18 dec 2016
Israeli occupation forces (IOF) arrested three Palestinian civilians from Iskaka village in Salfit province after claiming they started fires near the settlement of Ariel, Hebrew media reported on Sunday.
Hamdan Lami, 19, Jawwad Thaher, 19, and Yazid Lami, 24, were arrested on November 26, according to the Israeli report.
In another context, the Israeli prosecution on Sunday pressed charges against four Jerusalemites for supporting Hamas and incitement via Facebook
According to the Israeli website Walla, the four Jerusalemites, from 17 to 20 years old, have been charged with “inciting to terrorism and violence” on Facebook in addition to supporting a “terrorist group” and other charges.
Hamdan Lami, 19, Jawwad Thaher, 19, and Yazid Lami, 24, were arrested on November 26, according to the Israeli report.
In another context, the Israeli prosecution on Sunday pressed charges against four Jerusalemites for supporting Hamas and incitement via Facebook
According to the Israeli website Walla, the four Jerusalemites, from 17 to 20 years old, have been charged with “inciting to terrorism and violence” on Facebook in addition to supporting a “terrorist group” and other charges.
4 dec 2016
A Palestinian representative body announced on Saturday it is examining ways to prosecute Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu for racial incitement.
The High Follow-Up Committee for Arab Citizens of the Green Line, one of the top representative organizations in Palestine, accused Netanyahu of hate speech against Palestinian citizens of 1948 Occupied Palestine after a series of fires broke out across the area.
The committee condemned the Prime Minister’s statements, in addition to the role played by some of his ministers and the Israeli mass media.
The organization dubbed Netanyahu’s language a gateway to the escalation of incitement against the Palestinian people.
The committee also issued a statement criticizing the occupation government for its racist law on religious broadcasts, in reference to an Israeli ban on Adhan (the Muslim call to prayer).
The move came after Netanyahu claimed that Palestinians had been deliberately starting the fires that swept across many parts of the Green Line (territories occupied by Israel in 1948).
The High Follow-Up Committee for Arab Citizens of the Green Line, one of the top representative organizations in Palestine, accused Netanyahu of hate speech against Palestinian citizens of 1948 Occupied Palestine after a series of fires broke out across the area.
The committee condemned the Prime Minister’s statements, in addition to the role played by some of his ministers and the Israeli mass media.
The organization dubbed Netanyahu’s language a gateway to the escalation of incitement against the Palestinian people.
The committee also issued a statement criticizing the occupation government for its racist law on religious broadcasts, in reference to an Israeli ban on Adhan (the Muslim call to prayer).
The move came after Netanyahu claimed that Palestinians had been deliberately starting the fires that swept across many parts of the Green Line (territories occupied by Israel in 1948).
1 dec 2016
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Israeli media widely circulated this image, supposedly of a Palestinian setting a forest fire. The man, who had been tending his own land, was interrogated for five days and then released.
A Palestinian man who Israeli media and authorities accused of arson, amid wildfires that forced tens of thousands to flee their homes last week, has reportedly been released without charge. “Remember Jawad Qattoush from Battir? He starred in all the newspapers in recent days – a Palestinian who lights fires,” Nir Hasson, a journalist for the Tel Aviv newspaper Haaretz, posted on Facebook on Thursday. |
“So after five days in detention, interrogation by the Israel Security Agency and the prohibition of a meeting with a lawyer, he went home. He actually did light a fire, he burnt garbage on his own premises, 150 meters from his home, 1.5 kilometers from any Jewish town,” Hasson stated.
“Oh, and he also put out the fire,” Hasson added.
The accusations against Qattoush came as Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, asserted that Palestinians were starting the wildfires that the government was struggling to control.
Qattoush was one of more than 20 Palestinians, some of them citizens of Israel, rounded up on accusations ranging from arson to making satirical comments about the fires on social media.
Tending his land
Israel’s Channel 2 had reported that on Saturday, Israeli park rangers spotted a man setting a fire at “Nahal Refaim in the Judean Hills,” a river valley straddling the boundary line between the occupied West Bank and present-day Israel.
The report claims that inspectors from Israel’s Nature and Parks Authority observed a person coming from Battir, a village west of Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank, near the boundary line with Israel. The man then began setting vegetation alight, but “thanks to the efforts of the rangers the fire was prevented from spreading.” Channel 2 adds that Israeli occupation forces followed the man back to Battir and detained him there.
Israel’s Ynet also reported that the army and police “apprehended a suspect identified by a forest ranger as setting fire to the brush northwest of the Palestinian village of Battir.”
But in Battir, neighbors told a very different story to Ma’an News Agency reporter Mirna al-Atrash:
They said that Qattoush, 43, works in Jerusalem, and his day off is Saturday, which is when he typically tends to and waters his land. That’s what Qattoush was doing last Saturday, according to one neighbor: he collected scrub and debris and burned it, and then returned home.
The video report shows a small patch of charred earth where Qattoush burned the brush.
“We were surprised when a short time later the army and police arrived and took him away,” the neighbor said.
Another neighbor explained that following the autumn olive harvest villagers typically clear their land of fallen branches, as Qattoush was doing, far from any forested area.
About a third of Battir’s land was seized in 1948 and now lies inside present-day Israel, but under the 1949 Rhodes Armistice Agreement, villagers continue to maintain ownership of their land on the Israeli side. But Qattoush’s land, as Ma’an states, is well within the West Bank side.
In 2014, the United Nations cultural body UNESCO added Battir to its World Heritage List, describing its landscape of olives, vines and the ancient irrigation terraces used by its people as being of “outstanding universal value.”
Battir, which is in an area of heavy encroachment by Israeli settlements and is under threat from Israel’s wall in the West Bank, is also on UNESCO’s list of World Heritage in Danger.
Scapegoating
Adalah, a legal advocacy group that defends the rights of Palestinian citizens of Israel, told The Electronic Intifada earlier this week that Netanyahu’s claims that the wildfires were “terrorism” came as part of a “strategy of incitement” against the Arab population.
Israeli analysts also observed that Netanyahu sought to scapegoat Palestinians to shift public anger over failures in the government’s firefighting effort.
In another case, a 24-year-old Palestinian citizen of Israel from the northern town of Umm al-Fahm has been indicted for setting several fires in his neighborhood, but Israeli media reported that the alleged actions had “no nationalistic motives.”
Israeli media revealed on Saturday that a fire blamed on Palestinians may have been started by Israeli forces chasing them in a wooded area west of Jerusalem.
“Though the initial concern was that the two were looking to commit arson out of nationalistic motives, after they were arrested, they were found to be known to the police to be part of a band of thieves,” Ynet reported. “As such, the police began investigating whether the forest fire was caused due to security forces using equipment to light the way during the chase.”
The fires affected Palestinian citizens of Israel as much as anyone else. Palestinian rescue workers and firefighters, both from within Israel and the occupied West Bank, risked their own lives to protect others.
And despite the scapegoating of their communities, they are part of the recovery as well. In the northern city of Haifa, for instance, Palestinian businessmen are repairing a synagogue damaged by a wildfire free of charge.
On Thursday, heavy rains and snow were predicted to bring an end to the long dry spell.
A change in the weather may put out the remaining fires, but it is unlikely to extinguish the Israeli government’s inflammatory attacks and incitement.
Dena Shunra provided translation.
“Oh, and he also put out the fire,” Hasson added.
The accusations against Qattoush came as Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, asserted that Palestinians were starting the wildfires that the government was struggling to control.
Qattoush was one of more than 20 Palestinians, some of them citizens of Israel, rounded up on accusations ranging from arson to making satirical comments about the fires on social media.
Tending his land
Israel’s Channel 2 had reported that on Saturday, Israeli park rangers spotted a man setting a fire at “Nahal Refaim in the Judean Hills,” a river valley straddling the boundary line between the occupied West Bank and present-day Israel.
The report claims that inspectors from Israel’s Nature and Parks Authority observed a person coming from Battir, a village west of Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank, near the boundary line with Israel. The man then began setting vegetation alight, but “thanks to the efforts of the rangers the fire was prevented from spreading.” Channel 2 adds that Israeli occupation forces followed the man back to Battir and detained him there.
Israel’s Ynet also reported that the army and police “apprehended a suspect identified by a forest ranger as setting fire to the brush northwest of the Palestinian village of Battir.”
But in Battir, neighbors told a very different story to Ma’an News Agency reporter Mirna al-Atrash:
They said that Qattoush, 43, works in Jerusalem, and his day off is Saturday, which is when he typically tends to and waters his land. That’s what Qattoush was doing last Saturday, according to one neighbor: he collected scrub and debris and burned it, and then returned home.
The video report shows a small patch of charred earth where Qattoush burned the brush.
“We were surprised when a short time later the army and police arrived and took him away,” the neighbor said.
Another neighbor explained that following the autumn olive harvest villagers typically clear their land of fallen branches, as Qattoush was doing, far from any forested area.
About a third of Battir’s land was seized in 1948 and now lies inside present-day Israel, but under the 1949 Rhodes Armistice Agreement, villagers continue to maintain ownership of their land on the Israeli side. But Qattoush’s land, as Ma’an states, is well within the West Bank side.
In 2014, the United Nations cultural body UNESCO added Battir to its World Heritage List, describing its landscape of olives, vines and the ancient irrigation terraces used by its people as being of “outstanding universal value.”
Battir, which is in an area of heavy encroachment by Israeli settlements and is under threat from Israel’s wall in the West Bank, is also on UNESCO’s list of World Heritage in Danger.
Scapegoating
Adalah, a legal advocacy group that defends the rights of Palestinian citizens of Israel, told The Electronic Intifada earlier this week that Netanyahu’s claims that the wildfires were “terrorism” came as part of a “strategy of incitement” against the Arab population.
Israeli analysts also observed that Netanyahu sought to scapegoat Palestinians to shift public anger over failures in the government’s firefighting effort.
In another case, a 24-year-old Palestinian citizen of Israel from the northern town of Umm al-Fahm has been indicted for setting several fires in his neighborhood, but Israeli media reported that the alleged actions had “no nationalistic motives.”
Israeli media revealed on Saturday that a fire blamed on Palestinians may have been started by Israeli forces chasing them in a wooded area west of Jerusalem.
“Though the initial concern was that the two were looking to commit arson out of nationalistic motives, after they were arrested, they were found to be known to the police to be part of a band of thieves,” Ynet reported. “As such, the police began investigating whether the forest fire was caused due to security forces using equipment to light the way during the chase.”
The fires affected Palestinian citizens of Israel as much as anyone else. Palestinian rescue workers and firefighters, both from within Israel and the occupied West Bank, risked their own lives to protect others.
And despite the scapegoating of their communities, they are part of the recovery as well. In the northern city of Haifa, for instance, Palestinian businessmen are repairing a synagogue damaged by a wildfire free of charge.
On Thursday, heavy rains and snow were predicted to bring an end to the long dry spell.
A change in the weather may put out the remaining fires, but it is unlikely to extinguish the Israeli government’s inflammatory attacks and incitement.
Dena Shunra provided translation.
29 nov 2016
A Boeing 747 Supertanker aircraft from the United States drops fire retardant on a forest fire near Jerusalem, on 26 November. In inflammatory comments, Israeli leaders sought to blame Palestinians for wildfires that forced tens of thousands to evacuate their homes.
Palestinians and Palestinian citizens of Israel are being blamed for recent wildfires as part of the Israeli government’s deliberate strategy of incitement, a leading rights group has said.
“Senior Israeli government officials – including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – continue to make inflammatory statements that lay much of the blame for the recent tragic fires in the Haifa and Jerusalem areas on Palestinian citizens of Israel,” Adalah, a legal advocacy group that defends the rights of Palestinians in the country, told The Electronic Intifada.
“This rhetoric is a continuation of the Netanyahu government’s ongoing strategy of incitement against Arab citizens of Israel, and its portrayal of them as a fifth column,” Adalah added. “The government’s legislative agenda also mirrors its incendiary speech with the passage of new racist laws, most recently the Expulsion Law which seeks to illegally kick Arab members of the Knesset out of the parliament.”
Shifting blame
Over the last week, Israel struggled to gain control of wildfires amid tinder dry weather conditions that forced tens of thousands of people to evacuate their homes. Top politicians immediately cast blame on Palestinians.
Education minister Naftali Bennett declared that “only someone who this land does not belong to would be capable of setting fire to it,” a comment that The Times of Israel estimated was “aimed at Palestinians and/or members of Israel’s Arab community.”
Netanyahu and public security minister Gilad Erdan suggested the fires were a form of “terrorism.”
“Whoever tries to burn parts of Israel will be punished for it severely,” Netanyahu vowed.
But as an analysis in the Tel Aviv newspaper Haaretz noted, Netanyahu’s declarations appeared to be a tactic to shift blame for his government’s incompetence in bringing the fires under control, despite its claims that it had learned the lessons from the devastating 2010 Carmel fire that killed more then 40 people.
“This time Netanyahu laid the blame on terrorism. He’ll always have that option,” the newspaper’s Yossi Verter observed. “Even before investigators and general security service (Shin Bet) personnel issued one unequivocal finding regarding the source of the fire, Netanyahu ruled that it was ‘arson and incitement’ that had caused the fires.”
By doing so, Verter added, Netanyahu had “navigated the discourse towards his comfort zone.”
Another analysis said that since the 2010 fires, the Netanyahu government had spent vast sums on firefighting planes that are ill-suited for the conditions in the country, proving too large to maneouver into the tight spots where fires were threatening homes.
Israel arrested more than 20 Palestinians on suspicion of arson or “incitement” to arson. In one case, Israel arrested an Arab citizen in the south of the country for a satirical Facebook post about the fires.
Adalah told The Electronic Intifada that it is “monitoring the arrests of Palestinian citizens of Israel in the wake of the fires and is receiving reports regarding recent developments from a variety of sources.”
It said that private lawyers are representing most of those detained, but that “decisions related to possible future legal action by Adalah are dependent upon developments in these cases.”
Snubbing Palestine
Palestinian citizens of Israel were as much victims of the wildfires as anyone else – particularly in and around the mixed city of Haifa. And rescue workers who are Palestinian citizens of Israel have been risking their lives to protect others.
Several countries, including Greece, Italy, Turkey, Russia and the United States sent firefighting aircraft or other resources.
And just like in 2010, the Palestinian Authority in the occupied West Bank sent dozens of firefighters and their equipment to assist Israel.
Netanyahu even took a break from accusing PA leader Mahmoud Abbas of “incitement” to thank him for the Palestinian contribution.
Israel acknowledged the assistance of those countries in a post on its official Arabic-language Facebook page.
Palestinians and Palestinian citizens of Israel are being blamed for recent wildfires as part of the Israeli government’s deliberate strategy of incitement, a leading rights group has said.
“Senior Israeli government officials – including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – continue to make inflammatory statements that lay much of the blame for the recent tragic fires in the Haifa and Jerusalem areas on Palestinian citizens of Israel,” Adalah, a legal advocacy group that defends the rights of Palestinians in the country, told The Electronic Intifada.
“This rhetoric is a continuation of the Netanyahu government’s ongoing strategy of incitement against Arab citizens of Israel, and its portrayal of them as a fifth column,” Adalah added. “The government’s legislative agenda also mirrors its incendiary speech with the passage of new racist laws, most recently the Expulsion Law which seeks to illegally kick Arab members of the Knesset out of the parliament.”
Shifting blame
Over the last week, Israel struggled to gain control of wildfires amid tinder dry weather conditions that forced tens of thousands of people to evacuate their homes. Top politicians immediately cast blame on Palestinians.
Education minister Naftali Bennett declared that “only someone who this land does not belong to would be capable of setting fire to it,” a comment that The Times of Israel estimated was “aimed at Palestinians and/or members of Israel’s Arab community.”
Netanyahu and public security minister Gilad Erdan suggested the fires were a form of “terrorism.”
“Whoever tries to burn parts of Israel will be punished for it severely,” Netanyahu vowed.
But as an analysis in the Tel Aviv newspaper Haaretz noted, Netanyahu’s declarations appeared to be a tactic to shift blame for his government’s incompetence in bringing the fires under control, despite its claims that it had learned the lessons from the devastating 2010 Carmel fire that killed more then 40 people.
“This time Netanyahu laid the blame on terrorism. He’ll always have that option,” the newspaper’s Yossi Verter observed. “Even before investigators and general security service (Shin Bet) personnel issued one unequivocal finding regarding the source of the fire, Netanyahu ruled that it was ‘arson and incitement’ that had caused the fires.”
By doing so, Verter added, Netanyahu had “navigated the discourse towards his comfort zone.”
Another analysis said that since the 2010 fires, the Netanyahu government had spent vast sums on firefighting planes that are ill-suited for the conditions in the country, proving too large to maneouver into the tight spots where fires were threatening homes.
Israel arrested more than 20 Palestinians on suspicion of arson or “incitement” to arson. In one case, Israel arrested an Arab citizen in the south of the country for a satirical Facebook post about the fires.
Adalah told The Electronic Intifada that it is “monitoring the arrests of Palestinian citizens of Israel in the wake of the fires and is receiving reports regarding recent developments from a variety of sources.”
It said that private lawyers are representing most of those detained, but that “decisions related to possible future legal action by Adalah are dependent upon developments in these cases.”
Snubbing Palestine
Palestinian citizens of Israel were as much victims of the wildfires as anyone else – particularly in and around the mixed city of Haifa. And rescue workers who are Palestinian citizens of Israel have been risking their lives to protect others.
Several countries, including Greece, Italy, Turkey, Russia and the United States sent firefighting aircraft or other resources.
And just like in 2010, the Palestinian Authority in the occupied West Bank sent dozens of firefighters and their equipment to assist Israel.
Netanyahu even took a break from accusing PA leader Mahmoud Abbas of “incitement” to thank him for the Palestinian contribution.
Israel acknowledged the assistance of those countries in a post on its official Arabic-language Facebook page.
28 nov 2016
Israeli media outlets said that several new brush fires broke out on Sunday in different areas of Israel (the 1948 occupied territories).
According to Israeli news reports, a small forest near Hadera city caught fire before Israeli fire brigades managed with aerial support to control the blazes.
New brush fires were also seen raging near the ethnically cleansed Palestinian village of Sataf in west Jerusalem. No efforts to extinguish the flames were reported.
Earlier in the morning, the Israeli police reported forest fires in Kiryat Malachi city, south of Israel, before fire crews intervened to control them.
In the Jerusalem Hills area alone, the recent fires have so far destroyed more than 5,000 dunums (1,250 acres) of forest, and as of Sunday night, firefighters were still battling blazes, according to Haaretz newspaper.
The Jerusalem Hills also suffered fires in 2014 and last May 2016.
In a related context, an Israeli expert warned Sunday that the forest fires in Israel would only get worse in the coming years because of climate change.
Yohay Carmel, professor of environmental, water and agricultural engineering at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, said that “climate change is causing things we have not seen before."
“In 2010, there was no significant rainfall until early December, so the vegetation had endured nine months of aridity.” This year has been similar, and “in this situation, you do not need arson; anything can ignite the vegetation.”
“Israel is not the only country experiencing an upsurge in fire damage. Forest fires of similar magnitude or worse have recently been raging annually throughout the Mediterranean basin, including in Spain, Portugal, Greece, and France, as well as in other parts of the globe, such as California and Australia,” Haaretz said.
According to Israeli news reports, a small forest near Hadera city caught fire before Israeli fire brigades managed with aerial support to control the blazes.
New brush fires were also seen raging near the ethnically cleansed Palestinian village of Sataf in west Jerusalem. No efforts to extinguish the flames were reported.
Earlier in the morning, the Israeli police reported forest fires in Kiryat Malachi city, south of Israel, before fire crews intervened to control them.
In the Jerusalem Hills area alone, the recent fires have so far destroyed more than 5,000 dunums (1,250 acres) of forest, and as of Sunday night, firefighters were still battling blazes, according to Haaretz newspaper.
The Jerusalem Hills also suffered fires in 2014 and last May 2016.
In a related context, an Israeli expert warned Sunday that the forest fires in Israel would only get worse in the coming years because of climate change.
Yohay Carmel, professor of environmental, water and agricultural engineering at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, said that “climate change is causing things we have not seen before."
“In 2010, there was no significant rainfall until early December, so the vegetation had endured nine months of aridity.” This year has been similar, and “in this situation, you do not need arson; anything can ignite the vegetation.”
“Israel is not the only country experiencing an upsurge in fire damage. Forest fires of similar magnitude or worse have recently been raging annually throughout the Mediterranean basin, including in Spain, Portugal, Greece, and France, as well as in other parts of the globe, such as California and Australia,” Haaretz said.
