Israel Was Tried For War Crimes Today, The Testimony Will Break Your Heart
"I’ve been in Brussels today witnessing the Russell Tribunal on Palestine which is assessing Israel’s war crimes in Gaza during Operation Protective Edge. The full testimony is available on the Tribunal’s website, but I have captured some key excerpts from my live reporting today."
This link above is to an article about the heart breaking testimony presented at the Russell Tribunal on Palestine 2014, regarding the 2014 genocidal attack on Gaza by the political Zionist government of Israel. A Russell Tribunal was set up "to examine the violations of international law, of which the Palestinians are victims, and that prevent the Palestinian People from exercising its rights to a sovereign State."
I highly recommend accessing the Russell Tribunal on Palestine (rtop) at the link offered in the excerpted first paragraph, above. The Tribunal is named after Bertrand Russell, and the Bertrand Russell Foundation supported setting up a Russell Tribunal on Palestine. Much more of value can learn more about the Russell Tribunal on Palestine by clicking the above link. The link directly below is the opening paragraph on the Russell Tribunal on Palestine About page which tells more about the establishment of Russell Tribunal and also about the specific Russell Tribunal on Palestine.
I happened upon this article about the Russell Tribunal, yesterday, on the page of a new Facebook friend. I recommend the article as an introductory read for anyone, especially for those who have no idea of the viciousness of intent and action that was carried out on inhabitants in the most recent genocidal attack on Gaza; an attack which demonstrably has nothing to do with Israel's claims of targeting terrorists. It is an "open secret" that the government of Israeli has long employed targeted assassination, worldwide, and has untold numbers of political Zionist agents in place worldwide, particularly in the middle east posing as Arabs; and untold numbers of hired assassins to do it's evil deeds. It is no figment of anyone's imagination. It is actuality. As such, the government of Israel has no need to try to obliterate Gaza from the map in order to pursue terrorists, though such was the claimed reason for the attack.
This is a long discussion. So, for those who are aware of the issues - there is no need to read further. But for those who are not, well . . . let's just say that exposing yourselves to some righteous, warranted anger expressed lucidly, though what might seem harshly to some, is also an introduction to issues that will not be resolved until a critical mass understanding of the issues has been reached. I urge readers to become part of that critical mass of understanding which is the only way an actual solution to the problem of ideological political Zionism as illegally perpetrated on Palestinians, will be reached. The problem actually compromises world peace, increasingly so for the past few decades. Continue reading if you do not know how it does so.
I would like to imagine that most people remember the most recent genocide of 2014 which the government of Israel launched on Palestinians in Gaza, and anyone else who happened to be there at the time. I would like to imagine that most people know enough minimal history to understand the injustice, not only of the repeated political Zionist genocidal efforts, but also of how the inadequately addressed problem of political Zionism has increasingly corroded world peace since around the turn of the 20th century . . . thus for nearly a century.
It is a long complex history interrelated to modern geopolitics, though not related to the claim of political Zionists that the problems are due to a millennia long "ongoing biblical conflict" (*see note below) from before the time of both Christianity and Islam. People of all religions coexisted peacefully in Palestine throughout most of modern history even sharing in one another's religious celebrations.
Lest there be an assumption that "genocide" is an exaggeration, it is not an exaggeration according to the description of genocide in the "Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide", to which I offer the link below, and the Article II section which itemizes the acts of genocide. This Convention was formulated after WWII so that nothing of a similar nature would ever again occur - whether it occurs over a period of a few years (like the genocide of the Nazi regime, and several other genocides since that time), or occurs sporadically over a period of several generations (like in Palestine). The genocide perpetrated by the ideological political Zionist regime of Israel fulfills ALL of the itemized acts considered to demonstrate genocidal intent. But committing any one of them is considered to indicate the intent of genocide.
Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
Israel's genocide has been consistently occurring in some of the above ways, and more sporadically occurring in others, since before 1948 when political Zionist terrorist groups decided to kill Swedish Count Bernadette who was the UN Security Council's unanimously appointed mediator in Mandated Palestine. Before that time there had already been a concentrated sniping effort targeting Palestinians. Shortly after assassinating Count Bernadette, the political Zionist terrorist groups rampaged through Palestine killing as many Palestinians as they could and promising to kill those who did not leave. Thus, the 1948 exodus of Palestinians from their homes which resulted in, to date, several generations of Palestinians living in what were intended to be temporary refugee camps when they were establish by the U.N. in Palestine and neighboring nations.
Count Bernadette had been tasked by the U.N. Security Council with mediating a peaceful equitable division of Palestine so that the political Zionists would be granted an equitable portion of Palestine for a Jewish only nation. However there was nothing equitable about it nor about the deceit that perpetrated the division effort. Taking a portion of Palestine and displacing the Palestinians who lived there was an ideological political plan that arose long before WWII. In fact it's early roots were back in the 1830s - in Europe. Yet, if the political Zionists' hasbara which differs from fact, is to be believed, partitioning the land had everything to do with WWII and nothing else. That apparent contradiction is an example of a red flag which indicates a problem with facts not agreeing. As is usually the case regarding contradiction, it arises based on omitted pertinent facts. And upon investigation, ordinarily the red flag contradictions will expose a twisted truth and/or an actual lie i.e. intended as disinformation in both cases.
But there was a plan to partition Palestine long before WWII started. The inhabitants of Palestine had been promised by the allied nations of WWI that if Palestine supported them against the Turkish, the allies would support Palestine in becoming a nation with the Ottoman Empire's dissolution after the war. It was the same promise extended to other areas in the region of what, at that time, were also part of the Turkish Ottoman Empire with whom the allied nations were at war during WWI.
The allies reneged ONLY on their promise to the Palestinians. Because, there had been a clandestine agreement between the British and the political Zionist leadership to give some of Palestine to the political Zionists for a "Jewish only" nation intended to become modern "Israel". In actuality, the clandestine promise was made to those who embraced the irreligious political ideology of Zionism, those whose primary strategy was to use and abuse the religion of Judaism by any means they deemed necessary, for the purpose of appropriating all of Palestine, eventually, to be peopled ONLY by those who claimed to be Jewish (religion) no matter their ethnicity or their nation of origin.
Demonstrably, though as with most promises from the ideological political Zionists, it was nothing more than hot air, a twisted truth, a contradictory double standard promise, and remains so to this day. Consider that African Jews who emigrated to Israel have been viciously discriminated against rather than welcomed. So too non-Jewish workers from other nations living in Israel temporarily, when they want to stay permanently. Even so no other groups are victimized to the extent of Palestinians in Israeli Occupied Palestinian Territory (oPt)
Worse, Palestinians who live in oPt, as if imprisoned - especially Muslim Palestinians - have always been deemed by political Zionists to be cannon fodder. Of course the government of Israel has little trepidation about also targeting Palestinian Christians, but most actively targets populations and cities that are predominately Muslim. With Israel's "blessing" the illegal settlers target the cities, villages, and rural areas, both Muslim and Christian, when the Israeli military is not tasked to target them.
What the settlers and soldiers do to Palestinians and their land is completely unconscionable. The facts are presented in the Russell Tribunal on Palestine, and by many journalists. The facts have the capacity to make one feel ill in a number of ways, simply reading about them, and/or listening to people who know about them and/or who have directly experienced the crimes, and lived to tell about the abuse, torture, and violence. Those same crimes have been perpetrated on Palestinian children and young adults who are imprisoned in Israeli prisons for no reason except that they were kidnapped by settlers or the Israeli military - and survived to tell about it.
What is my purpose in wanting people to be informed? Well there are several reasons, all equally important. The first is that nations signatory to the Geneva Conventions have agreed to abide by them. However, because the government of Israel does not abide by the agreements to which it is signatory, an entire nation of Palestinian people has been victimized by a decades long genocide that was started by a highly organized group of terrorists who wanted the land indigenous Palestinians (of all religions) lived on - but without Palestinians living on the land it wanted to appropriate. As a result there has been a systematically committed genocide on the population of non-Jewish Palestinian people in oPt for over half a century. All the other reasons people should be informed, become informed, and stay informed about the issues are associated with that reason.
Secondly, followers of the political ideology of Zionism are using and abusing the religion of Judaism, thus it's adherents, in claiming all its illegal actions are in support of Judaism and Jews, thus inferring they are condoned by the religion of Judaism. However, none of the crimes committed by the ideological political Zionist government of Israel are condoned by Judaism. Jewish folks are increasingly recognizing that as a problem and refusing to support Israel's crimes. The situation is little different than the current one that people know more about because it is in the news regularly, that of crimes being committed by the irreligious ideological political terrorists who claim to do what they do in support of Islam, and that it is condoned by Islam, although none of the crimes they commit are condoned by Islam. Different perpetrators of evil - in name only - but not in spirit of ill-intent.
Thirdly, Christians worldwide who support the actions of the political Zionist government of Israel are complicit with the ideology of political Zionists when they try to persuade the government's of their nations to support the vicious illegal genocide of the political Zionist government of Israel. Apparently their support is based on some sort of man-made theology unique to several Christian denominations. It has been a major problem in the U.S.A. for decades and remains one that is perpetrated by lobbies in the U.S. which illegally represent the foreign nation of Israel and it's political desires, to our U.S. Congress.
Foreign lobbies are illegal. But, the Israel lobbies, collectively, are constantly pressuring Congress, by any means they can, to do Israel's bidding . . . to do what is right for Israel even when it is wrong for our nation i.e. those folks in Congress are known as "Israel firsters". People used to imagine most of those "Israel First" folks were Jewish. But such is not the case. With Israel firsters, who are predominately Christian, populating our Congress, it is no mystery that we witness an increasingly bold use of religious reasoning being offered up for the domestic choices made for our nation; nor a mystery that religious reasons are used when the "Firsters" want to persuade other members of Congress - as if doing so does not push beyond the limits of our so-called "church and state" constitutional clause.
The various Israeli lobbies collectively pressure Congress to provide increasingly more military aid to Israel through 10 year memorandums of understanding (mou). There is a requested increase from the most recent $30+ Billion mou, to over $45+ Billion for a subsequent 10 year mou. The lobbies make a stink about everything Israel wants from Congress that it doesn't get, but will grudgingly acquiesce about many items on their shopping list to Congress, when our government continues to provide and increase military aid. But just think about and imagine the benefits that over $45 Billion could provide towards creating a truly equitable system of both health care and higher education for our own nation of people.
Fourthly, the U.S.A. is the staunched military materiel supporter of the political Zionist regime which makes it complicit in the genocide against Palestinians living in oPt; which also makes it complicit in the appropriating of increasingly more oPt land by the political Zionist regime of Israel. The question arises how my nation could support a regime which blatantly purports exclusivity for people of a specified religion, at the cost of displacement of those not of the specified religion who are criminally persecuted, even unto death, for not being of the specified religion. My nation certainly makes a human rights issues out of that type of situation when other nations violate. So why does it enable and condone Israel's human rights violations? It's another red flag double-standard contradiction that has no adequate justification.
Besides the crimes being wrong by anyone's standards, there are also Geneva Conventions which outline how an occupied people must be treated and cannot be treated. Israel violently and illegally violates them. Given U.S. laws, thus the intended mind-set of our nation which prevents religion and government from abusing one another and from abusing the citizenry in the name of religion, I ask, again, how is it the U.S.A. is so willing to staunchly support Israel's violent and illegal crimes which Israel purports are in the name of the specified religion of Judaism? But that is a topic for another time. It is also a question we, the people, all need to be asking our elected and appointed folks in government who are supposed to be representing our wishes about what is best for our nation.
Do I seem angry? Well, of course I am, and have felt highly infuriated and outraged about the problem for several decades once I started making an effort to objectively learn why the reported news simply did not add up but instead came across as being contradictory. That started for me shortly before the war of many names started i.e. the Six Days war, the June War, the War of 1967, 1967 Arab–Israeli War,Third Arab–Israeli War started. That was shortly before the end of the third quarter of my freshman year in college.
Pursuit of answers to the contradictions started for me because of a news article a fellow student had written about the pending war based on a letter from his mother in Jordan telling him the war would soon start. He asked me to type it for him because he could not type. When I asked how he knew there would be a war he insisted, absolutely insisted that I read the letter his mother had sent which spoke of the inevitable war. When the war did start several days after the article was published in our college newspaper, the mainstream news reports on t.v., radio, and newspapers were aghast about it having been so unexpected. Yet, I knew it was going to happen because someone who lived in the area knew it, and said so. That seeming paradox was a huge incongruous contradiction I could not ignore which also included a dimension of concern about controlled news, thus freedom of our press.
I started to learn the history associated with that contradiction, and became determined to continue investigating until I found some valid answers to the nature of the increasingly more unconscionable contradictions I was happening upon, as I learned more. The problems became abundantly clear. I happened upon so many cause and effect facts that differed from what the news reported. I was astounded, of course. I am still astounded by the blatant misleading information from news reports - a large amount of it being due to the problem of omission of pertinent facts which in turn leads to twisted truth "analysis" that places blame on Palestinians when it is actually the political Zionists who are persecuting the Palestinians. News reports have been presented that way for decades. It is always a celebration when there is actual news coverage.
Here is my fifth, final, and larger reason for wanting people to become informed. The problem of political Zionism actually has been increasingly threatening world peace for several decades. To learn about the problem of the ideology of political Zionism as demonstrated by it's ongoing genocidal intent towards Palestinians in oPt, is to understand how and why that is fact.
So even though I would like to imagine that people remember, if not the several genocidal attacks on Gaza, at least the most recent one; that people are willing to speak up about not being willing to tolerate such actions - I know this is not the case. Even though I would like to imagine that people know enough basic history to be aware of the illegality of the occupation of the Palestinian land and people, by the political Zionist regime of Israel, I know this is not the case.
But I do want to believe that decent people everywhere are not willing to tolerate what the article presents about the Russell Tribunal on Palestine, and what the video within the article exemplifies. Perhaps, most importantly, what I want to point out is that the responsible Palestinian population has long chosen to "fight" a self-declared nemesis, non-violently. That nemesis is the war declared on Palestinians by the political Zionist regime simply because Palestinians live on land Israel wants to claim for Israel, as a nation where only Jews are welcome to live permanently and be treated decently.
Why does it seem the problem of ideological political Zionism comes from being stuck in the mentality of WWII which other nations have transcended, relegating it to sorrowful history? Yet Israel seems stuck in perpetrating the same kind of problems, with the same intent of exclusivity and privileged arrogance that was a hallmark of the Nazi regime. An end must be put to the type of criminal behavior such problems foster.
The Russell Tribunal on Palestine is a world-wide non-violent effort to put an end to the problem. The only other non-violent means available in which everyone can participate is the boycott, divestment, and sanction (BDS) of Israel, using the model that was applied to South Africa. The worldwide effort applied to South Africa eventually gained enough support to do what needed to be done, and what it was intended to do. It caused the replacement of a corrupt racist government that excluded and attacked indigenous people by creating laws to manifest circumstances intended to keep the indigenous population disadvantaged and discriminated against, increasingly so by depriving them of decent living conditions, education, work. Yet, many South African folks who lived through those change say conditions are worse for the indigenous Palestinians (of all religions) than they were for indigenous South Africans.
I want to believe that decent people everywhere are not willing to tolerate the type of criminality exemplified in the article, the video, and the tribunal. I also know that most people are not able to make time in their lives to do on-going thorough and objective academic research about the problems created by the ideology of political Zionism. Therefore, I also believe BDS is necessary, and have been advocating since the early 90s, for decent people everywhere to support and advocate for BDS as the most effective non-violent way in which everyone can participate to put an end to the problems created by the political Zionist regime of Israel.
Israel's political Zionist regime not only victimizes Palestinians with it's genocidal intent, but also increasingly threatens world peace, primarily by persuading other nations to become embroiled in it's contrived battles against the neighboring nations - the nations the political Zionist regime considers to be threatening to Israel. As it happens those nations are all the nearby nations which happen to be predominately Muslim; and which, like Israel, do not legally insure that religion and government will be prevented from having an untoward effect on one another and thus on their nations' populations.
The nature of the government in the predominately Muslim nations is a different topic than the one treated here. However, none of those nations would have had reason to be a threat to Israel had Israel not become threatening to them because of trying to expand the territory that political Zionist terrorist groups seized in 1948, then declared to be the nation of Israel. Additional territory was again seized from neighboring nations in subsequent altercations in the following decades by the political Zionist government; a government which was peopled by the same folks who had comprised the terrorist organizations that rampaged through Palestine killing Palestinians in 1948, then declared Israel to be a nation.
In actuality one of the worst problems perpetrated by the ideology of political Zionism is that it makes war on religion. Do not be fooled into imagining the ideology has not also been perpetrating a war on Judaism. As previously stated, above, it has, does, and continues to do so simply because it blames Judaism for all of it's criminal actions by suggesting the crimes are condoned by and for the benefit of Judaism. The ideology has also clearly declared war on Islam, primarily because it is the predominate religion of the nations in that region. It has less clearly declared war on Christianity, perhaps even less clearly than on Judaism because most of it's manipulations have been aimed at evincing the support of Christians, particularly Christians who serve in government in America.
The effort of Israel's illegal U.S. lobbies is a more twisted, convoluted tale of political Zionist deceit, than what has already been mentioned above, and also a topic for another discussion at another time. For those who have a further interest, Cynthia McKinney who represented Georgia in the House of Representative is one of those folks who had the integrity and scruples to not bow down to the pressure of Israel's lobbies. She is also willing to talk about what that did to her career in Congress - "courtesy" of Israel's U.S. lobbies. The same has happened to the careers of many other folks in Congress for not doing the bidding of the moneyed Israeli lobbies.
So what is my own "end game"? World peace? Yes, or course. But also what is necessary to lead to it, that being educating ourselves and doing what we can to understand the issues; for example paying attention to the goings on of the Russell Tribunal on Palestine; and supporting the BDS effort.
One of the largest contributors to preventing world peace, increasingly for over half a century, is the self-declared nation of Israel, conceived in greed and dedicated by the adherents of the ideology of political Zionism, to the genocide of Palestinians. If the crimes committed by Israel, as demonstrated and documented in the article, it's video, and the Russell Tribunal, are not enough to convince decent people to actively support BDS, then I encourage making a personal objective effort to learn history. Of course I always encourage personal research anyway, but also understand the time constraints of life. There are many more articles and videos about the problems by journalists of the highest integrity, a large percentage of whom are Palestinian. What they say is an excellent way to start recognizing the myriad of contradictions that exist in the differences between what are essentially documentary accounts, and what the reported news to which we are exposed, reports inaccurately often because of what it neglects to report.
I learned, early on, in researching this topic that any contradictions to be found will dictate the direction and extent of research needed. And there will be contradictions at every turn, and it will demand a lot of time and effort to do the research. But even if you doubt that the political Zionist regime of Israel is THE complex problem it actually has become, before or instead of doing your own research, I am requesting that people consider supporting BDS simply because it is clear that the attacks by Israel on Gaza are the type of attacks that can not and should not be tolerated by anyone, no matter the nation that perpetrates them, no matter who the people that are being targeted.
Supporting BDS is support for a non-violent effort that is intended to stop Israel from continuing to violate UN treaties to which it is signatory, thus intended to stop Israel from continuing to commit genocide on the Palestinian people in oPt. The treaties were formulated for the purpose of preventing the type of genocide that was a hallmark of WWII. To ignore them and allow repeated instances of genocide is an indicator that people have not learned the lessons of WWI and WWII. And when we ignore and refuse to learn the lessons of history then we repeat them.
Please join decent folks worldwide in learning about and supporting the non-violent BDS effort. The only people who do not consider it a realistic, peaceful, and viable solution to a deadly problem, are the ideological political Zionists who the government of Israel represents.
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note: There are indications (i.e. "from the Nile to the Tigris-Euphrates" as carved in stone above the entrance to the Knesset) that the ideology of political Zionism, considers itself the representative of ancient Israel . . . also Judea (there having been irreconcilable differences within historic ancient Israel that caused a split into two nations). The nations existed only for a relatively short period of time in history. Yet the nation of Israel has chosen to recreate and embrace an attitude of personal injury in the form of an "eye for eye, tooth for a tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot" as a political and territorial grudge against an ancient Babylon Empire that no longer exists, either, except in history. That period of time was long before either Christianity or Islam existed. It can also be pointed out that the primarily civil Babylonian Code of Hammurabi was apparently used as a model for what is the later primarily religious Hebrew law. But which was first is a topic of discussion for another time given that some consider it debatable.
"I’ve been in Brussels today witnessing the Russell Tribunal on Palestine which is assessing Israel’s war crimes in Gaza during Operation Protective Edge. The full testimony is available on the Tribunal’s website, but I have captured some key excerpts from my live reporting today."
This link above is to an article about the heart breaking testimony presented at the Russell Tribunal on Palestine 2014, regarding the 2014 genocidal attack on Gaza by the political Zionist government of Israel. A Russell Tribunal was set up "to examine the violations of international law, of which the Palestinians are victims, and that prevent the Palestinian People from exercising its rights to a sovereign State."
I highly recommend accessing the Russell Tribunal on Palestine (rtop) at the link offered in the excerpted first paragraph, above. The Tribunal is named after Bertrand Russell, and the Bertrand Russell Foundation supported setting up a Russell Tribunal on Palestine. Much more of value can learn more about the Russell Tribunal on Palestine by clicking the above link. The link directly below is the opening paragraph on the Russell Tribunal on Palestine About page which tells more about the establishment of Russell Tribunal and also about the specific Russell Tribunal on Palestine.
“May this Tribunal prevent the crime of silence“…
…declared Lord Bertrand Russell to define the spirit and the objective of the International War Crimes Tribunal constituted in 1966 to investigate crimes committed in Vietnam and judge them according to international law. Initiated by Lord Russell, Nobel Prize of literature in 1950, and supported by eminent intellectuals such as Jean-Paul Sartre, who chaired the Tribunal, Lelio Basso, Guenther Anders, James Baldwin, Simone de Beauvoir, Lazaro Cardenas, Stokely Carmichael, Isaac Deutscher, Gisèle Halimi, Laurent Schwartz…, this Tribunal was named the Russell Tribunal."I happened upon this article about the Russell Tribunal, yesterday, on the page of a new Facebook friend. I recommend the article as an introductory read for anyone, especially for those who have no idea of the viciousness of intent and action that was carried out on inhabitants in the most recent genocidal attack on Gaza; an attack which demonstrably has nothing to do with Israel's claims of targeting terrorists. It is an "open secret" that the government of Israeli has long employed targeted assassination, worldwide, and has untold numbers of political Zionist agents in place worldwide, particularly in the middle east posing as Arabs; and untold numbers of hired assassins to do it's evil deeds. It is no figment of anyone's imagination. It is actuality. As such, the government of Israel has no need to try to obliterate Gaza from the map in order to pursue terrorists, though such was the claimed reason for the attack.
This is a long discussion. So, for those who are aware of the issues - there is no need to read further. But for those who are not, well . . . let's just say that exposing yourselves to some righteous, warranted anger expressed lucidly, though what might seem harshly to some, is also an introduction to issues that will not be resolved until a critical mass understanding of the issues has been reached. I urge readers to become part of that critical mass of understanding which is the only way an actual solution to the problem of ideological political Zionism as illegally perpetrated on Palestinians, will be reached. The problem actually compromises world peace, increasingly so for the past few decades. Continue reading if you do not know how it does so.
I would like to imagine that most people remember the most recent genocide of 2014 which the government of Israel launched on Palestinians in Gaza, and anyone else who happened to be there at the time. I would like to imagine that most people know enough minimal history to understand the injustice, not only of the repeated political Zionist genocidal efforts, but also of how the inadequately addressed problem of political Zionism has increasingly corroded world peace since around the turn of the 20th century . . . thus for nearly a century.
It is a long complex history interrelated to modern geopolitics, though not related to the claim of political Zionists that the problems are due to a millennia long "ongoing biblical conflict" (*see note below) from before the time of both Christianity and Islam. People of all religions coexisted peacefully in Palestine throughout most of modern history even sharing in one another's religious celebrations.
Lest there be an assumption that "genocide" is an exaggeration, it is not an exaggeration according to the description of genocide in the "Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide", to which I offer the link below, and the Article II section which itemizes the acts of genocide. This Convention was formulated after WWII so that nothing of a similar nature would ever again occur - whether it occurs over a period of a few years (like the genocide of the Nazi regime, and several other genocides since that time), or occurs sporadically over a period of several generations (like in Palestine). The genocide perpetrated by the ideological political Zionist regime of Israel fulfills ALL of the itemized acts considered to demonstrate genocidal intent. But committing any one of them is considered to indicate the intent of genocide.
Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide
Article II
In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts
committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national,
ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
Israel's genocide has been consistently occurring in some of the above ways, and more sporadically occurring in others, since before 1948 when political Zionist terrorist groups decided to kill Swedish Count Bernadette who was the UN Security Council's unanimously appointed mediator in Mandated Palestine. Before that time there had already been a concentrated sniping effort targeting Palestinians. Shortly after assassinating Count Bernadette, the political Zionist terrorist groups rampaged through Palestine killing as many Palestinians as they could and promising to kill those who did not leave. Thus, the 1948 exodus of Palestinians from their homes which resulted in, to date, several generations of Palestinians living in what were intended to be temporary refugee camps when they were establish by the U.N. in Palestine and neighboring nations.
Count Bernadette had been tasked by the U.N. Security Council with mediating a peaceful equitable division of Palestine so that the political Zionists would be granted an equitable portion of Palestine for a Jewish only nation. However there was nothing equitable about it nor about the deceit that perpetrated the division effort. Taking a portion of Palestine and displacing the Palestinians who lived there was an ideological political plan that arose long before WWII. In fact it's early roots were back in the 1830s - in Europe. Yet, if the political Zionists' hasbara which differs from fact, is to be believed, partitioning the land had everything to do with WWII and nothing else. That apparent contradiction is an example of a red flag which indicates a problem with facts not agreeing. As is usually the case regarding contradiction, it arises based on omitted pertinent facts. And upon investigation, ordinarily the red flag contradictions will expose a twisted truth and/or an actual lie i.e. intended as disinformation in both cases.
But there was a plan to partition Palestine long before WWII started. The inhabitants of Palestine had been promised by the allied nations of WWI that if Palestine supported them against the Turkish, the allies would support Palestine in becoming a nation with the Ottoman Empire's dissolution after the war. It was the same promise extended to other areas in the region of what, at that time, were also part of the Turkish Ottoman Empire with whom the allied nations were at war during WWI.
The allies reneged ONLY on their promise to the Palestinians. Because, there had been a clandestine agreement between the British and the political Zionist leadership to give some of Palestine to the political Zionists for a "Jewish only" nation intended to become modern "Israel". In actuality, the clandestine promise was made to those who embraced the irreligious political ideology of Zionism, those whose primary strategy was to use and abuse the religion of Judaism by any means they deemed necessary, for the purpose of appropriating all of Palestine, eventually, to be peopled ONLY by those who claimed to be Jewish (religion) no matter their ethnicity or their nation of origin.
Demonstrably, though as with most promises from the ideological political Zionists, it was nothing more than hot air, a twisted truth, a contradictory double standard promise, and remains so to this day. Consider that African Jews who emigrated to Israel have been viciously discriminated against rather than welcomed. So too non-Jewish workers from other nations living in Israel temporarily, when they want to stay permanently. Even so no other groups are victimized to the extent of Palestinians in Israeli Occupied Palestinian Territory (oPt)
Worse, Palestinians who live in oPt, as if imprisoned - especially Muslim Palestinians - have always been deemed by political Zionists to be cannon fodder. Of course the government of Israel has little trepidation about also targeting Palestinian Christians, but most actively targets populations and cities that are predominately Muslim. With Israel's "blessing" the illegal settlers target the cities, villages, and rural areas, both Muslim and Christian, when the Israeli military is not tasked to target them.
What the settlers and soldiers do to Palestinians and their land is completely unconscionable. The facts are presented in the Russell Tribunal on Palestine, and by many journalists. The facts have the capacity to make one feel ill in a number of ways, simply reading about them, and/or listening to people who know about them and/or who have directly experienced the crimes, and lived to tell about the abuse, torture, and violence. Those same crimes have been perpetrated on Palestinian children and young adults who are imprisoned in Israeli prisons for no reason except that they were kidnapped by settlers or the Israeli military - and survived to tell about it.
What is my purpose in wanting people to be informed? Well there are several reasons, all equally important. The first is that nations signatory to the Geneva Conventions have agreed to abide by them. However, because the government of Israel does not abide by the agreements to which it is signatory, an entire nation of Palestinian people has been victimized by a decades long genocide that was started by a highly organized group of terrorists who wanted the land indigenous Palestinians (of all religions) lived on - but without Palestinians living on the land it wanted to appropriate. As a result there has been a systematically committed genocide on the population of non-Jewish Palestinian people in oPt for over half a century. All the other reasons people should be informed, become informed, and stay informed about the issues are associated with that reason.
Secondly, followers of the political ideology of Zionism are using and abusing the religion of Judaism, thus it's adherents, in claiming all its illegal actions are in support of Judaism and Jews, thus inferring they are condoned by the religion of Judaism. However, none of the crimes committed by the ideological political Zionist government of Israel are condoned by Judaism. Jewish folks are increasingly recognizing that as a problem and refusing to support Israel's crimes. The situation is little different than the current one that people know more about because it is in the news regularly, that of crimes being committed by the irreligious ideological political terrorists who claim to do what they do in support of Islam, and that it is condoned by Islam, although none of the crimes they commit are condoned by Islam. Different perpetrators of evil - in name only - but not in spirit of ill-intent.
Thirdly, Christians worldwide who support the actions of the political Zionist government of Israel are complicit with the ideology of political Zionists when they try to persuade the government's of their nations to support the vicious illegal genocide of the political Zionist government of Israel. Apparently their support is based on some sort of man-made theology unique to several Christian denominations. It has been a major problem in the U.S.A. for decades and remains one that is perpetrated by lobbies in the U.S. which illegally represent the foreign nation of Israel and it's political desires, to our U.S. Congress.
Foreign lobbies are illegal. But, the Israel lobbies, collectively, are constantly pressuring Congress, by any means they can, to do Israel's bidding . . . to do what is right for Israel even when it is wrong for our nation i.e. those folks in Congress are known as "Israel firsters". People used to imagine most of those "Israel First" folks were Jewish. But such is not the case. With Israel firsters, who are predominately Christian, populating our Congress, it is no mystery that we witness an increasingly bold use of religious reasoning being offered up for the domestic choices made for our nation; nor a mystery that religious reasons are used when the "Firsters" want to persuade other members of Congress - as if doing so does not push beyond the limits of our so-called "church and state" constitutional clause.
The various Israeli lobbies collectively pressure Congress to provide increasingly more military aid to Israel through 10 year memorandums of understanding (mou). There is a requested increase from the most recent $30+ Billion mou, to over $45+ Billion for a subsequent 10 year mou. The lobbies make a stink about everything Israel wants from Congress that it doesn't get, but will grudgingly acquiesce about many items on their shopping list to Congress, when our government continues to provide and increase military aid. But just think about and imagine the benefits that over $45 Billion could provide towards creating a truly equitable system of both health care and higher education for our own nation of people.
Fourthly, the U.S.A. is the staunched military materiel supporter of the political Zionist regime which makes it complicit in the genocide against Palestinians living in oPt; which also makes it complicit in the appropriating of increasingly more oPt land by the political Zionist regime of Israel. The question arises how my nation could support a regime which blatantly purports exclusivity for people of a specified religion, at the cost of displacement of those not of the specified religion who are criminally persecuted, even unto death, for not being of the specified religion. My nation certainly makes a human rights issues out of that type of situation when other nations violate. So why does it enable and condone Israel's human rights violations? It's another red flag double-standard contradiction that has no adequate justification.
Besides the crimes being wrong by anyone's standards, there are also Geneva Conventions which outline how an occupied people must be treated and cannot be treated. Israel violently and illegally violates them. Given U.S. laws, thus the intended mind-set of our nation which prevents religion and government from abusing one another and from abusing the citizenry in the name of religion, I ask, again, how is it the U.S.A. is so willing to staunchly support Israel's violent and illegal crimes which Israel purports are in the name of the specified religion of Judaism? But that is a topic for another time. It is also a question we, the people, all need to be asking our elected and appointed folks in government who are supposed to be representing our wishes about what is best for our nation.
Do I seem angry? Well, of course I am, and have felt highly infuriated and outraged about the problem for several decades once I started making an effort to objectively learn why the reported news simply did not add up but instead came across as being contradictory. That started for me shortly before the war of many names started i.e. the Six Days war, the June War, the War of 1967, 1967 Arab–Israeli War,Third Arab–Israeli War started. That was shortly before the end of the third quarter of my freshman year in college.
Pursuit of answers to the contradictions started for me because of a news article a fellow student had written about the pending war based on a letter from his mother in Jordan telling him the war would soon start. He asked me to type it for him because he could not type. When I asked how he knew there would be a war he insisted, absolutely insisted that I read the letter his mother had sent which spoke of the inevitable war. When the war did start several days after the article was published in our college newspaper, the mainstream news reports on t.v., radio, and newspapers were aghast about it having been so unexpected. Yet, I knew it was going to happen because someone who lived in the area knew it, and said so. That seeming paradox was a huge incongruous contradiction I could not ignore which also included a dimension of concern about controlled news, thus freedom of our press.
I started to learn the history associated with that contradiction, and became determined to continue investigating until I found some valid answers to the nature of the increasingly more unconscionable contradictions I was happening upon, as I learned more. The problems became abundantly clear. I happened upon so many cause and effect facts that differed from what the news reported. I was astounded, of course. I am still astounded by the blatant misleading information from news reports - a large amount of it being due to the problem of omission of pertinent facts which in turn leads to twisted truth "analysis" that places blame on Palestinians when it is actually the political Zionists who are persecuting the Palestinians. News reports have been presented that way for decades. It is always a celebration when there is actual news coverage.
Here is my fifth, final, and larger reason for wanting people to become informed. The problem of political Zionism actually has been increasingly threatening world peace for several decades. To learn about the problem of the ideology of political Zionism as demonstrated by it's ongoing genocidal intent towards Palestinians in oPt, is to understand how and why that is fact.
So even though I would like to imagine that people remember, if not the several genocidal attacks on Gaza, at least the most recent one; that people are willing to speak up about not being willing to tolerate such actions - I know this is not the case. Even though I would like to imagine that people know enough basic history to be aware of the illegality of the occupation of the Palestinian land and people, by the political Zionist regime of Israel, I know this is not the case.
But I do want to believe that decent people everywhere are not willing to tolerate what the article presents about the Russell Tribunal on Palestine, and what the video within the article exemplifies. Perhaps, most importantly, what I want to point out is that the responsible Palestinian population has long chosen to "fight" a self-declared nemesis, non-violently. That nemesis is the war declared on Palestinians by the political Zionist regime simply because Palestinians live on land Israel wants to claim for Israel, as a nation where only Jews are welcome to live permanently and be treated decently.
Why does it seem the problem of ideological political Zionism comes from being stuck in the mentality of WWII which other nations have transcended, relegating it to sorrowful history? Yet Israel seems stuck in perpetrating the same kind of problems, with the same intent of exclusivity and privileged arrogance that was a hallmark of the Nazi regime. An end must be put to the type of criminal behavior such problems foster.
The Russell Tribunal on Palestine is a world-wide non-violent effort to put an end to the problem. The only other non-violent means available in which everyone can participate is the boycott, divestment, and sanction (BDS) of Israel, using the model that was applied to South Africa. The worldwide effort applied to South Africa eventually gained enough support to do what needed to be done, and what it was intended to do. It caused the replacement of a corrupt racist government that excluded and attacked indigenous people by creating laws to manifest circumstances intended to keep the indigenous population disadvantaged and discriminated against, increasingly so by depriving them of decent living conditions, education, work. Yet, many South African folks who lived through those change say conditions are worse for the indigenous Palestinians (of all religions) than they were for indigenous South Africans.
I want to believe that decent people everywhere are not willing to tolerate the type of criminality exemplified in the article, the video, and the tribunal. I also know that most people are not able to make time in their lives to do on-going thorough and objective academic research about the problems created by the ideology of political Zionism. Therefore, I also believe BDS is necessary, and have been advocating since the early 90s, for decent people everywhere to support and advocate for BDS as the most effective non-violent way in which everyone can participate to put an end to the problems created by the political Zionist regime of Israel.
Israel's political Zionist regime not only victimizes Palestinians with it's genocidal intent, but also increasingly threatens world peace, primarily by persuading other nations to become embroiled in it's contrived battles against the neighboring nations - the nations the political Zionist regime considers to be threatening to Israel. As it happens those nations are all the nearby nations which happen to be predominately Muslim; and which, like Israel, do not legally insure that religion and government will be prevented from having an untoward effect on one another and thus on their nations' populations.
The nature of the government in the predominately Muslim nations is a different topic than the one treated here. However, none of those nations would have had reason to be a threat to Israel had Israel not become threatening to them because of trying to expand the territory that political Zionist terrorist groups seized in 1948, then declared to be the nation of Israel. Additional territory was again seized from neighboring nations in subsequent altercations in the following decades by the political Zionist government; a government which was peopled by the same folks who had comprised the terrorist organizations that rampaged through Palestine killing Palestinians in 1948, then declared Israel to be a nation.
In actuality one of the worst problems perpetrated by the ideology of political Zionism is that it makes war on religion. Do not be fooled into imagining the ideology has not also been perpetrating a war on Judaism. As previously stated, above, it has, does, and continues to do so simply because it blames Judaism for all of it's criminal actions by suggesting the crimes are condoned by and for the benefit of Judaism. The ideology has also clearly declared war on Islam, primarily because it is the predominate religion of the nations in that region. It has less clearly declared war on Christianity, perhaps even less clearly than on Judaism because most of it's manipulations have been aimed at evincing the support of Christians, particularly Christians who serve in government in America.
The effort of Israel's illegal U.S. lobbies is a more twisted, convoluted tale of political Zionist deceit, than what has already been mentioned above, and also a topic for another discussion at another time. For those who have a further interest, Cynthia McKinney who represented Georgia in the House of Representative is one of those folks who had the integrity and scruples to not bow down to the pressure of Israel's lobbies. She is also willing to talk about what that did to her career in Congress - "courtesy" of Israel's U.S. lobbies. The same has happened to the careers of many other folks in Congress for not doing the bidding of the moneyed Israeli lobbies.
So what is my own "end game"? World peace? Yes, or course. But also what is necessary to lead to it, that being educating ourselves and doing what we can to understand the issues; for example paying attention to the goings on of the Russell Tribunal on Palestine; and supporting the BDS effort.
One of the largest contributors to preventing world peace, increasingly for over half a century, is the self-declared nation of Israel, conceived in greed and dedicated by the adherents of the ideology of political Zionism, to the genocide of Palestinians. If the crimes committed by Israel, as demonstrated and documented in the article, it's video, and the Russell Tribunal, are not enough to convince decent people to actively support BDS, then I encourage making a personal objective effort to learn history. Of course I always encourage personal research anyway, but also understand the time constraints of life. There are many more articles and videos about the problems by journalists of the highest integrity, a large percentage of whom are Palestinian. What they say is an excellent way to start recognizing the myriad of contradictions that exist in the differences between what are essentially documentary accounts, and what the reported news to which we are exposed, reports inaccurately often because of what it neglects to report.
I learned, early on, in researching this topic that any contradictions to be found will dictate the direction and extent of research needed. And there will be contradictions at every turn, and it will demand a lot of time and effort to do the research. But even if you doubt that the political Zionist regime of Israel is THE complex problem it actually has become, before or instead of doing your own research, I am requesting that people consider supporting BDS simply because it is clear that the attacks by Israel on Gaza are the type of attacks that can not and should not be tolerated by anyone, no matter the nation that perpetrates them, no matter who the people that are being targeted.
Supporting BDS is support for a non-violent effort that is intended to stop Israel from continuing to violate UN treaties to which it is signatory, thus intended to stop Israel from continuing to commit genocide on the Palestinian people in oPt. The treaties were formulated for the purpose of preventing the type of genocide that was a hallmark of WWII. To ignore them and allow repeated instances of genocide is an indicator that people have not learned the lessons of WWI and WWII. And when we ignore and refuse to learn the lessons of history then we repeat them.
Please join decent folks worldwide in learning about and supporting the non-violent BDS effort. The only people who do not consider it a realistic, peaceful, and viable solution to a deadly problem, are the ideological political Zionists who the government of Israel represents.
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note: There are indications (i.e. "from the Nile to the Tigris-Euphrates" as carved in stone above the entrance to the Knesset) that the ideology of political Zionism, considers itself the representative of ancient Israel . . . also Judea (there having been irreconcilable differences within historic ancient Israel that caused a split into two nations). The nations existed only for a relatively short period of time in history. Yet the nation of Israel has chosen to recreate and embrace an attitude of personal injury in the form of an "eye for eye, tooth for a tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot" as a political and territorial grudge against an ancient Babylon Empire that no longer exists, either, except in history. That period of time was long before either Christianity or Islam existed. It can also be pointed out that the primarily civil Babylonian Code of Hammurabi was apparently used as a model for what is the later primarily religious Hebrew law. But which was first is a topic of discussion for another time given that some consider it debatable.
