and violates their property rights, in contravention of international humanitarian and human rights law.9
9. The new law allows the transfer of land from state and the Jewish National Fund “ownership” into private Jewish-ownership in occupied East Jerusalem, illegally annexed by Israel. The privatization process will encompass the settlements and areas planned for development (settlement construction) in occupied East Jerusalem. In essence, Israel will generate huge profits from the privatization of land in the OPT, despite its legal obligations as an occupying power under international humanitarian and human rights law to respect the right to private property and refrain from permanent confiscation of such property.
6 OCHA, Fact Sheet: Sheikh Jarrah, August 2009.
7 OCHA, Fact Sheet, Op. cite.
8 Adalah to Attorney General and Custodian of Absentee Property: Israel’s Sale of
Palestinian Refugee Property Violated Israeli and International Law, Press Release, 22
June 2009).
9 The 1907 Hague Regulations stipulates the need of combatants to respect the right to private property and explicitly prohibits permanent confiscation of private property following the termination of warfare. The U.S. Military Tribunal at Nuremberg was the first to address the confiscation of property following the end of fighting in the Second World War. In U.S. v. Alfred Krupp et al., the tribunal ruled that such confiscation of property and its subsequent acquisition by the Krupp firm constituted a violation of Article 46 of the 1907 Hague Regulation. U.S. v. Alfred Krupp et al. cited in How Does Law Protect in War? Cases, document and teaching materials on contemporary practice in international humanitarian law, 2nd ed., Vol.2 (ICRC, 2006), p.1030, and Adalah’s letter addressed to the Attorney General on Tenders for selling absentees’ property administered by Amidar, 19 May 2009.
A/HRC/12/NGO/10
page 4
RECOMMENDATIONS
We therefore urge the Human Rights Council to call on Israel to:
(1) Immediately halt dispossession and displacement of Palestinians, including refugees, in the OPT by putting an end to forced eviction and home demolition;
(2) Facilitate the return of the displaced to their homes as a result of forced eviction and house demolition; ensure the implementation of the UN Principles on Housing and Property Restitution for Refugees and Displaced Persons (“Pinheiro Principles”); and seek a durable solution to the refugee plight, namely repatriation;
(3) Protect the rights of Palestinians to land and property and ensure respect for international human rights and humanitarian law;
(4) Annul the new Israel Land Administration Law, end the transfer of ownership rights over Palestinian refugee property, and promote the right of Palestinian refugees to property restitution.

Thursday November 5, 2009, 3:31 pm
Tinkie K
Does Israel have the right to exist? Not without theaproval of Palestinians.

http://www.care2.comnews/member/760164053/1294270

Thursday November 5, 2009, 3:37 pm
Because it is written it doesn't make it fact and especially important is to see who the author is. This is written by:
Joint written statement* submitted by Adalah – The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, the Badil Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights, the Habitat International Coalition (HIC), non-governmental organizations in special consultative status

Thursday November 5, 2009, 4:23 pm
David, because it was written by...Adalah... Arab Minority Rights, does not make it untrue.
Tried to "note" this but the click would not work. Strange!

Thursday November 5, 2009, 4:39 pm
Israel cannot undertake to wipe out the Palestinians just because their birth rate is so great that it will overtake and displace the Israelis. This is just so damn ludicrous!!! There is plenty of land for both peoples Israel must see this and both Israel and Palestine must agree to disagree and stop this unnecessary killing of both peoples - but - having said that this battle between Israel and Palestine is legions old. Love & Light TY Cal

Thursday November 5, 2009, 5:03 pm
I don't rightly know, but since a two state solution hasn't made any headway since day one of the peace talks, why not then a one state where both ethnic groups could intermingle and with Palestinians and Israelis in any given crowd or a neighborhood, maybe then it'd be a little harder for suicide bombers and Israeli bombs to isolate, target and respectively take the other one out.

Anyway as their currently doing in eastern Jerusalem, dislodging Palestinians from their homes, Israel has been conducting that practice since day one. Maybe it's time for Palestinians to maybe not totally regain their homeland for thousands of years, but at least be afforded to share it with the Israelis...

Thursday November 5, 2009, 6:37 pm
Tinkie, Israelis look what Arabs living in the same country do to each other in Pakistan, Iraq, Gaza, etc and sure enough don't want exactly the same or worse happenning to them.

The birth rate of Palestinians went down and now is similar to the birth rate of Israelis.

Thursday November 5, 2009, 7:32 pm
Susan, That's true it doesn't make it untrue. One thing that I have learned in these news groups is to look at content and context. I then look for other articles involving this topic and the motives of certain groups and people and form an opinion. I have seen some doosies taken completely devoid of context. It's amazing the different conclusions one makes when certain things are said devoid of context as opposed to being in context. Goebbels was a master of manipulating context as are some of the quotes I've seen used here. Just the other day I saw this map of Israel and Palestine that reflects who controlled what land over 4 periods of time . The map is terrible, untrue and based on inflaming emotions against Israel and from what I see it works much of the time. There are many people who look to demonize Israel and it's supporters at every opportunity and the means is secondary to the ends for them.

Thursday November 5, 2009, 7:57 pm
Are you referring to this map?

Friday November 6, 2009, 1:11 am
Every person has the right to exist and no state has the right to deny that existance! The intransigence on either side of this devide is sufficiently frustrating to those of us who view it with out the bias of one side or the other to require the parties to metaphorically "have their heads banged together and get it sorted"! The biggest problem apart from the extremist views and intransigence of significant numbers of the parties is their external benefactors fermenting a surrogate war for their own selfish interests. Perhaps if those interests were detached then the parties could bury their differences and ditch the imflammatory rhetoric such as eliminating Israel , never giving Palestine a homeland etc etc. Of course if that happened the world wouild be a safer place but arms sales would suffer which of course would economically hurt places like America. Russia and China and we could not possibly have that could we! Sadly Israel's continued use of methods borrowed from it's former Nazi persecuters such as targetting innocent Zoo animals and children does nothing to endear their cause and likewise the indiscriminate rocketing of Israel by Hamas is also counter productive. The responce is somewhat imbalanced by the might of American firepower in the hands of the IDF and their video of their actions against Gaza Zoo takes some swallowing amongst the images of mutilated animals destroyed not by accident but deliberatly at eyeball range. The image of the remains of a probably American made missile sitting beyond the hole it made in a pregant camel sums up the cowardly nature of surrogate war games and nastiness of the lowest order imaginable! When will this nonsense stop?

Saturday November 7, 2009, 7:17 am
Thannxxx... people definitely need to learn tolerance and love... giving and learning to submit and be prepared to sacrifice.. so that others may benefit... as it is better to give than to receive.. if only these two groups could learn these basic and simple principles the world would be a better place for us all