Forced hysterectomy in Palestinian Authority provokes concern
For Immediate Release: The Middle East Foundation for Peace & Justice expresses our concern regarding reports of forced hysterectomy procedures being performed on girls and women within the Palestinian Authority. Dr. Mohammed Breget, a clinical psychologist at Al Quds University informed human rights groups that the procedures are primarily forced upon girls with supposed “mental disabilities”. The hospitals involved are administrated by the Palestinian National Authority.
Rima Al Khuffash at Birzeit University released a study which documented seven such procedures conducted at hospitals in the West Bank. The operations were deleted from the hospital registries.
The study also mentioned that the Palestinian Ministry of Health has issued a resolution which forbids such operations. However, researcher Rima Khuffash said that some religious advisers and doctors are encouraging Palestinian families to have their daughters undergo “eradication surgery of the womb” (hysterectomy) pointing to the concentration of these surgeries in the north and central West Bank.
MEFPJ condemns forced or coerced sterilization and urges the Palestinian Authority to take forceful steps to put an end to these procedures.
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Forced Hysterectomy at Palestinian Hospitals
Palestinian Authority rights report raises concerns
For immediate release: The Middle East Foundation for Peace & Justice expresses our grave concern regarding the safety and well being of those residing within control of the Palestinian Authority.
The Palestinian Independent Commission for Human Rights (ICHR) last week issued a report revealing the latest assaults on freedoms and human rights in the West Bank and Gaza, committed by the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Hamas respectively.
The monthly report lists assorted abuses, including cases of torture and mistreatment in prisons and at the hands
of the PA’s feared Preventive Security Service.
For the month of January 2014, ICHR received 56 complaints about torture and mistreatment in Palestinian prisons, including 36 in the Gaza Strip and 19 in the West Bank.
In addition to cases of physical mistreatment, the Palestinian human rights organisation reported dozens of complaints about arbitrary and unlawful arrests of Palestinians by the various PA police and security forces and by Hamas. ICHR related that it received 85 complaints during January concerning such unlawful arrests by the two Palestinian governments. Many of the detainees reported being taken into custody for “politically-motivated” reasons.
The report cited additional complaints from Palestinians who accused the Palestinian Authority security forces in the West Bank of unlawfully seizing their money, computer sets, mobile phones, cameras and flash memory devices belonging to citizens. Despite frequent calls for returning these items, seized without any judicial order, the PA has returned nothing to the rightful owners.
ICHR received 46 complaints concerning violations of the right to due process of law, largely for arbitrary or political reasons, including violations of the right to a fair trial and political detention.
The report also found the PA again ignoring court rulings. The Preventive Security Service and the General Intelligence Force chronically ignore orders issued by various courts to release Palestinian detainees. The report listed seven such illegal detention cases that occurred last month.
The dismal human rights records of both the Palestinaian Authority and Hamas have been tracked for some time, yet receive virtually no media attention.
In December 2012, the Arab Organization for Human Rights (AOHR) released a report accusing the PA of “inhumane practices and human rights violations” against Palestinian civilians.
The AOHR report alleged that between 2007 and 2011, the PA tortured over 10,000 detainees, resulting in six deaths, and that PA officers confiscated equipment and personal cash after arresting suspects.
The ICHR monthly reports repeatedly show that neither the Palestinian Authority nor Hamas show much respect for human rights or freedoms in the territories they control. But perhaps more disturbing is the lack of media interest in these human rights abuses at the hands of Palestinian governments.
MEFPJ implores the Palestinian Authority to respect basic universal standards of human rights and freedoms. We invite our fellow human rights organizations to join with the MEFPJ in condemning these increasingly concerning human rights abuses in the Palestinian Authority.
Outbreak of Anti-Semitic Media in Arab Islamic World
In 2003, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International issued a joint statement on antisemitism: Recognizing anti-Semitism as a serious human rights violation, we also recognize our own responsibility to take on this issue as part of our work. It should not be left to Jewish groups alone to highlight this issue and to appeal to the international community to address it. We are firmly committed to joining their ongoing efforts and to helping to bring problems of anti-Semitism into the overall human rights discourse.
Scene from the upcoming Egyptian mini Series “Khaybar“.
The Middle East Foundation for Peace and Justice (MEFPJ) reaffirms our commitment to the 2003 declaration especially in light of the recent escalation of government sanctioned antisemitism proliferating throughout the Islamic countries of the Middle East.
The Media researchers at EOZ have documented recent antisemitic diatribes shown on Lebanese TV and in a popular Egyptian newspaper. Additionally EOZ reported on two current accusations of the medieval blood libel in Egypt, a newspaper series insulting Judaism in Jordan, as well as examples of antisemitism in the Iraqi media, a Saudi Arabian newspaper, a Palestinian Arab “human rights group” and “peace activist,” and pan-Arab media. The researchers have documented many more similar instances in the Arab & Muslim world.
In 2001, a hugely popular 30-part Ramadan TV series aired in the Arab world based on the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. It was rerun in Egypt this year. Iran released an antisemitic movie last year.
A purely anti-semitic TV series (“Khaybar”) is being filmed now in Egypt and Morocco to be shown on Arabic TV it will be used to incite hundreds of millions of people against Jews during Ramadan next year. The filming of the series gets regular coverage in Arab media, and they make clear that it is meant to demonize Jews. The director doesn’t even attempt to hide the purpose of the film.
As EOZ notes, “Peace is literally unthinkable when the Jewish people are viewed as evil incarnate. Human rights organizations have clout. Shining light on this problem is essential, and it is not an obstacle to peace – it is a prerequisite.”
The MEFPJ condemns the rampant and unchecked outbreak of antisemitism in Arab and Islamic Media. The examples displayed above and many others are inciteful and a violation of basic human rights. We call upon our sister human rights organizations to join us in exposing and condemning these activities.
MEFPJ Condemns Huffington Post Bias
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: The Middle East Foundation for Peace & Justice (MEFPJ) joins the Simon Wiesenthal Center in expressing concern for beyond the pale anti-Israel bias displayed on the pages of The Huffington Post. We condemn recent dishonest headlines and manipulative photographs clearly designed to dehumanize the Jewish state and her citizens.
A headline carried by the Huffington Post super-blog that read simply “Israel Strikes Again” has drawn criticism from the Simon Wiesenthal Center, a Los Angles based Jewish human rights group that “promotes human rights and dignity, stands with Israel” and “defends the safety of Jews worldwide.”
The headline, which linked to a story about recently reported Israeli strikes in Syria aimed at preventing the flow of advanced weaponry to terror group Hezbollah, according to US and Israel officials, provided no context regarding the strike. The story was accompanied by a picture of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu smirking and clapping, and appeared on Sunday afternoon as the main headline on the publication’s much visited homepage.
“President Obama underscored Israel’s right to strike inside Syria; a leader of Syria’s rebels went on Israel’s Channel 2 to thank Bibi and company for weakening Assad,” said Associate Dean Abraham Cooper in an email to The Algemeiner, “Apparently all that’s not enough for today’s Huffpost editors. They even trotted out a picture of PM Netanyahu scowling while headlining—Israel strikes again.” Read the rest at The Algemeiner.
MEFPJ JOINS HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH IN CONDEMNING GAZA MURDERS
Hamas gunmen drag the body of a man suspected of working for Israel in Gaza City, Nov. 20, 2012. Photo by Reuters
For immediate release: The Middle East Foundation for Peace & Justice (MEFPJ) joins with Human Rights Watch in condemning the murders and atrocities commited by the Hamas run government in Gaza. We call upon the international community, the United Nations and international human rights organizations to universally condemn the ongoing extra-judicial killings and serial human rights abuses being inflicted on the inhabitants of Gaza by or with the sanction of the Hamas run government.
Report from Human Rights Watch (HRW): (New York) – The Gaza government has apparently not even begun a promised investigation more than four months after gunmen killed seven Palestinian prisoners accused of collaboration with Israel. Meanwhile, the Hamas government has set a deadline of April 11, 2013, for suspected collaborators to turn themselves in, promising them an amnesty.
“Hamas’s inability or unwillingness to investigate the brazen murders of seven men makes a mockery of its claims that it’s upholding the rule of law in Gaza.” Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director HRW
The men, who were last seen alive in custody during the November 2012 fighting with Israel, were executed on a public street. One of the men’s bodies was dragged behind a motorcycle. Military courts had convicted the men primarily on the basis of coerced confessions, ignoring credible evidence that interrogators tortured at least six of them.
“Hamas’s inability or unwillingness to investigate the brazen murders of seven men makes a mockery of its claims that it’s upholding the rule of law in Gaza,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “Even before the killings, the abuses the men suffered made the criminal justice system a travesty, regardless of their guilt or innocence.”
In a separate case, on March 24, 2013, a military court in Gaza sentenced a man arrested in August 2011 and convicted of collaborating with Israel to death by hanging. Human Rights Watch has documented numerous cases of severe due-process violations, abuse of detainees, and unfair trials in Gaza; Palestinian rights groups recorded more than 100 allegations of torture in 2012 alone. The government should at least impose an immediate moratorium on executions, and preferably end the death penalty altogether, Human Rights Watch said.
In an April 6 statement on the website of the Gaza Interior Ministry, Muhammad Lafi, the deputy director of the Internal Security agency, stated that the security services had recently arrested an unspecified number of collaborators – allegedly working for “Western intelligence agencies” – and that “half of them have confessed.”
Hamas set the April 11 deadline for surrender for a promised amnesty under the terms of what Hamas calls the “National Campaign against Collaborating with the Enemy.” Lafi told Al-Monitor, a regional news website, that the agency has a list of collaborators who will be arrested if they do not turn themselves in.
The families of the seven men killed in November last saw them alive in detention facilities in Gaza, in some cases days before they were murdered, raising concerns that prison officials failed to protect them from the killers or, worse, handed them over.
Gunmen killed one of the victims on November 16, while the other six were killed on November 20, during the eight-day Israeli military offensive in Gaza.
The Izz el-Din al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s armed wing, claimed responsibility for the latter six killings, and notes were pinned to the bodies reading: “Al-Qassam Brigades announces the execution of the traitors,” international news organizations reported. The gunmen tied some of the six corpses to motorcycles and dragged them through the streets. The faces of some of the motorcyclists are visible in photographs that have been published on news websites.
Human Rights Watch has reported extensively on laws-of-war violations by Israeli forces and by Palestinian armed groups during the November fighting.
Some Hamas officials offered weak justifications for the killings at the time. Ma’an, a Palestinian news agency, quoted Mahmud Zahar, a Hamas leader, as telling journalists on November 24: “We will not allow one collaborator to be in Gaza, and let human rights groups say whatever they want. A human has rights if they have honor and not if they are a traitor.”
Hamas security officials also falsely claimed that one of the men had confessed to aiding Israel while the six others “were caught red-handed” and “possessed hi-tech equipment and filming equipment to take footage of positions” during Israel’s November military offensive in Gaza, Palestinian media reported. All seven men had been in detention for months or years before the November 2012 hostilities, however.
Other Hamas leaders, including deputy politburo chief Musa Abu Marzouq, condemned the killings and called for those responsible to be held accountable. Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the Gaza government, stated on November 25 that Hamas had established an independent committee to investigate the killings, although he gave no details of its composition. On December 2, at a meeting with the Independent Commission for Human Rights (ICHR), the Palestinian national institution for human rights, Haniyeh criticized the killings, pledged to implement the committee’s recommendations, and said that the government would consider compensating the victims’ families if the committee called on it to do so.
The government has not announced any information about the committee’s membership, work, or findings. Haniyeh did not respond to a letter from the ICHR in March requesting information about the committee. Of the five families of the victims interviewed by Human Rights Watch in December, four said in April that they had not been contacted by the committee. The wife of one of the men said that a Hamas official told her son that the killers had been caught and were being interrogated, but that she knew of no information to support that claim. The fifth family could not be reached for comment.
Family members of five of the six men killed on November 20, interviewed separately, said that when they went to collect their bodies at al-Shifa hospital that day, they found that the five bodies had been dumped together on the floor of the morgue, that hospital officials prevented them from recovering them for 24 hours, and that the bodies were in the same place the following day. The family of the sixth man declined to be interviewed.
The military prosecutor had charged the man who was killed on November 16 with collaborating with the enemy, and his trial was in progress at the time of his murder. Military courts had previously convicted the six men killed on November 20 of collaborating with the enemy, but in each case, appeals courts were still hearing their cases.
In at least four of the seven cases, the judicial authorities in Gaza appear to have ignored claims that the men had been denied access to family members and lawyers for long periods, that they had been tortured in detention, and that their convictions for collaboration were based on confessions obtained under duress, according to the men’s families, lawyers, and court documents that Human Rights Watch reviewed.
Military courts have issued 13 death sentences against alleged collaborators, and the Interior Ministry has executed six of them since Hamas took power in Gaza in 2007, according to the Independent Commission for Human Rights. During and after hostilities with Israel in 2008 and 2009, gunmen and members of the security services in Gaza extrajudicially executed at least 32 people, including alleged collaborators. Hamas authorities told Human Rights Watch at the time that they had investigated four of the cases, which involved deaths in detention, and had filed charges against two police officers involved.
“Months after seven Palestinians were murdered in broad daylight, seemingly with the collusion of security officials, the Hamas authorities in Gaza appear not to have lifted a finger to investigate, let alone to hold those responsible to account,” Whitson said. “Hamas should be taking concrete steps to reform the criminal justice system and break the cycle of impunity that, as these men’s cases show, lets torturers and killers roam free.” Read the entire report by clicking HERE.
MEFPJ Condemns Rights Violations in Gaza
Palestinian children attend a class at the UNRWA elementary school in Shati refugee camp in Gaza City, Tuesday, April 2, 2013. Gaza’s Hamas-controlled parliament has passed a law requiring separate classes for boys and girls in public and private schools from the fourth grade. (AP Photo/Hatem Moussa)
For Immediate Release: The Middle East Foundation for Peace and Justice (MEFPJ) has expressed grave concern regarding the rapid deterioration of human rights in the Palestinian Arab controlled Gaza Strip. The Hamas controlled government has recently taken the step of banning all mixed gender education and imposing strict interpretations of Islamic law on the entire population.
This declaration follows a series of rules restricting women or requiring them to cover up in the traditional Islamic dress of long robes and headscarves.
Hamas has been running Gaza since its violent takeover of the coastal territory in 2007. The group advocates the establishment of an Islamic state in all of the Mideast, including Israel.
In addition to legislation, there has been mounting social pressure on Gaza girls and women to wear headscarves and robes. Earlier this year, a branch of Al-Aqsa University in the southern town of Khan Younis made it a requirement for all female students to wear robes in addition to headscarves.
Other edicts include bans on women smoking water pipes in public, riding on the backs of motorcycles or getting their hair done by male stylists. Last month, it barred girls and women from participating in a U.N.-sponsored marathon, prompting a U.N. aid agency to cancel the race.
Of additional concern, Police in Hamas-ruled Gaza have started grabbing young men with long or gel-styled spiky hair off the streets, bundling them into jeeps, mocking them and shaving their heads, two of those targeted and a rights group said Sunday.
It is the latest sign that the Islamic militants are imposing their strict practices on the population.
Hamas has been slowly forcing its fundamentalist interpretation of the religion on already conservative Gaza since it overran the territory in 2007, but the new crackdown on long hair and tight or low-waist pants – in several cases accompanied by beatings – appears to be one of the most aggressive phases of the campaign so far.
The crackdown began last week, and two of those targeted told The Associated Press they were rounded up in separate sweeps in Gaza City that included more than two dozen young men.
MEFPJ calls upon the International community and the United Nations to condemn escalating human rights violations in the Palestinian Arab controlled territories.
A Young Muslim Must Go Into Hiding for Fighting Anti-Semitism
By Rabbi Abraham Cooper; Courtesy of The Algemeiner:
Mehmet Sahin has written these words: “Within a couple of days, I will move to another city of The Netherlands.… After what happened in the last three weeks, I understood the eternal loneliness and pain of the Jewish population. In the rest of my life, I will tell the whole world that we all must resist this aggression.”
Passover. This week we will all eat more matzo then we ever thought possible, hear more commentary about the Haggadah and its multiple messages for our time, and sit back in awe and (hopefully) love at the site at of our extended family circle.
But this Pesach, let’s leave some space for one young Muslim who deserves the world’s attention and support. He is not a martyr and desperately wants to avoid becoming one. But as of now, he and his family are in hiding in an undisclosed location in the Netherlands, because of death threats.
His name is Mehmet Sahin, a doctoral student, who has volunteered to reach out to street youth in the city of Arnhem. A few weeks ago he interviewed a group of Dutch-Turkish youth on Nederlands TV2 during which several declared their unabashed hatred of Jews and open admiration of Hitler. “What Hitler did to the Jews is fine with me,” said one. “Hitler should have killed all the Jews,” said another.
While these teens knew all about the fate of iconic Holocaust child victim, Anne Frank, that knowledge did nothing to deter them from expressing their outright hatred of Jews over and over again, and insisting that everyone at their school harbored similar views. When you view the clip you will see that their smirks and body language confirm a deeply-embedded hatred. Watch the video as one boy smiles as he declares: “What Hitler said about Jews is that there will be one day when you see that I am right that I killed all the Jews. And that day will come.”
From where does such bigotry emanate? Here’s a hint. When Mehmet Sahin reprimanded the youngsters and committed to spend however much time it would take to debunk and remove their ignorance and hate, here is how his neighbors reacted: They collected signatures to demand he leave the area. When Mehmet began to receive death threats, the Mayor of Arnhem, Pauline Krikke, urged him to go into hiding.
And that is where he and his family are today. Read the Rest.
MEFPJ asks you to take a moment to send a message of solidarity to Mehmet c/o information@wiesenthal.com and together we will let him know he is not alone.
Rabbi Cooper is associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center.
Arab-Israeli Christian Wins Top Singer on Israel’s The Voice
Courtesy of The Algemeiner: Lina Makhoul, an Arab-Israeli Christian, is the winner of the second season of the Israel version of the hit reality show The Voice Israel. The 19-year-old from Acre, who beat out three other contestants in the final rounds, will receive a record contract and a scholarship to attend music school. Makhoul’s performed Canadian-Jewish musician Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” as her final song.
The Voice Israel is the Israeli version of the internationally syndicated reality singing competition originally launched in the Netherlands in 2010 as The Voice of Holland. The American version is hosted by Carson Daly and Christina Milian and is broadcast on NBC.
Lina Makhoul, an Arab-Israeli Christian, is the winner of the second season of The Voice Israel.
MEFPJ Condemns Assault by ISM Members in Oakland
For Immediate Release: An extremist associated with the International Solidarity movement (ISM) assaulted a young Jewish woman for chalking the Hebrew words “Am Yisrael Chai” which translates as The People of Israel yet live, on the pavement of Oscar Grant Plaza in Oakland, CA this past Wednesday. The perpetrator of the prolonged assault was identified as ISM activist Gabrielle Silverman.
The victim and her male friend were then chased off the plaza by ISM members who were shouting epithets and threats at the young Jewish couple throughout. The disturbing episode was captured on video and was posted to YouTube. A link to the video is posted below.
The Middle East Foundation for Peace & Justice condemns these acts of violence and calls upon the leadership of the International Solidarity Movement to issue an apology to the victims of this attack and to take steps to prevent their membership from engaging in further acts of violence.
Click on the above link to view video of ISM activist Gabrielle Silverman assaulting a Jewish woman for writing the Hebrew words “Am Yisrael Chai” The people of Israel live.
3-year-old critically injured by Palestinian stone throwers
Courtesy of YNET News: A woman and her three daughters were injured on Thursday in a car accident caused by stones hurled by Palestinians on Route 5 connecting Tel Aviv and Ariel.
Remains of the car (Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg)
A truck that veered off course crashed into the woman’s car which also swerved as a result of stone throwing. The truck driver was lightly injured. A bus was also hit by stones with its driver sustaining
Medics evacuated the four-year-old girl to the Chaim Sheba Medical Center in Tel Hashomer and the additional victims were taken to the Rabin Medical Center in Petah Tikva.
The four were on their way back from a visit to their grandmother, Martine Elmakayes. Biton’s fourth daughter, eight-year-old Moriya, did not join them as she was visiting a friend. Continue Reading and see related video report at YNET.
The Middle East Foundation for Peace & Justice 