UN MUST ACT TO HALT GAZA VIOLENCE: ERDOGAN
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey has called on the UN and Muslim countries to halt the Israeli military offensive against the Palestinians in Gaza. Turkey, said Erdogan, will support any UN initiative to end the violence. “We invite every state and every institution, regardless of their faith and origin, to act as soon as possible against Israel’s attacks,” Erdogan said in a televised address. The Turkish leader has also spoken with Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani about the escalation between Israel and Palestine. Bilateral ties were also discussed. The former Prime Minister of Malaysia, Dr Mahathir Mohamad, shared a post on Twitter in which he said that he too has had a phone discussion with Erdogan about the situation in occupied Palestine.
Turkey has also called for an international force to protect the Palestinians, as Israel’s military offensive against the Gaza Strip remains ongoing. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu on May 16 told delegates at an emergency meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) that, “These efforts should also include physical protection through forming an international protection force with military and financial contributions of willing countries.”
‘ISRAEL COMMITS CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY’: JEWISH SCHOLAR
A prominent American-Jewish political scientist and activist, in an interview with Anadolu Agency, said Israel does not only commit war crimes, but also commits crimes against humanity, which are “among the most awful crimes”. Referring to a report by Human Rights Watch (HRW) on April 27, A Threshold Crossed: Israeli Authorities and the Crimes Apartheid and Persecution, Norman Finkelstein said that apart from committing war crimes and crimes against humanity, Israel recurrently declared that it would not withdraw from the occupied Palestinian territories, which is considered illegal annexation under international law.
“If it is an illegal annexation, Israelis have no right whatsoever in East Jerusalem. They have no rights whatsoever in Gaza. Let me emphasise it, they have no rights of self-defence. They have only one right: They have the right to pack up their bags and leave (Palestine),” he noted. Finkelstein stressed that the recent escalation in East Jerusalem and Gaza should be understood as part of Israel’s long-term, systematic, and planned efforts and history of stealing Palestinian lands, which could be traced back to even before the establishment of Israel in 1948.
ISRAEL COMMITTING WAR CRIMES IN GAZA: B’TSELEM
An Israeli human rights group on May 15 accused Israel of committing “war crimes” in the Gaza Strip and demanded that the international community intervene. “The international community must step in immediately and use its leverage to force Israel to change its policy before it claims even more victims,” B’Tselem said in a statement. It said that since 2014, Israel “has not wreaked this level of destruction on the blockaded Gaza Strip,” in reference to ongoing attacks on Gaza. The group reiterated that Gaza is experiencing a humanitarian crisis because of a 14-year Israeli blockade imposed on the 2 million residents in Gaza.
AUSTRALIAN POLITICIANS CONDEMN ISRAELI AGGRESSION
A number of Australian politicians have boldly spoken against the eviction of Palestinians from their homes in Sheikh Jarrah, attacks on Muslim worshippers during Ramadan in Aqsa Mosque and the brutal bombardment of Gaza by Israel levelling three high rise residential towers killing more than 200 civilians, including almost 59 children and 35 women, and rendering almost 500 injured. “Israel’s violations of international human rights and humanitarian law, attempts to change facts on the ground must be condemned. This includes the discriminatory acts of violence, including the disproportionately high number of deaths amongst children,” Senator Janet Rice, Mr Ken O’Dowd MP and Ms Maria Vamvakinou MP said in a statement.
IRAQI MP URGES GOVT TO CUT TIES WITH NORMALISATION STATES
Iraqi MP Hassan Salem on May 16 called for the government in Baghdad to cut ties with the Gulf States that have signed normalisation deals with Israel, namely the UAE and Bahrain. He added Saudi Arabia into the mix as well, as it is known to have unofficial links with the occupation state. The MP stressed the need for the Iraqi government to move beyond false political courtesies with these “treacherous regimes” that were the right arm of the Zionist entity in killing people in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, and, most recently, Palestine. “They support the terrorist Zionist entity which has committed massacres of children, the elderly and women.”
ITALIAN WORKERS REFUSE TO LOAD ARMS SHIPMENT TO ISRAEL
Italian workers in the port of Livorno have refused to load a shipment of arms destined for Israel, a report said on May 17. “The port of Livorno will not be an accomplice in the massacre of the Palestinian people,” said L’Unione Sindacale di Base, an Italian trade union of port workers. According to Wafa news agency, it was a report by The Weapon Watch, a Genoa-based NGO that monitors arms shipments in European and Mediterranean ports, which tipped off the union about the destination of the ship in question and its cargo. The union pointed out that the shipment contained “weapons and explosives that will serve to kill the Palestinian population, already hit by a severe attack this very night, which caused hundreds of civilian casualties, including many children.” It added that it is organising an event in solidarity with the Palestinians and to call for an immediate end to the Israeli raids on Gaza and the confiscation of Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem.
‘OUR ARMY IS A TERRORIST OUTFIT RUN BY WAR CRIMINALS’
A former Israeli Air Force pilot, Yonatan Shapira, has described the Israeli government and army as “terrorist organisations” run by “war criminals.” Captain Shapira who had resigned from the Israeli army in 2003 at the height of the Palestinian Second Intifada explained in an exclusive interview with Anadolu News Agency why he realised after joining the army that he was “part of a terrorist organisation”. I realised during the Second Intifada what the Israeli Air Force and Israeli military are doing are war crimes, terrorising a population of millions of Palestinians. When I realised that, I decided to not just leave but to organise other pilots that will publicly refuse to take part in these crimes, he said. His campaign has led 27 other army pilots to be discharged from their posts in the Israeli Air Force since 2003.
MUSLIM WOMEN IN FRANCE ARE A TARGETED LOT
Emmanuel Macron’s La Republique en Marche party barred a headscarf-wearing Muslim woman from running in a local election after she appeared in a campaign flyer photograph, even though French law does not prohibit the wearing of the hijab or other religious symbols on such flyers. The party claimed that “in secular France, there should be no place for the overt display of religious symbols on electoral campaign documents.” Eighty-one per cent of Muslim high school students think the current laws on laïcité (secularism) are Islamophobic.
INDONESIA: MAN TEACHES QUR’ĀN WEARING CLOWN GARB
Yahya believes teaching in clown costume more effective as children become eager to learn, memorise lesson faster. He teaches the Qur’ān to children at an orphanage near his home in Tangerang, the third-largest city in the Greater Jakarta metropolitan area. He discovered this unique method while teaching the Qur’ān at the Darussalam An-Nur orphanage, where he has been working for the past 13 years. “It is been 11 years since I started dressing up as a clown and teaching the Qur’ān in a fun way,” said Yahya, 38, who is wearing in an Islamic white hat and a blue and yellow dotted dungaree.