Update on Israeli military aggression

2002-04-03

Richard Moore

Bcc: contributors

Friends,

My apologies for not posting in quite a while.  I've been
swamped with the work involved in getting a new startup
company off the ground.  Needless to say, I'm glad this
opportunity has come along... it will be good to be
economically viable again.  Still not enough time to write
anything, but I'll share some of the messages that have been
piling up about the situation in Israel and the Palestinian
territories.

I am aware that many of you do not share my views on what's
going on there.  The issues are clouded by the Palestinian
suicide bombers who target innocent civilians, as well as by
the sympathy all of us share for the historic suffering of
the Jewish people.  As I see it, the historic suffering
issue is entirely irrelevant to the present day
circumstances, and the desperate response of the suicide
bombers, though not excusable, is also inevitable given the
brutal and long-standing suppression of the Palestinian
people.

There can be no excuse for unleashing a modern army on a mainly 
unarmed civilian population.

best regards.
rkm
http://cyberjournal.org


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Delivered-To: •••@••.•••
Reply-To: "Brit Eckhart" <•••@••.•••>
From: "Brit Eckhart" <•••@••.•••>
To: <•••@••.•••>
Subject: RE Foreigners arrive in Ramallah to aid Palestinians
Date: Tue, 2 Apr 2002 06:29:09 -0500

http://www.nandotimes.com/world/story/330604p-2774238c.html

Foreigners arrive in Ramallah to aid Palestinians

Copyright © 2002 AP Online

By HADEEL WAHDAN, Associated Press


RAMALLAH, West Bank (March 29, 2002 2:27 a.m. EST) -
Hundreds of pro-Palestinian foreigners arrived in the West
Bank town of Ramallah on Thursday, offering themselves as
human shields for Palestinians anticipating a massive
military response by Israel to a suicide bombing that killed
20 Passover diners.

About 600 activists, most of them European members of the
Public International Protection group, arrived in Ramallah
for 10-day stays with local families. The town is Yasser
Arafat's West Bank headquarters.

"We are going to stay here in Ramallah in particular to
provide the Palestinians with protection," said French
farmers' union leader Jose Bove.

"The Israeli government and our governments all know that we
are in Ramallah. (Israeli Prime Minister Ariel) Sharon must
understand that if he decides to bombard Ramallah he is
going to bombard hundreds of foreigners."

Sharon convened his ministers in Jerusalem into the early
hours of Friday to discuss responding to Wednesday's suicide
bombing by a Palestinian militant at a seafront hotel in
Netanya.

"I'm here to tell the Israeli government and to tell my
government that the source of terror and violence is the
Israeli government and racism," said group member Karrin
Wheeler, of Pittsburgh.

Another 200 other activists from Italy were turned back by
Israeli troops at a road block at Kalandiya, just south of
Ramallah.

Meanwhile, United Nations officials in Ramallah said several
foreign staffers, mainly families with young children, left
the town. The officials, however, denied reports that the
organization ordered an evacuation.

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Date: Mon, 01 Apr 2002 07:31:13 -0500
To: (Recipient list suppressed)
From: Bill Thomson <•••@••.•••>
Subject: MIDEAST ALERT:  ACTIONS NEEDED TODAY

"THIS WAR HAS NO TERRITORIAL OR OTHER BOUNDARIES."
Israeli Defense Minister
3/29/02

1)  Request for help from Allegra Pacheco:  Spread Voices of Opposition
---<snip>---
7)  ISRAEL GOES ON NUCLEAR STRIKE STANDBY

This is a critical time in which every voice is needed. 
PLEASE take a half hour today to support our Palestinian,
Israeli and International colleagues who are assertively,
nonviolently, risking their lives on the ground on behalf of
peace and justice in the world in confrontations with the
Israeli Army.

Peace,
        Bill

***********************************
Allegra Pacheco is an Israeli human rights attorney (a lead
attorney in the "End of Torture" case before the Israeli
supreme court), and a very articulate spokesperson for
Palestinian, Israeli and human rights.  If any of you have
media contcts, PLEASE PUT THEM IN TOUCH WITH ALLEGRA
ASAP--Bill.

From: "allegra pacheco" <•••@••.•••>
Subject: Spread Voices of opposition - email for Sam Husseini and friends
Date: Mon, 01 Apr 2002 08:20:44 +0000

Dear Sam Husseini and friends,

I have been trying to find the best way to contribute to
stopping the horrible situation here. Several Palestinian
friends have suggested that my voice as an Israeli-American
Jewish lawyer representing and working with Palest. should
be utilized more and given my experience with the media,
activists abroad should be working to help get opposing
voices to Israeli oppression out to the media. e.g. when
PRes. Bush says "he respects the right of Israel to defend
herself."

I am available at any time to do media interviews to discuss
the situation and can arrange interviews of other Israeli
Jews who will speak out against the Israeli military and
government's policy, occupation, etc and tell the world that
this isn't a matter of self-defense, but rather aggression,
oppression, power, and dispossession. I am also in the West
Bank, and am experiencing the fruits of US Military Aid to
Israel - F-16's flooding the skies overhead spreading fear
and trepidation in all of us. If you have contacts, I think
especially with radio, tell them to call. If you have other
ideas let me know. I"m currently drafting an op-ed piece as
well.

Phone: 011-972-50-387-570. Mobile phone is on all the time.

In solidarity,
Allegra

---<snip>---

***********************************
(I do not have any independent confirmation of this story--BT)

ISRAEL GOES ON NUCLEAR STRIKE STANDBY
Gordon Thomas (EXCLUSIVE)
by Gordon Thomas

Two Israeli fighter-bomber squadrons equipped with
battlefield tactical nuclear weapons have been placed on
"cock-pit standby." They are based at an airfield in Galilee
- minutes only flying time from Syria. The Golan Heights
which borders Syria has also been sown with neutron-type
bombs. Designed at Israel's nuclear facility in the Negev
desert, the bombs are designed to "kill soldiers and leave
the infrastructure intact," was how one Israeli Defence
Forces source described the weapons.

This escalation of military preparations follows an urgent
report from Mossad chief Efraim Halevy to prime minister,
Ariel Sharon, of "credible intelligence" that both Syria and
Iraq - who have held lengthy private talks at the Beirut
"summit" this weekend - may be preparing to intervene in the
dangerously-out-of-control situation in the West Bank and
Gaza.

At the summit both counties were the strongest voices to
pledge all-out support for the PLO. Syria, with its massive
army of 300,000 ground troops and state of the art aircraft
supplied by both Russia and China, has always presented a
credible threat to Israel.  The hard-liners who run Syria
make no secret it is only a matter of time before the day of
reckoning will come between Israel and Syria. Of equal
concern to Israel is Mossad's intelligence that Saddam has
some 100 kamikaze pilots within a few minutes flying time
from Israeli cities - and Dimona. The kamikazes are under
the command of Saddam's son, Qusay. Mossad believe their
aircraft are fitted with bio-chemical weapons.

Gordon Thomas is a writer on intelligence for a number of
leading European newspapers (the Sunday Express, UK; El
Mundo, Spain; Welt am Sonntag, Germany). His work is also
syndicated internationally by World Wide Syndication. Any
use of the above must carry a clear attribution to both
Gordon Thomas and Globe-Intel. He is a Contributing Editor
to Globe-Intel, an international newsletter devoted to
intelligence matters.

---<snip>---

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Delivered-To: •••@••.•••
Reply-To: "Brit Eckhart" <•••@••.•••>
From: "Brit Eckhart" <•••@••.•••>
To: <•••@••.•••>
Subject: RE Israeli Army Broadcasts Porn, Hebrew Propaganda to Besieged 
Palestinians
Date: Mon, 1 Apr 2002 07:13:17 -0500

http://palestinechronicle.com/article.php?story=20020331004714620

Israeli Army Broadcasts Porn, Hebrew Propaganda to Besieged
Palestinians

Sunday, March 31 2002

RAMALLAH, West Bank: Porn movies and programs in Hebrew are
being broadcast by Israeli troops who have taken over three
Palestinian television stations of Ramallah, irate residents
of the besieged West Bank town have told AFP.

The offices of three local television and radio stations
were occupied by soldiers yesterday morning, a few hours
after tanks and hundreds of troops stormed the town in
Israel's biggest offensive against the Palestinian Authority
and its leader Yasser Arafat.

The soldiers started broadcasting the porn clips --
considered extremely offensive by most Palestinians --
intermittently this afternoon from the Al-Watan, Ammwaj, and
Al-Sharaq channels, the residents said.

"The pornographic movies started on Al-Watan television at
around 3:30 pm," one 34-year-old Palestinian mother named
Reema told AFP.

"I have six children at home, they have nowhere to go with
what is going on here and can't even watch TV," she said
angrily.

Anita, a 52-year-old mother of three children, complained
about "the deliberate psychological damage caused by these
broadcasts".

"I am furious, these are the people who are shooting at us
that also play this disgusting trick on us," she said.

"We are desperate for news and constantly flipping channels
and get these terrible pictures instead," adding that videos
of the intifada were also shown backwards with "ideal
terrorism" written in red across the screen.

"Luckily, there is no electricity in half of Ramallah," she
said from her house in east Jerusalem where the channels are
also available.

A fourth local station, whose premises were not seized by
the army, ran a written message across its screen letting
people know it was the Israelis who were behind the graphic
scenes.

"Anything currently shown on Al-Watan and other local TV
channels has nothing to do with Palestinian programs but is
being broadcast by the Israeli occupation forces, we urge
parents to take precautions," the message said.
From Australia’s Sunday Mail

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